Chapter Text
Touya wakes up slumped against his bathtub. That in itself isn’t unusual - he’s fallen asleep here many times before, with the benefit of the toilet being right there next to him when he wakes to vomit coming up his throat.
He also feels disgusting, which is not unusual either. Dried sweat leaves a thin layer on his heavily tattooed skin, his black hair greasy and knotted, left untrimmed and unwashed for too long. Even his teeth feel scummy - like if he plucked one out of his skull, there would be a layer of strange, pale fur on the dull enamel.
In short, he’s miserable, his head hurts, and he doesn’t see himself getting off the floor anytime soon. It’s still a damn sight better than the previous night, though, when he’d sat a little too long with only his thoughts, and came to the realization that he was a toddler sitting atop a trainwreck doused in gasoline, and he was playing with a box of matches.
His phone buzzes softly on the floor - somehow still holding a charge after a mythical bender - and he fumbles for it, expecting a text from Tenko or Jin, who both seem to have a sixth sense for his worst nights.
To his disbelief, and his dismay, your name flashes across the cracked screen above several messages, still chased by the black heart he added to your contact back when you were both into cheesy shit like that. The first text he reads is old - delivered hours ago, but left unopened.
i swear to god, you better not do anything fucking stupid, todoroki.
It stings to see his surname, used without a second thought in place of something more familiar, but as he swipes across the screen, thumb brushing against the ragged cracks he hasn’t bothered to fix, he guesses he did something to warrant it.
After catching himself up on the first conversation the two of you have had in months, it’s very clear he did.
Around ten, he sends a simple ‘hey’, the first message from his number to yours in quite some time. You greet him politely shortly after, there’s some bullshit pleasantries that make his teeth grit, and then it all goes to shit.
The paragraph he sent you, describing how much of a singular fuckup he was, and how he knew he was a fuckup, but couldn’t seem to find a way to not be such a colossal fuckup, is comparable to Homer’s great works, and there’s a particularly grating section where he almost grovels, waxing drunkenly eloquent about what a beacon of light you are in such a fucked up world. To your credit, you keep up easily, almost as if you were familiar with a drunken Touya that can’t do much more than whine and apologize and whine some more.
Eventually, though, he seems to strike a moment of clarity, and in the clearest, most concise wall of text he sent all night, he tells you that he’s going to fix it all, that this is the last you’ll hear from him, that he wishes you all the best in your life, and that someday, maybe you’ll forgive him.
Touya grimaces just reading it, knowing how slimy and manipulative it sounds, especially when compared to his past behaviors. It wasn’t uncommon for him to say things like that, when you were around.
He liked to talk, and he assumed that if he talked enough, said all the things that came to mind, that you would stay forever. Tricky thing to believe, because it just pushed you away faster.
Your responses to his last message start off dry and exasperated, but grow in worry as the hours tick past, ending with four words that make his blood run cold, and the headache in his temples pound harder.
goddamnit, i’m coming over.
“ Shit .” Forgetting his current state, Touya tries to pull himself off the floor, only to make a sound one might hear from a sick walrus, and slump back against the tub.
He’s definitely not going anywhere, anytime soon. All he can do is sit and wait as your message ages, and you presumably make your way to the apartment you once shared.
“Jesus Christ , Touya.” His eyes drag open blearily as cool fingers brush his sweaty hair back out of his face, another hand at his shoulder to keep him from planting his face in the reeking bowl of his toilet. Your voice is soft for all it’s sandpaper annoyance - cottony with relief that feels wrong to wrap around himself like armor. “You’re unbelievable.”
“I know,” he rasps, spitting into the toilet and leaning away before he can gag again. You flush it without looking, easing him back to lean against his tub before you disengage, resting against the counter as far from him as you can get in the cramped bathroom.
“You’re gross,” you add, a barbed afterthought that only makes him smile, looking at your paint-stained jeans through his eyelashes.
“Yeah.” He coughs once, smacks his lips with a scowl, and manages to look at your face. It’s like looking at the sun, though, and he has to let his chin fall after just the barest glimpse. “‘m sorry.”
“You say that every time. You don’t mean it.”
“Do this time,” he whispers. “‘m’not sure why it’s taken me so long.” His eyes blink open again, a slow smile taking hold of his face. “How’s Keigo?”
“He’s fine.” You’re prickly; defensive. A younger Touya would take that poorly. He would’ve started a one sided fight and talked you in circles until you broke under the pressure and let him have his way.
Small mercies that Touya isn’t him anymore. He’s still in there, somewhere, but he’s long been forced into silence.
“Yeah? You guys’re, what, coming up on a year?”
“We are.” Clipped, flat words that don’t leave room for him to wiggle them around later, put shapes and flavors into the way they sit in your own mind that weren’t there when you spoke them. “Why?”
“Jus’ curious. Time flies, huh?” He exhales, reaches up to scrub at his eyes. “I, uh. Believe it or not, I’ve been sober for a while. Shit just snowballed last night, you know? Went and had too much of myself so I had to chase it out. Bad idea.” You only hum, and he sighs. “And… hey, I’ve treated you like shit, and I want to apologize.” Silence sits between you like a midwinter snowbank before you laugh.
