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Motionless. Delicate. Like the glass surface of a lake, the air is still.
The slightest stir ripples through the crowd. Bated breaths. Darting tongues. Smacking lips. Citizens of all kinds and quirks hover at the outskirts of the school grounds. Hyenas starving for the first kill.
The first limousine pulls up to the shoreline of journalists, and the silence erupts. Lenses snap like firecrackers, blinking fast into focus in blinding flashes, the low buzz around UA bursting into cheers.
A long, dark leg slips out of the door of the limo, and the Rabbit Hero Miruko steps out in ivory white heels. The hem of her shoulderless dress spills to the floor, opalescent and shimmering with how it catches the light. She scans the crowd with her signature, self-assured grin before strutting down the sea of lights.
If the UA Sports Festival outstripped the Olympics in scale, then the UA Graduation Ball made the Met Gala look like child’s play.
Every year, for the momentous ball following the UA graduation ceremony, campus security measures are doubled. Droves of fans swarm the school gates. The wide eyes of flash tubes loom from on high, periscopes peeking out from the sea of paparazzi. Hefty cameras set at head height, trigger fingers primed on shutter buttons, aimed and ready to fire. Crowding the edges of the skyscraper school, vans and cameras catch the glint of dusk ricocheting off the academy’s sleek, tinted windows. Only one long red carpet carves a path through the masses, a parted Red Sea.
Tradition dictates that esteemed guests of pro heroes and other hero graduates show up first. A warm-up before the teachers make a splash, before the stars of the show arrive at the scene. Other pro heroes follow Miruko’s example. Pulling up in long, polished cars and donning black-tie pieces. Stopping for the cameras as they make their way to the UA Academy entrance.
The press attention turns ferocious once the teachers arrive. Ectoplasm, Cementoss, Vlad King, and Thirteen. Hound Dog’s muzzle shines with glossy, black leather when he answers the crowd with little more than a growl. Midnight shows up in a violet dress sheer like gossamer, wearing dark lingerie and a garter belt peeking from underneath. Present Mic announces his arrival with a sonic boom, finger guns and hair pointed toward the sky in a victory cry. Suit black velvet, tie and pointed oxfords bright yolk-yellow to accent his look. His pencil mustache is curled at the ends to match his smile, as wide and sharp as the crescent moon.
He’s followed closely by Eraser Head, homeroom teacher to the graduating hero class of 3-A, and the crowd’s energy is a steaming kettle, brewing to a boil. Aizawa’s clean-shaven with his hair tied back, the capillaries in his eyes even redder in the floodlights swallowing him alive. He gets Yamada to move along with a tired “Hizashi,” and eventually the Voice Hero settles for waves and finger guns while walking.
“Come on.” A jut of his head, and he walks ahead of Yamada toward the academy. “Reception’s waiting.”
Yamada opens his mouth for a clever comeback, but sudden quakes in the earth halt him. The aftershocks of a stampede and shrill cries of joy. The roar of the crowd makes him shiver down to the roots of his hair.
But of course, only one person in the world could have caused that.
He whirls around and witnesses the riot stirred by a skeletal, humble All Might, standing to his full height from his limo. Packed with the lights and cameras, the chaos and commotion, it’s the sort of party Yamada thrives off.
But he looks back to Aizawa’s cranky, ever-tired stare, and he settles for bowing out with a grin.
Bakugou thumbs the edge of his phone for the eleventh time.
His neck is sore, hooking downward for so long. The livestream is tinny and whispering, the footage washed out with so much white light. All Might looks even smaller than usual, drowning in the flash. The ridges of his bones lighter, the shadows cast by them darker. Jagged, haystack hair and sunken eyes of blue twinkling brighter.
“Hey.” A palm slides over the back of Bakugou’s hand, balled into a fist on his lap. “You’ve been looking at that for a while now.”
He looks down at Kirishima’s hand encasing his. How the pad of the thumb feels deceptively soft, rubbing the back of it. But different enough from his own skin to feel as interesting as it does comforting. The interior of the limo is dim-lit and quiet, the ride steady and the motor muted from the black back seat cushions. With the divider up courtesy of the chauffeur, it feels like they’re alone.
But Bakugou can’t hide how he’s feeling. Even as he puts his phone down, he can feel his brows notching, his heart nesting in his throat. How the imprint of his back would come out clean on the plush leather behind him.
