Work Text:
“In bed we laugh, in bed we cry;
And born in bed, in bed we die;
The near approach a bed may show:
Of human bliss to human woe.”
- Isaac de Benserade
—
1.
The first time Tamaki shares a bed with someone who isn’t his parents, he’s eight years old and experiencing what he’ll later learn to describe as a panic attack.
Mirio is sleeping on a futon on the floor of Tamaki’s bedroom just a few feet away. It’s late — very late. Tamaki can see the outline of Mirio’s body under the blanket, the gentle rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, but this does not reassure him. He still sees the vivid afterimages of his nightmare: Mirio’s body sinking down through the floor and into the black earth, his arm outstretched desperately until that vanishes, too, and he disappears forever.
“Mirio-kun,” Tamaki murmurs into the dark. His voice is fragile even to his own ears, but he’s trembling too much to keep it steady. He is frozen. His heart thuds in his chest and his lungs burn, but he doesn’t dare to move. He feels like if he tried to move, he would shatter into pieces — or worse, Mirio might.
“Mirio,” Tamaki says again after several long, long moments. His voice is only a little louder than it was the first time, but it’s enough. Mirio stirs.
“Tamaki…?” Mirio sounds groggy, the syllables of Tamaki’s name slurring together. “What’s going on? You okay?”
Tamaki says nothing, his voice caged in his throat. His silence seems to concern Mirio, because he sits up. Mirio’s eyes find his in the dark, bright and gleaming despite the low light, and although Tamaki’s heart is still racing and his body feels taut like a bowstring, Mirio’s eyes ground him.
“Did you have a bad dream?” Mirio asks softly.
A second, and then Tamaki manages to nod ever so slightly.
“Do you want me to come up there with you? It helps sometimes if there’s someone with you.”
Tamaki nods again.
Without another word, Mirio pushes off his blanket, stands up, and crawls into bed next to him. Tamaki grips Mirio’s arm. The skin is warm and solid underneath his fingers — real. Tamaki lets out a breath, slow and shaky.
“It’s okay,” Mirio says. “I’m here.”
They fall asleep like this: facing each other on Tamaki’s bed, Mirio’s wrist in Tamaki’s hand, heads resting on the same pillow. Tamaki has no more nightmares that night.
2.
The UA entrance exam is tomorrow.
Tamaki is sleeping over at Mirio’s house tonight so they can take the train together tomorrow to go to the school. It had been Mirio’s suggestion. “If we’re together, we won’t get lost,” he’d said with a smile. Tamaki had agreed without question, even though Mirio has always been the one who had trouble with directions. Even without the pretense of traveling to the school, Tamaki would have agreed. Tamaki has been anxious about this exam for months, and being with Mirio calms him. A sleepover is mutually beneficial: Tamaki can make sure Mirio doesn’t lose his way, and Mirio can make sure Tamaki doesn’t lose his nerve.
Now, as Tamaki hesitates at the doorway of Mirio’s bedroom, he wonders if this was a mistake after all.
“The extra futon is at the drycleaners,” Mirio explains sheepishly. “I know we’re a little old to share a single, but hopefully you don’t mind?”
Tamaki’s face flames. He glances at Mirio’s bare chest and pajama shorts before looking away just as quickly, staring at the bed. The thought of sleeping next to Mirio embarasses him for reasons he can’t articulate. Still — on a night like tonight, sleeping in Mirio’s bed is so, so much better than sleeping alone.
“It’s okay. I don’t mind,” Tamaki says. He gives Mirio a small smile and that, thankfully, seems to convince him.
The bed really is too small for two boys their age — especially when one of them is Mirio, who’s grown more in the last year than Tamaki has grown in the last three. When they finally settle in to sleep, the lights off and their blankets arranged, Tamaki barely has room to roll to his other side without running into Mirio. He’s sleeping on his side, facing away from Mirio. Mirio is on his back, like he always is. If Tamaki slept on his back, too, their shoulders would touch.
Tamaki does not sleep on his back. He already imagines he can feel the heat of Mirio’s skin radiating across the few inches that separate them, and his heart is pounding. If Mirio were actually touching him, Tamaki might have a heart attack.
Tamaki stays like this for a while, willing himself to sleep. The combination of his anxiety over the exam and the buzzing tension he feels in the space between them makes that all but impossible. It’s like he drank something with caffeine right before bed. He feels both exhausted and wide awake at the same time — tired but unable to turn his brain off long enough to let sleep take over. He opens his eyes and blinks into the darkness of Mirio’s bedroom, staring at the familiar shapes of the hero posters that cover the walls. Maybe if he counts them, he can fall asleep…
“Tamaki?”
Mirio’s voice is barely above a whisper, but the sound feels loud in the silent bedroom. Tamaki tilts his head in Mirio’s direction — not quite enough to see him all the way, but enough for Mirio to know he’s listening.
“You’re going to do great at the exam tomorrow,” Mirio says. “Trust me.”
And Tamaki does. More than anything else in the world, he trusts Mirio.
“Thanks,” Tamaki whispers back. “You too.”