“Are you still drunk? Or are you fucking with me? Is this some fucked up plan to get me to pity you enough that I’ll come back to you?”
“No! Fuck, no!” His head swims, eyes hot with pressure, but he has to look at you, even if it pinches at his chest, and your face wavers in his vision. “I’m serious, this time. I’ve been a shitty guy, and I’m not excusing myself just cause I was really fucked up, but all the shit I put you through, all the shit you put up with…”
He pauses, cottonmouth dampening his speech.
“You didn’t deserve it. Any of it. We said we were in love, but it— I was fucked up, and I’m sorry. I can’t take it back, but I want to, so badly.” Touya puts a hand to his forehead, nails digging lightly into his scalp. “Sometimes I think about what I used to say to you, and how you’d just take it, and it makes me feel like I’ve got cement in my stomach. You’re not… you aren’t a bad person. You’re a good person. You've always been good, and soft, too.”
“Soft?” He smiles at the hesitation in your voice - you’ve always been slow to accept compliments, especially from his dual-edged tongue.
“I treated you like shit, the world treated you like shit, and instead of being like… like me , you were gentle. You are gentle. You took all your hurt and your anger, and made yourself armor that never hurt anyone else. You refused to act like the rest of us do, and I envied you, for having the strength to make that choice.”
Your silence neither dismisses or encourages him, but he goes on anyway, now that some of it is in the open.
“I… talked to my parents, the other day.” He feels your eyes on him, and the bewilderment in the weight of your gaze makes him laugh outright. “I know, I know. I swore I’d never speak another word to either of them, not even if I was dying. Fuck, hearing Dad’s voice… it was like I was a kid again, peeking around the doorway when he came home. And Shoto… Shoto graduated high school this year. I got to talk to him a little. I don’t think he remembers me that well.”
“You’re hard to forget.” There’s a wedge of bitterness on your tongue as the words slip out - a garnish that is more than deserved.
“Ha! I guess so. I remember, he was small like me as a kid, but… Mom sent me a picture, and he looks so much like Dad. Fuyumi’s working as a school counselor, now, and Natsuo’s a doctor. Then there’s me .” He makes a halfhearted attempt at jazz-hands, and succeeds in smacking his hand against the tub. “Ow. Family fuckup, Touya Todoroki, at your service, and trying to better himself.”
“How’s that going for you?” You’re trying to not be amused, but it bleeds into your voice, and that’s enough to reassure Touya that you might not hate him.
“Oh, you know, got shitfaced to avoid my crippling family issues when Mom invited me to family dinner, texted my ex several questionable things, woke up to them holding my hair back as I puked in a toilet. All in all, I’d say on the sliding scale of Fucked Up, I’m at a solid Touya.”
Your surprised laughter is the best sound he’s heard all week, and it gives him the strength to push himself up onto the edge of the tub on shaky knees.
“You’re insane,” you say, one hand over your mouth, and he smiles in that crooked, boyish way you always liked.
“Yeah, well, there’s one of us in every family.” He looks at you for a moment, now that the fog in his skull has had some time to pull back, and he notices details he missed earlier.
You’re practically glowing, with smooth, healthy skin, and eyes that shine in the late morning light. You look happy, even though you’re here with him, in a bathroom that doesn’t smell like much more than sweat and drunk-human misery. You’re looking back at him, too, but slowly your expression sinks into something somber, and he braces himself for whatever you’ll say.
“I thought you went through with it,” is what comes out of your mouth, delicate as a spider’s thread. “I thought… God, Touya, I thought I’d come in and find a corpse. You said-“
“I know.” His hoarse voice is strained further, and he pushes his palm into his eyes, feeling an echo of the unease you must have experienced. “I am… far from eloquent, when I’m drunk.”
“Depends on your mood,” you correct quietly. “Sometimes, you said the most beautiful things, between all the cursing. I liked it.” He snorts quietly, but he knows you’re not lying.
“You know, I still love you.”
“Touya—“ You’re prepared to scold him, but he holds up a hand, smiling.
“Hold on a second. I’m not saying it to try and guilt you, or make you feel bad for moving on. I just know that I still do, and I think I will forever.”
“It might go away.” The reasoning is flimsy, but he allows it, shrugging one shoulder.
“Maybe, maybe not. But a beautiful soul like yours? It leaves an impression. Maybe I’ll learn to be a better man, from all this.”
“Maybe.” You offer a small smile, turning to glance down the hallway. “Hey… want me to make some coffee? I’m tired, and it’ll help with your headache.”
“Please.” You nod and push off the counter.
“Don’t go anywhere.” He calls your name before you get too far, and you stop in the doorway, look back at him.
“It’s good to see you,” he admits, shy to voice the thought that's repeated itself in his mind since he first saw your face, painted with worry as you stood over him. Your expression softens, and for a moment, he could swear the two of you have gone back in time, and this is just another fucked up Tuesday.
“It’s... yeah, it’s good to see you too, Touya.” Like a dream, you disappear down the hallway, and Touya sighs, deflates like a leaky balloon.
He closes his eyes, rests his head in his hands, and waits for the smell of coffee to drift back to him.