He’s still looking down when Kirishima’s face comes into view. Eyes soft, searching his. His thumb rubs smooth over his tight fist till it loosens, till it soothes the hairline creases on his dress trousers. “And you’ve been making that face for a while, too.”
A snort comes out of Kirishima’s nose with the comment. Tempered by his patience, the curve to his lip. It warms Bakugou’s chest, and he keeps pouting in defiance of it. Kirishima glances down for a moment, looking thoughtful.
“C’mon,” he murmurs. Looking up at Bakugou again. Hand squeezing his. “Talk to me?”
To anyone who reckons with him, Bakugou is a stone wall. Or so he would like to think, till he goes up against his boyfriend, who becomes one for a living.
He thinks it’s a loss to a worthy opponent, or something different altogether when his body tilts into Kirishima’s. His head finds its home in the crook of Kirishima’s neck, lying on his collarbone. The breath that leaves his body seems to eke out his every bone, and he lowers his eyes.
“. . . This ball’s stupid.”
Kirishima hums. Understanding immediately. Bakugou loosens his hand some more, letting Kirishima’s fingers slip between his on his lap. The heat to his words is a soft simmer, even if the divider’s supposed to be soundproof.
“It’s, fucking,” he huffs. His nose wrinkles, and he sinks deeper into Kirishima’s side. “We already got our names out at debut. We’re not doing any hero shit we’re supposed to be doing. It’s an award show when we got nothing to show for it.”
“I hear you,” Kirishima says, “but graduating from UA is a pretty big deal, wouldn’t you say?”
“That’s why we got our damn diplomas at the actual graduation ceremony.” Bakugou rolls his eyes, leaning more comfortably into him. “The only good this ball’s for is networking, if you fucked up royally in the Sports Festival. This is all just . . . indulgent bullshit.”
Kirishima hums again. Content. Attentive. In a blink, Bakugou’s eyes open, and he shifts away.
“Uh.” His eyes dart over Kirishima, who looks at him, puzzled. “. . . Sorry.”
Kirishima blinks fast, like a concussion’s wracked him.
“Babe, why—” He coughs out a laugh, bewildered in his grin. “Why’re you sorry?”
“Shit, you know. ’Cause.” Bakugou looks down suddenly. “You love this sorta thing. Talking to people, getting us fancy suits. Having a good time. And I’m here bitching about it, being a . . .” He shrugs, squinting. “Bitch . . . about it.”
Fond. Hopeless. Those are the only words that can describe the laughter that bubbles out of Kirishima’s lips.
The hand that isn’t clasping Bakugou’s goes up to his jawline in a gentle stroke. Kirishima tilts his face up, and he reminds Bakugou of the happy light he has in his room. Radiant on the darkest of days, warm even on the coldest ones with the smile he gives him. With the kiss of his lips, blossoming tingles over his face when he pulls away. Bakugou’s eyes slide open with an easy languor. Like he’s waking from a dream he didn’t realize he’d slipped into.
“Katsuki.” His smile is like a quilt, stitched into his whisper. “I love you.”
Bakugou knows; the heat that bursts over his face is a real explosion. His face contorts like he’s eaten a lemon he’ll never spit out. “What the hell,” he chokes out. “Fucking . . . same.”
Kirishima’s grin goes boundless. It folds the laugh lines into his cheeks. He brings Bakugou into a hug, and that warmth swallows him alive all over again.
“I know you know I like that stuff. I know you’d put up with a lot for me,” Kirishima murmurs, stroking his back. His whisper cards through his hair. “But you’re way more important to me than some ball.”
“I mean,” Bakugou mutters into the lapels of his suit. “It is a big one.”
“We’re gonna be pro heroes, dude.” He pulls back to look at Bakugou again. Brushes the hair framing his eyes. The shaved sideburns in front of his ears. “There’ll be a lot of big things in our lives if I got anything to say about it.”
It appears again. That unbearable, swelling heat in his chest. The kind primed to explode into a hypergiant inside him. The biggest explosion Bakugou could imagine creating. The kind he’s always wanted to, when he cups the back of Kirishima’s neck.
“Think I’d let you outdo me, asshole?”
“Oh, I know you wouldn’t let me go down without a fight.” His hand slips around Bakugou’s waist, smile growing. “You’re good to me like that.”
Bakugou’s grin splits his face. He beams back at Kirishima with the light of a thousand suns, before their lips meet again.
