Chapter Text
-Spring-
Toshinori is already dying when he finally admits to Shouta how he feels, even knowing that his coworkers and most treasured friends are in some sort of relationship. They do everything together and seem to know each other frontwards and back. It’s sweet to see, but leaves Toshinori with a pang of mutual want and sadness. He missed his chance to be loved like that, but he has to say something. He doesn’t want pity, but maybe they’ll indulge him just a little, let him pretend someone loves him in a real way.
He’s expecting his friends to be a bit softer with him maybe, hoping again that they won’t be angry that he feels this way. He can’t help falling in love, even if he is on the way out and he’s in love with a taken man. He’s not expecting anything, really. He just needs it out, has to try before he dies. He doesn’t cry, but his hands shake when he tells Shouta on the end of an apology for keeping him so late that he’s had feelings for him for a while. That they don’t need to do anything, he just wanted him to know. He even manages to confess to hoping that maybe they’d include him in their lives a little more, even platonically.
He’s not expecting Shouta to break completely, right there in the staff room with Hizashi casually grading papers at the small table off to the side of the room. Shouta’s breathing is ragged and Toshinori doesn’t know what the look he’s given even means. He doesn’t know what to do to comfort him when the smaller man crumbles at his feet and looks to Hizashi for help. Toshinori finds him with a hand over his mouth and tears welling in those violently green eyes. Toshinori’s hand goes to Shouta’s hair, long bony fingers threading through the slightly greasy strands and feeling the man practically convulse under his touch. He shudders himself when the man leans into his touch and looks up through long dark lashes.
He doesn’t realize that the man at his feet has loved him for years. At least since he officially retired from hero work, probably before. Or how many times he and Hizashi had talked “what if’s” and “somedays” for when the time was right to tell him, to offer him whatever he might be amenable to. Toshinori doesn’t know how sweet and how cruel his admission is for both of them. He nearly jumps out of his skin when Shouta rises abruptly and activates his quirk, eyes red and puffy despite the sparseness of the tears streaking his face, just in time for a sob rivaling one of his protégés to break through the hands clamped over the voice hero’s mouth.
Toshinori watches quietly, sitting where he stood when he realizes a bit late that his legs are about to buckle as the last of his adrenaline fizzles out. He hears Shouta softly shushing his partner, speaking slow in hushed tones. That must work because when he looks over, the two across the room begin to settle, Shouta taking a few steps forward until their foreheads are touching. Sobs transition to sniffles, and then to quiet whispers between them. Lips brush as they speak and Toshinori makes his way toward the door, trying to quietly excuse himself when he’s hit with a coughing fit that has his vision swimming and ears ringing.
The other men move almost as one as they haul him up to guide him to the well worn couch a few feet away, pressing a palmful of tissues into one hand and a bottle of water into the other. Their voices are soft, soothing. They sit with a hand on each of his bony shoulders. Hizashi’s thumb rubs gentle circles there as Toshinori takes wet, shuddering breaths, hacking into the tissues Shouta shoves at him until he can finally catch his breath. Their hands fall away when he collapses back into the cushions, closing his eyes and just breathing for a minute. He can feel eyes on him even with his eyes closed, and he wants to tell them he’s okay, but trying earns him another harsh cough. They don’t speak to him until his breathing is its usual steady click and wheeze, content to just wait with him.
“How long?” Shouta asks so quietly that Toshinori has to hold his breath to hear the man.
It takes a minute for the meaning behind the words to sink in. He hasn’t actually told any of them he’s dying. Not even young Midoriya. But he knows that the other two heroes are sharp, and it’s probably pretty obvious to anyone who isn’t fighting not to believe it. They’ve seen death before and they know it’s fast approaching, ready to pull him under. His voice catches in his throat and he lets his eyes fall shut again as he struggles to force the words out.
“The longest estimate has been about a year.” He wants to run, wants to mask his emotions behind All Might’s smile, but he can’t seem to hide in front of the two men beside him.
Weight shifts on his right and warm air puffs across his jaw. He finds himself turning into it unconsciously, eyes fluttering open in time to catch the most intense expression he’s ever seen in the erasure hero’s eyes before they’re closing and warm, slightly chapped lips are over his own. He exhales into the kiss like he’s been punched in the gut, eyes falling shut without his consent. Suddenly, there’s nothing else but the feeling of those lips on his, tongue licking in gently, hot breath coming in heavy pants. His lung burns in a plea for oxygen, but he’ll gladly let the man over him steal his last breath if it means he doesn’t have to let go of this feeling.
