Work Text:
Come find me
As the world spun out from underneath Izuku, the light inside his chest blinking out, he heard his lover call out to him.
“Come find me in the next life,”
His lover’s voice sounded so far away; as if Izuku was at the bottom of a well and his lover was looking down on him from so many feet up.
“K-Kacchan,” Izuku coughed out. It took so much energy to just say one word, the most beautiful word there was, and Izuku hated it. He had been saying that word, that name, since he could talk.
Kacchan, sugoi!
Kacchan, wait for me!
Kacchan?
Kacchan, wait!
The weight that was bearing down on Izuku was becoming greater and greater every second. It hurt so deeply, so blindingly just to take a shaky breath. Soon, he wouldn’t be able to even do that.
He felt a hand on his cheek. Hard, calloused, warm skin against his own.
“You hear me, you stupid bastard? You better come back for me.”
Katsuki’s voice was softer than he had ever heard it. Izuku could barely make the words out, but he could feel them. Katsuki’s other hand was splayed out against his chest. As Izuku took his last long breaths, he felt that they were in time with Katsuki’s own labored breaths. In those breaths, they were all that was left in the universe. Everything was fading into a dull grey.
Everything but Kacchan.
The last thing Izuku saw was Katsuki’s ashy blonde hair as he laid his forehead against Izuku’s chest. The last thing he smelled was the burnt sugary scent from his skin. The last thing he heard was the soft sobs and pleas for Izuku to find him again. The last thing he felt was his overwhelming presence. The presence that was as much a part of Izuku as his own soul. It felt warm. It felt like home.
***
Izuku stepped off the subway, and took a deep breath through his nose. He loved the way the fresh spring air filled his lungs. Securing his bag strap, he continued on his way. He watched the sky as he went. It was crystalline blue, the only clouds in sight were sparse and thin. The sun was warm on Izuku’s skin.
Izuku was so distracted by the sky that he didn’t see the man that was walking backwards out of a small bake shop. Well, not until he ran into him and the force sent him reeling back a few steps.
“Hey! Watch where you’re going, you shitty moron! Can’t you see?!”
Izuku shook his head before looking up, already apologizing.
“I’m really sorry! I was just--”
As Izuku’s eyes found the blonde man in front of him, the words died on his lips. The blonde man’s garnet colored eyes anchored Izuku to that spot, but he felt as though the world’s orbit had changed.
Something raged inside his chest. A hurricane. A maelstrom. A tornado. A violent act of nature that left him breathless. The man stared back at Izuku. The sour expression he had been wearing broke, softened. His eyebrows were knit together in shock. His mouth was slightly agape.
His mouth.
In his mind, Izuku saw flashes of that mouth pulled into wide smiles, settled into cocky smirks, open in a way that caused Izuku to flush just by remembering. He could practically feel those lips against his.
Izuku took a tentative step forward, as if being pulled. The other man did the same.
“Deku?”
Upon hearing that name, time stopped. Just for a moment, everything around the two men was grey. Izuku felt the slightest weight on his pinky finger. He looked down and his eyes widened. Tied around Izuku’s pinky finger and stretching the small distance between the two men was a vibrant red string, the other end tied around the other man’s pinky.
Izuku looked back up to see a slight smile on the other man’s face.
It all came back to the both of them then, standing on that street corner. The lifetimes they had spent together. All the love, the laughter, the long nights in the comfort of the other’s embrace, the pain, the heartache, the years that would lead up to their next meeting. Like roots from an old tree, the memories spread through them. They tangled with the years they had already spent in this new life. The pieces of their souls moved like tectonic plates, making room for all the new moments and sensations.
Like taking in a breath of fresh spring air, Izuku’s lungs filled up with something that made him feel alive and full.
Izuku didn’t know it then, but that moment was the first time Katsuki had felt like that since losing Izuku in the last life.
What a beautiful thing-- breathing. Izuku briefly remembered what it felt like to not be able to do that. Remembered aching ribs and a cough stuck in his throat. Luckily, it was fleeting. This moment now, where they are reunited and faced with everything that they’ve had and lost so many times, it was always fleeting. It would crash into them like an unforgiving tidal wave and then settle into the slow push and pull of the ocean on a calm morning. The memories would surround them, bathe them in the hot white light of a passion that didn’t know the confines of time. And then they would fade. They would become hazy like dreams. Sometimes, these dreams were clearer and the two of them could recall events from lives past as if they were only months ago. Sometimes, they were much harder to place; only coming to them in an instant and going away even quicker.
They didn’t mind, though. They knew that whether they remembered clearly or not; all of those dreams of their lives together were real. They could feel it in those old roots, seeded in their veins. They could feel it in the atmosphere, in the way the other breathed, in the way the other touched. They could feel it in that absence that lived somewhere in their chests until they were together again.
Looking at each other, the two were whole once more.
Tears welled in Izuku’s green eyes.
“Kacchan! I found you!”
Izuku closed the distance between them in one leap; landing with a happy thud against Katsuki’s chest. Katsuki’s hands wound around him in a crushing hug. Izuku felt the faintest wetness in the crook of his neck where Katsuki’s face was.
“Took you long enough, you damn nerd.”