“After the appearance of All Might followed by Ingenium, Shouto, and Creati gracing the floor with stunning ensembles, every hair is on end to see who graces the red carpet next with notable hero graduates still on their way, and—”
A limo pulls up to the hem of the carpet, sending every reporter swiveling. The passenger door opens before the chauffeur can come out, and the crowd swells into cheers.
“—And it looks like the first couple of the night have arrived, with Red Riot and Supernova on the scene!”
Camera rigs swing to the limousine. Shutters snap like sharks at them, tasting blood in the water, blinding like flashbang grenades as Kirishima and Bakugou emerge from the doors. One by one, hand in hand.
The sensory overload is immediate. Kirishima doesn’t think he can see his way down the carpet, the light show of flash leaving green and purple trails in his vision. He catches the mesh of microphone heads over the velvet lane dividers and the glossy black pupils of cameras blinking in the light.
“Could we have a moment of your time, Red Riot—”
“Supernova, who are you wearing—”
“Is it true that you have plans to open a hero agency with Supernova—”
“How’re you feeling being here tonight?”
For what questions he can hear, he answers them as best he can, makes up for it with a smile and a wave when he can’t. There are papers and pens and phones, and he catches himself grinning wide at people holding up signs emblazoned with his logo, and he’s taking selfies and signing till his wrist twinges.
Bakugou also has ones directed at him, but he deigns not to answer. His eyes stay trained ahead, giving the cameras the angles of his profile as long as he cares to linger. His shoulder stays cold for the media, mostly. For fans who fight to the front to get a signature, a picture, air similar to the air he breathes, he doesn’t give them all what they want, but smirks at their moxie. Which apparently strengthens his brand all the more. Untouchable. Unattainable.
All except for Kirishima. His partner and best friend, by his side.
“Supernova, Red Riot, we’ve been dying to know,” a reporter cries amongst the din, “what’s the secret to your lasting relationship?”
They’re next to each other when the question is raised from behind them. Kirishima doesn’t hear it, too busy playing catch-up with everyone and no one on the sidelines. Bakugou hears it, but he doesn’t answer.
When he slips a hand around Kirishima’s waist and the cameras capture it in a frenzy, he looks straight ahead.
The doors yawn open to the reception hall. A chandelier dangles large and delicate from the high ceiling in crystal threads. Prim, clean-cut waiters float between guests, offering appetizers and hors d’oeuvres on silver platters. Even the emergency doors are padded with a deep brown leather, their slim handlebars painted golden. Monitors and live cameras are set up in the reception hall, where live footage streams from the entryway outside and to the guests inside.
They make nice with the pro heroes and alumni who are already at reception. Bakugou gets caught up by Miruko and Best Jeanist in one fell swoop, and Kirishima is already overjoyed when he catches up with Fat Gum, Suneater, and Lemillion near the refreshments table. Other students start to fill in the reception. Graduates from across the year group in UA show up, and the 3-B students trickle in, receiving the same star treatment as the other hero class of the year.
Bakugou conveniently busies himself with drinks when Kirishima catches Tetsutetsu arriving on-screen.
The cameras permitted in the theatre lap up the moment he and Kirishima reunite. Catching each other’s hands with their quirks activated, a throwback to their first match in their first Sports Festival and every rematch after, before they grapple each other in with arms around the shoulders, the reverb of their laughter carried by the acoustics of the hall.
Soon Kirishima and Bakugou catch up with their classmates who arrived beforehand. When Inasa and Camie show up with others from Shiketsu, Todoroki and Bakugou cluster with them for a chat about their retake days in first year. Shishikura appears from the side, squinting at the glare Bakugou gives him, before Inasa reels him and Todoroki in by the shoulders, booming and none the wiser.
When they drift apart into their own pairs, Bakugou stops at a tap on his shoulder. Shishikura’s narrow eyes peek from the slit where his hat and high collar show his face. A striking resemblance to Best Jeanist’s work as he meets Bakugou’s stare.
“I understand if you’re . . . disgruntled. Regarding the skirmish we had in our provisional license examinations.” Shishikura’s nose goes upturned, poking out from his collar. “But it’d be healthier for you to let it go. I don’t take pleasure in being scrutinized for something so distant in the past. Beyond that, I—”
“Who the hell are you?”
He sneers at Shishikura’s gawking. Perfect timing before Kirishima calls him over. He leans in when Bakugou turns heel to join him, and they’re out of earshot.
“That was Shishikura, right?” Kirishima asks, arm around Bakugou’s shoulder. “Man, it’s been a while. Remember when he turned us into meatballs back in first year?”