When they pull away, Toshinori wants to feel shame. He was just kissing a man in front of his- boyfriend? Partner? Something- after all. But when he turns to apologize to Hizashi, the expression on the man’s face is so blindingly joyful that he forgets to breathe for a beat. The younger blonde opens his mouth only to close it again, overwhelmed and speechless. Toshinori fights the urge to chuckle at he thought of the loud, enthusiastic voice hero being speechless. His smile is wide and bright, voice thick with emotion when he does speaks.
“A year, huh? That looked like one hell of a way to make up for lost time.” His laugh is rich and booming, his usual self coming to the surface even as his hands tug one of Shouta’s over and clasp Toshinori’s around it.
And just like the melting snow gives way to spring, Toshinori let’s the warmth in his chest bloom and the best months of his life begin.
-Summer-
Hizashi can’t stop himself from getting emotional when his best friend and lover falls at Toshinori’s feet, overwhelmed. He can’t help it when he thinks of watching for so long as the love of his life fell hard for the the man being crushed beneath the weight that is being the Symbol of Peace. How for the three years following USJ, his gut would twist with an unfamiliar ache whenever he watched the way Shouta looked at the other man.
It took far too long for him to catch on that Sho was falling and he was okay with it. And even longer to bring up the idea of sharing his partner with the older man. There were reservations for them both at first, but those don’t matter anymore. Not now, after watching the two of them want for one another for so long.
As they kiss beside him, all he feels is overwhelming compersion, joy from seeing his partner so happy. Toshinori sounds as though he might stop breathing, and Shouta whines into the kiss like it might be the last one he ever gets. Hizashi only smiles, makes a joke when they separate. There isn’t room for jealousy or insecurity, anything else but love in the limited time they have left.
They go home to the staff apartment Hizashi and Shouta share that night and talk, the three of them. Toshinori doesn’t leave again, other than to get things from his apartment over the weeks. Shouta wants every stolen second he can get and Toshinori is helpless to deny him anything. Hizashi isn’t willing to take that from him. From either of them. Lord knows Toshinori deserves this, and his heart swells the first time he walks in on the two of them necking on the couch like horny teenagers.
Hizashi sees their love like a heatwave in summer. Fierce and unrelenting and full of long sweaty nights. He hangs back a little in favor of watching them try to make up for a lifetime of missed opportunity. The way they love leaves him breathless in a way he hasn’t been since Oboro. He memorizes every touch, every expression. Takes way too many pictures. He needs them both to remember this when Toshinori is dead and buried and the rest of the world has moved on, not acknowledging anything but All Might’s legacy. They need proof of who he is now for when the world forgets.
Hizashi won’t ever forget the night he lays awake in bed beside them while they make love and his eyes lock with Toshinori’s for a moment. That’s all it takes. Watching Toshinori be loved by Shouta, intoxicated by the pleasure of it, does something to the last of his resolve and he feels it too finally. Deep, all-consuming need. And under that, love too intense to properly acknowledge. He lets himself be swept up in the whirlwind relationship.
It’s the three of them then, inseparable. They share lunch hours and late nights grading. When Toshi’s too exhausted Hizashi and Shouta split his grading for him. People at work start to notice how the three interact as they grow bold, sneaking kisses in the staff room, sitting pressed close on the sofa while Nemuri chatters to them about whatever new project she’s taken on.
At the graduation ceremony of Toshinori’s first class, he doesn’t even try to hide it. Kisses them both openly. Wipes away Toshinori’s tears when Izuku Midoriya is officially a graduate, officially a pro hero who can carry his legacy. They all are. The only class to be taught by All Might. He tries not to notice how the other man’s smile feels hollow after that. He knows what’s coming.
Shouta does, too.
-Fall-
At graduation Shouta sees the way Toshinori’s face drops. He watches tightly wound muscles come loose in a rush. He knows the exact moment the man comes to the conclusion that everyone will be okay when he’s gone. The second Toshinori gives himself permission to start letting go.
He wants to be angry at the man. He wants to tell him he can’t give up. That he wouldn’t be okay. He wants to scream at the man until he agrees never to die, never to leave. But that’s not fair to the man the world owes so much to, the man he loves so much he’s willing to be here even through the worst moments he’s likely to ever see as he watches Toshinori slowly slip away. Instead, he takes one big hand in his own and squeezes.
“Let’s go home, huh?” His voice comes out thick and a bit raw but he lets his lovers think its from watching his kids finally reach their goal and not because he feels like his chest is caving in.