Tamaki is still feeling anxiety squeezing his chest, but his muscles relax a little bit and his heartbeat is slowing. That, at least, is a start. When he does fall asleep, the slow rhythm of Mirio’s breath is the only thing on his mind.
3.
Tamaki doesn’t know what to make of Hadou.
Mirio and Hadou had befriended each other almost immediately after their first hero lesson, and wherever Mirio goes, Tamaki follows. It’s not that he dislikes Hadou. Hadou seems nice enough, but she’s very… forward. It’s difficult for Tamaki to understand why she does what she does, and that ambiguity makes Tamaki anxious. Her endless stream of questions are sometimes more than he can handle.
Tonight, the three of them are huddled in Hadou’s room for their second weekly movie night together. They’d gone to Mirio’s room the first time since he had been the one to suggest the get-together, but Mirio’s bed is a single while Hadou’s is a queen with more than enough room for the three of them and a laptop.
About three-quarters of the way through the movie, Mirio falls asleep on Tamaki’s shoulder.
Being this close to Mirio makes Tamaki anxious at the best of times, but today, sitting on Hadou’s bed with Hadou’s curious eyes watching the two of them with interest, Tamaki feels like his blood has frozen in his veins. There’s been a tension between him and Mirio lately — a disruption to the easy push and pull of their friendship. Tamaki knows now that the way he feels about Mirio is different from the way most people feel about their friends. He flushes at simple touches, like Mirio’s arm over his shoulder or his hand on his wrist, and Mirio seems to hesitate more and more before reaching out. Tamaki isn’t sure if that hesitation is because Mirio has noticed Tamaki’s reactions or because Mirio has those same complicated feelings too. It could be both.
Hadou stares at the place where Mirio’s head rests on Tamaki’s shoulder, and Tamaki is flooded with one of the strongest waves of embarrassment he’s ever felt in his life. He’d rather die than push Mirio off, but he also feels like he might die a little bit anyway, and the place where their skin touches is so hot it’s almost burning.
“Your face is really red,” Hadou says. Her voice is quieter than usual. “Do you like him?”
Tamaki nearly chokes on his own spit. Before he can muster up some kind of reply, Hadou speaks again.
“I think he likes you,” she states matter of factly, tilting her head to the side. “I think he really likes you. He gets this face whenever he’s looking at you and you’re not looking at him. Did you know?”
Tamaki blinks at her. There are a million questions in his head — what face? Is she sure? How did she know? Is Tamaki that obvious? Of all these questions, however, the one that comes out when he finally manages to find his voice is, “Why are you telling me this?”
Hadou shrugs. “I just thought of it, so I told you,” she says simply. Then she puts away the laptop, scoots down the bed a little bit, and lays down on her side. “I’m getting tired so I’m going to go to sleep. You guys can totally stay if you want. The bed is big enough and Mirio-kun is already asleep. Goodnight.”
And that’s it. Hadou fluffs her pillow a little bit and closes her eyes. She doesn’t say anything else.
Tamaki’s mind is whirling. There are so many uncertainties, but at least one thing is a little clearer. He thinks he understands Hadou better now. He’s spent so much time trying to figure out what she wants from him, attempting to find her ulterior motive even if it’s a benign one — but maybe there isn’t a “why” behind the things she says. Maybe she just says them.
Somehow, Tamaki takes comfort in that.
Tamaki’s skin is still on fire, but eventually he decides to stay. All three of them sleep there that night. It’s not the most spacious sleeping arrangement, but Tamaki is comfortable. He lets himself curl into Mirio’s side, just a little, and for now that’s more than enough. They have plenty of time to figure out the rest.
4.
It’s been two years since they became friends with Hadou, and she still hasn’t learned to knock.
When the door to Mirio’s dorm room bursts open, Tamaki almost jumps out of his skin. He nearly falls off the bed in his rush to scramble off of Mirio’s chest. The sheets are a tangled mess on the floor, and their hair is almost just as tousled.
“Oh good, you’re both here,” Hadou says. She walks right into the room, seemingly obvious to their flushed faces or Mirio’s kiss-swollen lips. Without waiting for a response from either of them, she flops back onto the end of Mirio’s bed and tilts her head to look at them upside-down. “Have you finished the English assignment yet? I’m stuck at the 5th exercise.”
“Um,” Tamaki stammers. “H-Hadou…”
“Lovely Hadou,” Mirio says, propping himself up on his elbows. “We’d love to work on the English homework with you, but… Could you come back later?”
Hadou rolls over and stares at them, brows furrowed in confusion. Her eyes flick from Mirio’s face to Tamaki’s, and then zeroes in on their rumpled shirts. Thank god we’re both wearing clothes , Tamaki thinks, in direct contrast with his train of thought only moments earlier.
“Ohhh,” Hadou says finally, her eyes widening in understanding. “You guys were—”
“Kissing,” Tamaki interrupts before she can finish her sentence. He covers his face with his hands. “We were just kissing.”