“Yeah,” he says simply. “I do.”
The sigh Kirishima blows out is lighthearted when he shakes his head, but it gets no reaction. He glances at Bakugou, looking up at the monitors panning over the walls.
Kirishima looks up and sees Midoriya displayed on the red carpet.
Soaked in camera lights, with his trademark red high-tops, he’s a far cry from the ball of nerves and puddle of tears he was in first year. Faced with the overwhelming press, Midoriya only gives a wave and a wide, open-mouthed smile.
Kirishima glances back at Bakugou, who keeps studying the monitor. The smallest, slightest tug to his lip. Which only brings a bigger one to Kirishima’s.
“Wanna go greet him?”
His voice doesn’t startle Bakugou. If anything, it leaches what tension was left in his shoulders, when he looks down to the entrance.
“Yeah.” He smiles. A little wider, somewhat calmer, his hands tucked in his pockets. “Let’s go say hi to that loser.”
Kirishima knocks his side. Snorts when Bakugou only gives back a smirk, and they head to the entrance together.
The others from 3-A all arrive soon after Midoriya does, and the ball goes into full swing.
Things really start to liven up when the Party Parade arrive—Sero, Ashido, and Kaminari (or, if anyone asked Bakugou, Dumb, Dumber, and Crown Stupid). They wrangle photos with all of 3-A, then 3-A with 3-B, then ones with the support group. They take group selfies with other students, even the teachers and pro heroes.
Then, amidst the buzz and chatter, the shriek of a microphone pierces the air.
A hush sweeps the hall. The UA teachers take center stage, preparing a few less formal remarks on this year’s graduating cohort. A healthy flush settles over the auditorium when Midnight opens the proceedings.
“With their first foot through the door to the world of pro heroes, the heights to which our students will climb just fills me with . . . anticipation.”
Kirishima clears his throat, already looking down when the cameras broadcast Midnight licking her lips in high definition.
He rocks on the balls of his feet once, then twice. A sigh streams through his nose when the monitors zero onto the rest of the teachers on stage. Even when he checks the corners of the stage, he only spots the glimmer of hair gel, dresses, makeup, and smiling eyes. Every head in the hall is turned toward the podium.
Then he turns to Bakugou beside him. Whose glance skims the great theatre as well. Whose eyes then land on his, like he was the home for his wandering attention. Like the way he was for Kirishima, too.
Kirishima reaches out with his hand. Looks to the fancy emergency doors and back at Bakugou. His eyes shining.
“Come on.”
Bakugou’s eyes go round like plates. He looks once to Present Mic taking over the night as emcee, to the goading applause that makes his eardrums vibrate till they go numb.
The critical moment. The perfect distraction. The split second where it all comes down to whether Bakugou takes his hand or not.
The clap of his hand in Kirishima’s drowns in the surrounding applause, and Bakugou grasps it tight. Eyes crinkled, burning bright. Before Kirishima pulls him along, through the throng, over the edge of mayhem. Spilling out from that dazzling, extravagant, alien realm, into the hazy, endless amber of dusk worlds away, Bakugou’s grin reigns triumphant. Stretching and stretching till it stings his cheeks.
Of course Bakugou takes it. Because it’s Kirishima.
“You idiot.”
It’s cold out.
Their suits are well-layered, but the air is still bracing. Fortifying. Laced with the chill of spring, while their suit trousers stretch and strain with the hike. They trek up a hill circling the back side of the academy, the slope long and gentle enough that the higher they climb, the farther they get away.
The mouths of Bakugou’s dress shoes are thin, rigid blades, stabbing his Achilles tendons through the high necks of his socks. He hops on one foot when he takes his other shoe and sock off, the grass cool and dewy beneath his feet. Grumbling all the while, spitting under his breath.
“Fucking, stupid-ass, motherfuckin’—”
“Oh, you don’t needa worry about getting those dirty, Katsuki,” Kirishima says. As airy as his step, treading on ahead. “I can always buy you new ones.”
“That’s not—like hell you will!” he barks, stomping after Kirishima, shoes and socks hooked on his fingers. “You think I didn’t see the bill you got for these? They cost a damn fortune!”
“I’ll buy you ten.”
“You—fucking—” he splutters. Even as Kirishima just smiles at him, he scowls back narrow-eyed. “Stop spending on me.”
“Maybe I will,” Kirishima lilts, sing-song. “Maybe I won’t.”