Shouta spends the rest of his summer with Hizashi and Toshinori, electing to take time off from even hero work. He holds them close. He makes love to them like each time is the last. He does everything he can to show Toshinori how precious he is and does his best to give him the best year of his life. He needs the man to know his value beyond his hero persona, even if for a short while.
So they go on short little coffee dates to Shouta’s favorite cat cafe, Toshi sipping slowly on his herbal tea while Hizashi yammers on enthusiastically and Shouta tries to beat his record for how many cats he can attract. They both watch him offer soft tired smiles, still so bright even as his strength seems to be deteriorating. He wheels himself and his oxygen through the record store Hizashi likes, choosing a collection of records he won’t let either of them see, only promising “Later.”
Fall comes faster than any of them like, the realization that Toshinori doesn’t have too much longer rolling in and clinging to them like early morning fog. He feels a cold knot settle in his stomach at the thought of losing him. So instead of dealing with his feelings, Shouta shoves them down and invites him out to Toshi’s favorite park. He pushes the man in his chair at a lazy pace, really taking in the trees and the crisp fresh air.
They stop for a while and just admire the scenery, and Shouta lets the hiss of Toshinori’s oxygen soothe him as they just sit together. Even in the wheelchair, the trip seems to exhaust the older man and Shouta watches him fight drowsiness for a couple minutes before he turns to him. Cupping his bony jaw in his hands, Shouta presses a soft kiss to his dry lips. “Hey, ready to go home?” The older man gives him a sleepy nod and that soft sweet smile. He sleeps the whole way back.
They pretend it isn’t happening, but Toshinori doesn’t leave home again.
Things move quickly after that. Their lover grows weaker and weaker by the day. By November, they’ve got a hospital bed in the living room of their apartment. Izuku stops in to see his mentor and has to be dragged out while Hizashi quiets Toshinori, gently washing away the blood he’s spewed all over himself trying to console the distraught young man.
He’s not ready, no one who knows this man truly could be, and Shouta tells him as much through grit teeth. Izuku nods through his tears and launches himself at his former teacher. Shouta holds the kid through it because he knows Toshinori would want that. The kid is his responsibility now.
Former and current students come and go for a few days. Shouta hates it, but Toshinori lights up when he sees them, so he allows it. Izuku comes back when the man is asleep, which is most of the time lately, to avoid making a scene and upsetting him again. Shouta spends hours curled up in that hospital bed just petting his limp stringy bangs back, memorizing everything he can about the man.
When Toshinori stops taking feedings, Shouta stops eating, too. Hizashi can’t get him to leave the room for more than a few minutes. He knows this isn’t fair to his lovers. If Toshinori knew, he’d be worried and angry and Hizashi is obviously struggling too. But he just can’t manage anymore. He has to be there and ready to give his full attention for every brief moment of wakeful lucidity the older man manages.
The shallow rattling in Toshinori’s lung starts the next day. Toshinori wakes every few hours, telling them in a panic that his chest feels heavy, clinging to them both weakly until the meds drag him under again. Shouta feels his blood turn to ice every time, ragged tearless sobs ripping out of him when the older man is asleep again and Hizashi has gathered him up.
He wants it to be him. He needs it to be him. Hizashi and Toshinori would be fine without him. They’d cope and they’d each be the bright spirit the other needs. He’s much more deserving of this slow suffocating death. He’s done a lot less good and gotten a lot more out of life. Toshinori deserves more fucking time.
Shouta leans over him, petting his hollow face, listening to his chest rattle with fluid. He doesn’t realize he’s crying until a big shaky hand comes up to brush a tear from his face and falls back to the cool sheets. Toshinori’s eyes are half closed and tears slide down the sides of his sharp face and into his hair.
“It’s okay. I’m here.” His voice is weak and thick with fluid and emotion. He coughs, a sick wet sound, and Shouta can hear the slow burble of liquid before it trickles from his mouth and nose. The next thing he remembers is Hizashi dragging him away from a gasping, choking Toshinori. Begging him not to look. Trying his best to console both men and get Nemuri there because he can’t watch them both. Shouta’s hands are bloody and he feels a bit lightheaded, but he can’t really focus over Toshinori’s gurgling breath.
It takes a long time to get Toshinori calm again after Midnight drags him out of the man’s line of sight. He watches Hizashi gently suction his mouth and nose, administer his pain meds, smooth his hair back. Toshinori tips his head slightly and Hizashi beams down at him, pressing lips to his in a brief kiss, then he waves Shouta over.