Hadou’s grin is audible. “Okay.” The mattress shifts, and when Tamaki peeks through his fingers to look, Hadou is no longer at the edge of the bed. “I’ll leave you two to it!” she laughs, a little too loudly. “Have fun!”
She leaves the room and lets the door slam behind her. They can hear her humming down the hall as she returns to her room.
Mirio turns his head to look at him. Here’s a hopeful tilt to his eyebrows.
“In a minute,” Tamaki mumbles. He buries his face in Mirio’s pillow, as though he can physically hide from his own embarrassment. His face is burning.
“Okay,” Mirio agrees with a smile. “In a minute.”
5.
It’s been three days since they stormed the Shie Hassaikai Compound, but Mirio still hasn’t been allowed to come home from the hospital.
Visiting hours are only from noon to five — too short. way too short. Tamaki wants to be at his side so badly it’s like a physical ache in his chest, more painful than the dull throb of his own injuries from the fight. They won, he tries to remind himself. They won, but they lost so, so much — and Mirio lost more than any of them.
Tamaki is lying on his bed, staring at the ceiling when there’s a gentle knock on his door. He lifts his head, but says nothing.
“It’s me,” says Hadou from the other side of the door. “Can I come in?”
Tamaki swallows. He thinks, and then finally clears his throat. “Okay,” he calls back. His voice sounds rough even to his own ears, but it’s clear enough. A moment later, the door to Tamaki’s room opens slowly, and Hadou slips inside.
“You’ve been in here for a while,” she says.
Tamaki nods, because it’s true. He’s been in his room all evening — ever since they got back from the hospital.
“Can I stay with you?”
Tamaki looks at her again — notes the uncharacteristic solumness in her expression, the bags under her eyes. He nods a second time.
He realizes, a little belatedly, that he might not have fully considered what he agreed to. As soon as he agrees, Hadou crosses the room, pulls up the covers on Tamaki’s bed, and crawls in next to him. He stiffens. They haven’t done this — or at least, he hasn’t. Not with her. But she’s warm — almost as warm as Mirio is. When she puts her arms around him, he finds himself crumbling into her touch.
“They’ll figure out how to get his quirk back,” Hadou says. “He’ll be okay. Trust me.”
And he does trust her, he realizes. He trusts Mirio, and he trusts her. If both of them have said something is true, there’s nothing he can do but believe them.
“Okay,” he murmurs into her shoulder, clutching at the fabric of her shirt. “Okay.”
The world is still a mess. Recovery will be slow, but with a spirit as strong as Mirio’s, Hadou is right — it’s inevitable. He will be okay.
+1
“Hold the door please, lovely Hadou!”
“Whoops — sorry Mirio-kun! Let me take one of those boxes—”
“I can carry them. Tamaki might need a hand with the table, though—”
“Oh! Right, it looks heavy. Here, Tamaki—”
“Hadou-san, the door—”
“Whoops!”
Just as the door to their new apartment begins to close on Mirio’s exposed back, Tamaki flings out a hand, his fingers turning into tentacles that manage to snag the door just in time. He sighs in relief. Then the table in his arms starts to slip.
“I’ve got you!” Hadou says. The other end of their new breakfast table lifts, and Hadou beams at him. “Good catch, Tamaki-kun!”
Tamaki returns her smile. “Thanks…”
After a little bit of rearranging and only minimal quirk use, they manage to get the last of the boxes and the table into their apartment. It’s not big — just two bedrooms, one bathroom, and a combined kitchen and common area. Even with their combined hero salaries, getting an apartment so close to their hero agencies is expensive. Still, it’s home — their first home. A home for all three of them.
The apartment is unfurnished. They have a couch, a table, and some chairs, but they will need to go buy beds tomorrow. Tonight, they’ll sleep on sleeping bags and a couple of Tamaki’s parents’ spare futons. It won’t be the most comfortable sleeping arrangement, but it’s only temporary.
They spend the evening unpacking what they can. When dinner time arrives, they order takeout, passing the paper containers between them on the floor of one of the bedrooms. Moving is exhausting, and they’re all bone tired. Mirio has only just finished cleaning up the trash from dinner when Hadou starts pulling out the futons, arranging them next to each other in the center of the empty room.
“Let’s share tonight, okay?” she says. “It’s our first night here. You can have the room to yourselves tomorrow when you actually have a bed.”
Mirio gives Tamaki a look, smiling. Tamaki ducks his head. His ears are burning just a little.
“Good idea, Hadou,” Mirio says. “Let me give you a hand with the sleeping bags.”
When they finally settle down to sleep, Tamaki is in the middle with Hadou and Mirio on either side. The futons are a little lumpy, and the sleeping bags aren’t quite big enough to comfortably cover all three of them, but Tamaki is comfortable. He’s safe and he’s warm and he’s nestled in between his two favorite people. Tomorrow, they’ll shop for a few necessities. They’ll unpack all the boxes they’ve brought and find a place for everything, mixing their possessions in drawers and cabinets and shelves until they’re not sure whose is whose anymore — just like their tangled limbs atop the old futons on the floor of this little bedroom. Their future is together, and it’s so, so bright. He’ll never let them go.