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Bakugou’s boots drag along the floor as she walks towards her apartment door. Her shoulders feel like they’ve settled inches lower than where they normally sit, weighed down by the exhaustion her body carries.
It’d been a long day. Literally and figuratively. She’s just now getting home, 19 hours since she stepped out this morning, nearing 2 am.
Reaching into her pocket nimbly, her nerves raced with heat, pain shooting up her arms. She could barely grip the key in her hand.
Not to mention every time she moved flakes of dirt fluttered to her feet. It was etched onto her costume, in her hair. Black ash adorned her face, streaked with dried sweat that had dripped from her forehead.
Finally getting the key into the damn hole, Bakugou twisted it and winced as the metal dug into her raw and overworked hands, pushing the door open. She decidedly did not look at her hands, a pang of fear spiking through her with just how raw her fingers felt.
She’d deal with it later.
It started when a petty group of villains with much too powerful quirks for their own good started a fight they couldn’t finish. The fight had escalated so severely within an hour that numerous pro heroes were called onto the scene, Bakugou included.
The whole ordeal was a mess, the villains doing whatever they could to try and gain some footing, unorganized and frantic without a plan. Which, of course, also meant trouble for the pros.
Cillvians got pulled in, and an uncontrolled fire meant a lack of coordination and panic among every party involved.
So, yeah. A mess.
Bakugou shucked her shoes off upon entering the apartment, heading towards her bedroom in the back. It was just as she left it this morning. Kirishima was still gone on an operation in a neighbouring city, not due to get back until late the next day, otherwise she probably would’ve been called on today as well.
She knew she needed to text her, but the last she saw of her phone it was nestled in her pocket and shattered. Yet another thing filed away under ‘deal with later’.
Bakugou stepped into the conjoining bathroom and reached into the shower, turning it on before stripping herself of her costume.
It was then that she realized just how severely she was shaking, pausing in her actions as she stared down at her trembling hands.
The adrenaline was wearing off, and for the first time that night she truly inspected the state of her hands.
The tips of her fingers, trailing all the way down to her wrist was raw and blistered. The most concerning part was that it wasn’t as leathery as the back of her mind was hoping it’d be, the wounds glistening wetly at her.
“Fuck…” Bakugou whispered.
She remembered when it happened. She’d been evacuating people from the burning building when, on the last exit, she’d gripped the scalding hot doorknob, the metal frame surrounding the door already starting to disfigure to the point where she couldn’t just simply kick it open like she could with the other doors. And it probably didn’t help that she’d continued to use her quirk afterwards.
Bakugou glanced back up at her shower, valiantly ignoring the hot, stinging pain. She didn’t know if she was even supposed to shower with burns like this, but she was already standing in the bathroom, naked, so she figured she might as well.
Thankfully, the stream wasn’t hot. Not exactly welcome on her sore muscles, but a stark contrast to how she’d just spent the last 5 hours of her day, surrounded by fucking fire.
She made an effort to keep her hands out of the water as it slowly washed the ash and dirt from off her body, before slowly submersing them, hissing through her teeth as tears sprung to her eyes, pain trailing all the way up her arms from the wounds.
She leaned against the wall for support as she hung her head and forced herself to keep her hands in place, at least until they didn’t feel like they were fucking burning up anymore. She braced herself tensely, teeth gritted and shoulders hunched as each forceful water droplet felt like they were ripping her hands apart.
Just as she was bringing her hands back slowly, standing up a little straighter as she inspected them again, the bathroom door burst open, and Bakugou whipped her head towards it, heart catching in her chest, eyes wide.
“Ei?” Bakugou blanched, looking at her girlfriend breathing heavily in the entrance of the bathroom, hand still braced on the back of the door, “What the fuck are you doing? Jesus, get out, I’m fucking naked!”
“Katsuki,” Kirishima growled wetly. Her voice surprised Bakugou, and it was then that she noticed the tears sliding cleanly down her face, how with every deep breath she took her chest stuttered a little.
Bakugou stayed quiet, watching as she stalked toward her.
“No call, no text? Nothing? Really, Katsuki? Really?” Kirishima said, too calmly for Bakugou’s liking. Her voice was still unsteady, however, verging on shaky, “I just got off a 2-hour train ride, hoping to God that you’re just an idiot who decided not to text me, hoping to God you weren’t dead.”
Her voice finally broke on the last syllable, composure crumbling as she used a hand to cover her mouth, brows coming together. Her eyes stayed trained on Bakugou, however, even as tears welled and slipped down her cheeks.
Bakugou couldn’t look away, as much as she wanted to. Kirishima’s expression could only be described as one thing. Disappointed.
Bakugou finally held her hands out to her, palms up, in lieu of an explanation, “I… I couldn’t text you,” she whispered.
Kirishima looked down at her hands, confused, and reached out to hold them nimbly in her own, bringing them closer to her face to inspect them, anger forgotten momentarily, “These are…”
“Second-degree, I think,” Bakugou finished.
Kirishima lifted her head back up to look at her, “Didn’t a medic check these out?”