“The morphine is making him sleepy. He wants a goodnight kiss.” Hizashi explains with the softest smile Shouta has ever seen. It looks wrong on his face. Wrong for what he’s saying. Not goodnight but goodbye. He knows.
Shouta comes around to sit on the bed, eyes meeting Toshinori’s. His face is sunken and pale. His eyes are dull and heavily lidded. But he looks so happy. So content. Long fingers thread through Shouta’s hair and pull him in for brief kiss, barely a brush of lips, but it’s the most intense kiss he’s ever felt. When he pulls back, Toshinori doesn’t open his eyes.
“Shou. ‘Zashi. Stay while I sleep?” His voice is barely a whisper and they strain to hear over the man’s own ragged breaths.
“As long as you need.” Is Hizashi’s instant reply.
They lay back on either side of the man, arms wrapped around his abdomen gently. Hizashi chats softly. He’s trying to be distracting, soothing. It works. Shouta falls asleep pressed flush against Toshinori, fingers twined with Hizashi’s on the other man’s belly.
There they sleep, curled into each other under Midnight’s watchful eye.
-Winter-
Winter comes early for Toshinori.
He doesn’t want it to be over yet. He hasn’t had enough time with them. It could never be enough time when he’s with two people he adores, cherishes so deeply. And he has to admit this is the way to go. He’s cold, but that only makes the bodies on either side of him even more comforting. So, with the two people he loves curled around him in peaceful sleep, he can stop fighting.
Finally. They’re going to be okay.
He can rest.
November snow falls through the city, the entire world eerily quiet as Hizashi wakes to find that in their quiet little home of three, only he and Shouta are left. Nemuri must have stepped out. He intends to just stroke the man’s hair and wait for Shouta to wake, but Toshinori’s phone rings. He answers softly, but the howl of anguish on the other end shakes loose his own tears.
He’s not sure how the boy knows. Maybe Nemuri? Maybe he can feel it. They, he and Shouta, know about One For All and how it works. The man explained it at the start of all this, hoping they could continue to aid his successor should he need it.
Hizashi tries to calm him, tries to soothe the boy through his own pain, but he can’t focus on the call or his partner with the overwhelming rush of grief that overtakes him when Izuku sons out something unintelligible. He lets out an involuntary wail and succumbs to the violent anguish. The house vibrates violently and then Shouta reaches over and takes the phone from him, quirk activated. Faintly, he feels his quirk being erased and gives himself over, trusting Shouta to take over for him.
Shouta answers the crying man on the other line with a grunt.
“Midoriya-“
His voice cracks, the strain of emotion and trying to keep Hizashi from leveling the building keep him from saying anything more.
On the other line, the sobbing intensifies when Shouta’s voice breaks. It should be raining, the man thinks absently, trying to drown out the sounds of sobbing around him. The snow’s too pretty, too pure for a day like this. Then again, Toshinori is too. Was, too.
Shouta feels the anger build as his dry eyes ache. He lets it dull the overwhelming grief as he watches his partner sobbing into the cold chest of the man they managed to have forever with.
He wonders where Nemuri could be. She was meant to stay so this didn’t happen. Or maybe she woke Hizashi, but they hadn’t woken him? And how did Midoriya know so quickly? Did everyone know before him?
He can’t. He hangs up without a word as Hizashi finally starts to get himself together.
Hizashi’s crying slows for long enough to pull the dark haired man to him, dragging him over the body still in their bed. His grip is painful and Shouta lets himself focus on the physical pain, hopes it will take the edge off the emptiness in chis chest that’s already leaving him gasping. His eyes fall shut, hoping Hizashi can keep control of his quirk because his eyes ache and he feels hollow.
He doesn’t know how long they stay like that, just grieving together before Nemuri comes back, having already made arrangements for the man to be moved. Then she’s gently coaxing them out of the cramped hospital bed and into their bedroom while he is taken from their apartment.
They’re all relieved that the funeral home was given written instruction from the man himself. Of course Toshinori would take the burden from them all, trying to ease the suffering of others even in death.
The relief is short lived for Shouta. That empty sinking feeling swallows it quickly, swallows him down with it. As Hizashi clings to him again, he feels numb.
The next few days are not kind to the two of them. News breaks of the death of All Might, Symbol of Peace as they ready themselves for the last workday of the week. Hizashi doesn’t dawn his hero garb, instead pulling on a pair of jeans and one of Shouta’s t-shirts from high school. He does switch to his tinted glasses, and still wears gloves and his speakers.
Shouta doesn’t bother changing out of his pink sweatpants and the soft white shirt that hangs far too loose on his shoulders. Just watching Hizashi leaves him tired and this is the best he can manage. There’s no point really. This is his last day at UA.