“You’re an insufferable little shit and you won’t pay for it.”
Kirishima laughs. Even as Bakugou grouses and grabs his hand with a vengeance, he still laughs. Loud and clear like the bash of a gong, the echo makes a home in his ears.
Not at all because Kirishima deserves it, Bakugou keeps holding his hand.
Till they leave the shadows of the towering campus, fuzzy and tinted in the golden sunset. Till they can see the rooftops of the academy below them, they trek up the sloping hill, to their private getaway.
A verdant, even swathe on the hilltop. Grass patches flattened and well-loved from their previous trips. The little meadow he’d call his and Bakugou’s own, Kirishima knows intimately. Like he planted every sprouting daisy and budding jasmine there himself.
But he can’t help his excitement when he turns to the view.
A full moon in twilight. The evening breeze picks up its nerve, tousling his hair and billowing his blazer, pouring over his face when it carries his breath in its wake. The trees around them sigh in the wind, tickling his nose with the smell of spring.
UA measures like a toy in the distance. Like a firefly he could hide with his palm, glowing warm yellow through the pinhole windows, the dazzling ceremony shining through. The sun stays shy behind the hills on the horizon. The glow it gifts the outline of their silhouettes shines so deep and vibrant red, it blots afterimages in Kirishima’s vision.
But if he looks up to the sky, before his neck strains under the stretch, the palette shifts. Pinprick white stars sprinkled over a powdery, royal blue, fading to light lavender. To swirling oranges and reds, like milk stirred fresh into black tea, a drizzle of honey coating the mountains far away.
He turns to Bakugou leaning his weight on his elbows, already lying on the grass. Soaking in the same view as he is. The light slides slow down his face, like wax melting down a candle, dripping off him. Bottled in his eyes, gleaming crimson trained on the sleeping sun. All while a gentle smile plays on his lips. Delicate and warm, teased in his eyes. A dozy, dreamy quality weaved in. Raw and quiet. Real and relaxed. Nothing hidden. Nothing repressed.
For the first time that night, Bakugou’s just smiling.
The groan that churns from Kirishima’s core is inevitable. He collapses on his knees and slumps onto Bakugou, who barely grunts when Kirishima whines muffled into his collarbone.
“Eijirou, what the hell,” Bakugou mutters. But he even sounds relaxed, and Kirishima is helpless nuzzling into the crook of his neck further. “What’s gotten into you?”
“I love you. I love you so much. You’re so manly.” Kirishima’s face scrunches up, like it agonizes him. “I’m gonna die loving you.”
“Like hell,” he scoffs, petting the back of Kirishima’s neck. “I’ll blast you before you even think about it.”
“Too late. I’m dying. M’already dead.” Kirishima shakes his head, arms snaking around the suit vest clinging to his boyfriend’s slim, perfect waist. “Katsuki, you killed me.”
He just laughs. Bakugou does nothing but laugh, and that cloying vice around Kirishima’s heart tightens without mercy, squeezing another groan from him.
“You’re so stupid,” Bakugou sighs. Rough with a smile leaking through, while his fingers fiddle with the shave of his undercut. “Stop being stupid.”
“Impossible. No way. How can I?” Kirishima moans, even kicking his legs. Bakugou’s chest rumbles chuckling some more, and the warmth it feeds Kirishima’s soul is so heady. He shakes his head. “You make me so dumb, dude. I’ll never not be dumb around you.”
A beat of silence. A breath of quiet, before Bakugou’s arms reach up to Kirishima’s shoulders.
His back falls onto the grass, but Kirishima’s the one who grunts from getting winded. Then they’re holding each other on the hilltop, the lights and music of the ceremony a distant memory. Just the wind and their breathing floating past their ears when Bakugou squeezes his shoulders, murmuring.
“. . . You better be ready to stay dumb then.”
It truly is a lost cause. The feelings and warmth freewheeling in Kirishima’s insides. Seeing Bakugou be so handsome and manly and himself. Hearing the soft, deep tones of his voice, cradling a promise and a smallness that lie beneath the childish words. A promise that, in another squeeze of his shoulders, Kirishima had no expectation of hearing, till Bakugou defies every one he has in another whisper:
“I’m not leaving you, Eijirou.”
It’s not unmanly to cry. Kirishima knows it’s not. But the tears that spring to his eyes, souring his nose, expanding his heart, are something he doesn’t want to let out yet. Not quite yet, when he pins Bakugou down in a firm, desperate kiss.