“Um, no…” Bakugou mumbled, averting her eyes, “Nobody looked at me, I just wanted to go home.”
Kirishima shook her head, exasperated, “Kat-”
“Please,” Bakugou interrupted, “Please. You can yell at me tomorrow. I just want to clean up and go to bed.”
They held each other’s gaze for a moment, before Kirishima nodded silently, turning to strip her shirt over her head, then to pull off her pants. Bakugou watched her, hands still held awkwardly out from under the stream.
Eventually Kirishima stepped into the shower behind her, wasting no time in lathering body wash over Bakugou’s body, carefully scrubbing away dirt, before moving on to wash her hair. She instructed Bakugou when to turn, or when to close her eyes, speaking softly. Bakugou felt her eyes grow heavy under the care.
“I’m sorry I didn’t text you,” Bakugou whispered eventually, opening her eyes to look at Kirishima.
“It’s okay,” Kirishima whispered back.
Bakugou shook her head, “If I was in your position… I’d be going out of my mind. I should’ve texted you, the burns aren’t a good enough excuse.”
“I was just scared,” Kirishima said, lifting a hand to cradle her cheek, “Watching the news, watching you disappear into that building and then… nothing. I told myself you’d text me, but when you didn’t… after hours of waiting, I just-” Kirishima’s breath hitched, and she bit her lip, averting her eyes, “If… If you weren’t here when I arrived… I don’t know what I’d do. And-and I didn’t know if you were here. Didn’t know until I heard the shower.”
Tears dripped down Kirishima’s face again, and Bakugou’s heart sunk, leaning into the hand on her face a little more.
“I know it’s morbid,” Kirishima continued, “But for some reason, all I could think about is how we haven’t had the talk yet, about what happens if one of us dies on the field. And for some reason that just terrified me. It almost sent me into a panic attack, just thinking about whether you’d want to be buried or cremated. ‘S stupid, there were a million other things to be worried about, but… I don’t know.”
Her words made Bakugou feel sick to her stomach, helpless as Kirishima let her hand drop.
She’s not good with words, so she stayed quiet. Selfishly decided not to consol her. She didn’t know how to.
Kirishima flicked her eyes back to her eventually and smiled meekly.
Together, the two of them climbed out of the shower, and Kirishima towelled Bakugou down before sitting her on the toilet seat. Bakugou watched as she knelt to rummage under the sink, remerging with bandage wraps.
“Ei, you don’t need to-”
“Let me. Please,” Kirishima lifted a hand to push some hair from Bakugou’s face, “Let me do this.”
Bakugou swallowed, staring into her eyes, “Okay.”
Kirishima got to work, settling in front of Bakugou, “We’ll go to the hospital today.”
Bakugou nodded, glancing into the bedroom at the alarm clock, 3:41 am.
The only sounds were their breathing as Kirishima took her time wrapping the fingers, the entire city seemingly settling after the chaos, their apartment included.
“I’ll do better, Ei,” Bakugou whispered after minutes of silence, when Kirishima was finishing up.
I’ll do better. I care about you. I’ll be less selfish.
Kirishima brought her eyes up to her’s, shaking her head, “Today wasn’t your fault.”
Bakugou swallowed, throat growing tight, “I’m still gonna do better.”
A small smile ebbed onto Kirishima’s face, “Okay,” she whispered, standing up and taking Bakugou by the wrist, pulling them both into the bedroom.
Bakugou didn’t know what was harder, being in a relationship or working herself to exhaustion, fighting villains for hours on end. Didn’t know what hurt more, gripping a molten hot metal doorknob or watching the one person she truly loves endure disappointment after disappointment because of herself. Watch her eyes dim after fuck up on top of fuck up.
It ached to know just how much love she had inside her for the girl, with no way of getting it out. Ached to know how hard she was to love in return.
Still, Bakugou allowed Kirishima to tug a sleep shirt over her head, and stepped into some sweatpants. Bakugou waited for Kirishima to do the same, before rounding the bed to crawl in with her, settling beside her on her back. She stared up at the ceiling for a moment, before her hand crept out to find Kirishima’s, their fingers lacing the best they could with the bandages. Bakugou ignored the twinge of pain and turned toward her on her side, and Kirishima lolled her head to meet her gaze.
“I love you.”
Kirishima smiled, and Bakugou shuffled awkwardly toward her, fingers staying laced, until they shared the same pillow, noses almost brushing.
Kirishima leaned forward and pecked her lips, before turning Bakugou over and spooning her from behind, hands winding around her middle.
“I love you too, Kat,” Kirishima whispered into her neck, “I love you so much.”
Bakugou smiled to herself, pressing herself back against Kirishima’s body.
Maybe they weren’t winning any awards for ‘best couple’ anytime soon, but if there’s one thing Bakugou knows it’s that she’ll absolutely never stop fighting for them, as there’s not a single pair of arms she belongs in more than Kirishima’s.
And right now, it’s enough of a reassurance to lull her into a steady sleep.