Some of the people who know that the three of them were more than just close friends come up to him, ask how he is or say that they’re sorry for his loss. The expression is the same for all of them, like it hurts just to look at him, like he should have known. He did know, but he couldn’t have told the man no when he’d confessed.
He knows he shouldn’t have gotten so close. He chuckles a bit at that. Like he ever had a chance at controlling his feelings when it came to Toshinori. Just like Hizashi, the man had been too bright a light in his life to let go.
Hizashi. He’s hurt, broken by the weight of their loss.
Shouta is responsible for his own stupidity, for his own pain, but he should have had the sense to keep Hizashi from it at least. His husband was never interested in Toshinori that way, so he thought maybe it would be okay. Even after Shouta had been caught watching the man enough times that Hizashi had carefully asked if it was just a crush, or something more. That had been a long night but by the end he’d confessed his feelings and Hizashi hadn’t wasted a second on jealousy. He just wanted his love to be happy. If Toshinori ever became interested, Hizashi would happily share.
It wasn’t until Toshinori’s confession, until the man was sleeping over every night and spending lazy mornings sipping tea with Hizashi and their two cats, that Hizashi developed feelings. If Shouta had been a little less selfish, then Hizashi wouldn’t be in so much pain now.
This is his fault.
They silently agree to finish up the work week, since it was Saturday and they only had their home rooms to teach. He watches his husband melt into every embrace their coworkers offer, sniffling and red eyed all day as they try to make it through work. Even those who don’t know the nature of their relationship offer condolences and comfort to the blond man.
He’s both envious and thankful that only Nemuri and Togata offer him hugs and condolences. Nemuri sticks close by all day, almost suffocating, but she seems to know that leaving Shouta alone is a bad idea.
When he does manage to slip away from her, he literally bumps into Mirio Togata on his way out of the staff room. The young teacher pulls him in for a crushing hug and it feels so much like Toshinori against him that his eyes ache and his breath catches on a dry sob. Mirio moves to pull back a bit, intending to ask if he’s alright, but Shouta clings tighter.
That’s how Nemuri finds him, clinging to the startled student teacher, shoulders shaking. She carefully pulls him away and takes him home. She intends to stay, but there’s an incident that requires backup in the area, so she tucks Shouta into his yellow sleeping bag on the couch and lets Hizashi know.
When Hizashi gets home forty-five minutes later, Shouta is on the couch downing the last of what looks like his fourth or fifth beer. When he looks over, his eyes are red-rimmed and glassy, but he looks steadier than he feels when he walks over to the fridge and pulls out two more cans, offering one to the blond man. Hizashi slumps down on the couch beside him and gulps down the contents of the can in just a few swallows, wanting to catch up.
He doesn’t remember much after that. None of the Sunday he spends trying to drink himself into a coma with Hizashi, who insisted he couldn’t drink alone. He doesn’t remember most of the funeral. He was never planning to go anyway, but Hizashi and Nemuri pushed until he came along. In the end, he came because Hizashi needed him.
They never said he had to be sober, though. He needs the edge it gives him. The way the alcohol makes everything fuzzy and soft and far away, distant enough that it almost doesn’t feel real anymore. Even watching Hizashi cry himself sick during the service doesn’t fill him with the same nauseating guilt he feels when he’s clear-headed.
Hizashi starts back at work the next day. He needs to be close to people, connected. He needs to feel like he’s doing some good and like he’s helping to keep the kids together. After all, it isn’t just the two of them who lost Toshinori.
Shouta doesn’t go back. There’s no point. He loves Hizashi for his optimism, but nothing they do will ever change the cycle. He thought they could fix it, but they can’t. They’re training children to push themselves to the limit. They’re showing these young people that their value is dependent upon how well they deal with breaking their bodies down to protect others day after day. They get recognized for it, praised. Their job is to raise perfect heroes and ignore what happens when they grow old and frail like Toshinori.
He can’t be part of that anymore. He won’t. The mentality of the UA hero track and of other hero programs. It took that man and taught him his worth was reliant upon his usefulness, then made him feel ashamed of his weakness. Hero work took Toshinori’s best years, leaving him lonely and overworked. It left him to die a slow, agonizing death, feeling guilty all the while for leaving the world without their precious Symbol of Peace.
Shouta doesn’t think peace is worth the price they’ve been putting on it. He pulls himself from his thoughts, picking up his cell and typing up a quick, careless resignation. Resting back against the couch he hits send and cracks open another beer.