He feels Bakugou’s soft snort against his lips. That smug fondness that bleeds into his love for him every day, that makes Kirishima’s heart soar to the roof of his mouth. He shifts his weight so he isn’t crushing Bakugou beneath him, when he moves his hands to touch him better. To tease his thumb over his cheek. To coax his mouth open so his tongue can slip warm and velvet over his. Pressing till a muffled, low moan leaves Bakugou’s throat, sighing when his grip knuckles into his suit jacket tighter, and he kisses him deeper.
His skin is tingling. He can’t tell where his mouth ends and his hands begin, pressing so close to Bakugou. Broad and strong and hot to the touch beneath him. His suit felt barely enough for the chill when they left. Now the cold just slides off his skin, pumping heat like a furnace when Bakugou pants along his lips. Another breathy, private noise that injects straight into Kirishima’s bloodstream, a frisson along his spine, a feeling he’ll never tire of mapping with his mouth.
It’s only when his chest aches to breathe that he pulls away. As suddenly as it started, their lips part. Bakugou’s face, his body tries to blindly follow Kirishima’s retreating before he falls back on the grass, catching his own breath.
His hands are planted beside Bakugou’s head when he stares down at him. Bakugou’s eyes flutter, half-lidded and dazed, to stare up into his, and Kirishima’s heart beats in his ears.
Bakugou’s bright, dandelion hair rests alongside the blades of grass. A blush rises rosy on his cheeks, matched by the flush of his lips, glossy and thoroughly kissed. The tip of his red tongue laving over his bottom one.
“. . . What is it?”
A breathless question from a breathtaking man, Kirishima’s own is stolen.
He doesn’t know what it is.
He wants to do everything with Bakugou. Live out his hopes and dreams and fears and pains by his side, till they retire and grow old and lazy. He wants to do nothing with Bakugou. To lie with him till the night swallows the sky, till teachers and friends and family wonder where they’re spending their days, on a perfect little hilltop they can call their own.
He wants to hug him, to kiss him, to tell him he loves him till he loses his voice saying it. Then he’d learn sign language and sign it till his fingers cramp, mouth it till his lips ache. Love him till there wouldn’t be a drop of energy left in him to love the man in his arms, the man he’ll marry. To love him any more than he already does and has and will. Until the stars take over the sky and there would be an eternity and oblivion and nothing left—not a trace in the world that would show how all along, Kirishima Eijirou was utterly, endlessly, irreversibly in love with Bakugou Katsuki.
He doesn’t know what it is. But he takes a shot in the dark when he sits up onto his knees, bringing Bakugou’s hands into his.
“I wanna dance with you.” He pulls out his phone with his free hand, light radiating from every pore when he beams. “Let’s dance, Katsuki!”
Bakugou blinks once, confusion deep in the dip of his brows. Then he barks out a laugh. Smile lines sneak onto the corners of his eyes when he gets up onto his feet, and Kirishima is grinning right along with him.
Kirishima gets a swing playlist he puts on shuffle, dialing up his phone to full blast before he tosses it onto the grass. The bass and brass echo from his phone’s small, bellowing speakers, giving him a spring in his step when he twists his hips, snaps his fingers, and pulls Bakugou along into his pace. One that Bakugou easily matches with his own footwork, much cleaner, just as free as Kirishima’s clumsy, carefree steps.
A whinnying blare of a trumpet, and Bakugou reels him in by the waist. In a blink Kirishima leaps, wrapping his legs around Bakugou’s hips in a giddy panic.
It takes a beat, a stare, a cry of a sax before they burst out laughing. Letting Kirishima’s feet touch the floor and Bakugou’s arm wrap further around his waist. Pushing Kirishima back in a dip so his leg goes up and he’s still laughing, missing the fierce, wide grin Bakugou shoots down his way.
It’s another night before the rest of their lives. Swinging and spinning the other around, taking turns to trip over themselves and laugh at it before they go again. To another catchy and unfamiliar tune. Another jaunt that will end up nowhere but the hill they call theirs. A quick stop on their way up to the very top of the world.
They take each other’s hand further along the tracks. Sometimes one, sometimes both. Even as the night grows dark and the moon dawns bright over them, the stars twinkle and the trees hum to their funny dancing. Heroes and graduates none the wiser in the UA Ball, pro heroes and graduation and the future a world and two light-years away, Red Riot and Supernova are nowhere to be seen.
At the end of their prologue, it’s simply Kirishima and Bakugou.
