Chapter Text
The snow falls sulkily, drifting down to the dingy pavement in inefficient spirals that suggest that it, too, would rather find anywhere else to land. Instead of a pretty powder dusting, the stark white flecks look unpleasantly similar to dandruff on a businessman’s shoulder.
Shinsou groans and shifts his weight, wincing as he realizes one of his feet has gone to sleep. At least the painful prickling sensation will keep him alert for a time. The thermos Shinsou still clutches in one hand has been empty for hours, though he still finds himself raising it to his lips periodically in hopes of finding one last, lingering drop.
He’s not supposed to be here, Shinsou thinks bitterly. He’s supposed to be at home, in the warm, with Mothball on his lap and mulled wine on the stove. Just the two of them, like Christmas Eve last year and the year before it, too.
But now. Well. Now, he has a chance.
It’s a slim one, to be sure. Vibrant, laughter-filled Kaminari couldn’t possibly be that interested in Shinsou, right? He flirts with everyone, always winking and smiling and pursing his shimmery lips. And yeah, he asked Shinsou to have dinner with him tonight - on Christmas Eve - and that’s definitely a sign. It has to be. Even Kaminari’s not that airheaded. But the last time Shinsou thought Kaminari was asking him out for coffee, it turned out to be a “friend thing”. Mina was there too, scowling and slurping obnoxiously on her pink Starbucks frappe-whatever that probably didn’t even have a teaspoon of coffee in it. Maybe the lack of caffeine was why the usually cheerful young woman was in such a foul mood that day.
Well, if Shinshou shows up to the restaurant and finds the whole gang waiting for him instead of just Kaminari, that’s fine. Totally fine. He’ll just smile, make polite conversation, drink an appropriate amount of alcohol, and then go home and drown himself in the bath.
And he definitely won’t give Kaminari his present.
That is, if there will even be a present to give. Shinsou’s been standing in this cursed line since the trains started running that morning but now the sun is already low in the sky, and the temperature is quickly dropping with it. The line crawls forward, and Shinsou moves with it, stumbling a little on his numb feet. He stows his decidedly empty thermos in his bag and then crams his hands in his jacket pockets, wishing he’d been wise enough to wear mittens.
But he couldn’t have predicted that the limited-edition smart watch Kaminari had been drooling over on Twitter for months would be this arduous to get a hold of. For one thing, even though Shinsou arrived at the crack of dawn, the line was already wrapped around the building when he got here. At this point he’s almost afraid to turn around and see how long it’s gotten. Secondly, they were supposed to open the doors at ten, but apparently the store was unprepared for how popular this stupid watch had gotten, too. They ended up moving the watches to their very own kiosk just outside the store’s entrance, allowing other shoppers to go inside unhindered. For some reason which Shinsou cannot possibly fathom, this took an entire four hours.
Then, someone near the front of the line made a big fuss when they found out that they were limited to the purchase of one watch only. A reseller, most likely, planning to make a killing by putting the watches online for sale at an obscene markup. They would not be moved, demanding to speak to the manager, then their manager, the owner of the store, and probably God themself by the end. Finally they had to call security to remove the greedy customer, and then security had to call the police when the reseller realized they hadn’t even managed to complete their transaction for the purchase of one measly watch and threw a violent fit.
A short while later, the debit terminals went down. Another hour lost.
So, by the time his prize is nearly within his grasp, Shinsou is quite prepared to give up on the whole thing. Perhaps he should cut his losses and give up on buying Kaminari’s gift. Shinsou supposes he could always just pick up another Pikachu plushie or something on the way to the restaurant. Or better yet, Shinsou should buy nothing at all. It will be easier to swallow the disappointment that way, when it inevitably turns out that this isn’t a date, either. That it will never be a date.
It’s only the memory of Kaminari’s sparkling eyes as he excitedly babbled about this new piece of tech that allows Shinsou to hang on to his resolve.
Finally, it’s Shinsou’s turn. He exhaustedly buys the damn thing and observes with dull eyes as the cashier delicately puts the shiny watch in a faux-velvet lined box, and then wraps the box with stiff, expensive-looking paper, and then puts the wrapped box in a bag, and then puts that bag into another bag.
For fuck’s sake. No wonder he’s been standing outside this godsforsaken store all day.
At last, Shinsou takes the elaborate package and steps away from the counter. Distantly, he can hear the cashier informing the customer behind him that the last watch has now been purchased and there is no stock remaining. Huh. Lucky him. Shinsou feels a moment of pity for everyone who wasted an entire day with nothing to show for it.
He checks his phone. The battery’s low, but it’s got enough juice left to inform Shinsou that he was supposed to be at the restaurant two minutes ago. Shit. Urgency propels Shinsou down the street towards the station. If he catches the next train he shouldn’t be more than twenty minutes late, right? Shinsou will just text Kaminari and let him know-
“Excuse me! Sir? Please, wait just a moment!”
Shinsou turns back and sees a man just slightly older than himself rushing to catch up with him. Did Shinsou drop something? He pats the side of his bag, but it is securely fastened.
“Thank you,” the man wheezes, fighting for the breath lost running after him. He’s smartly dressed, with a long grey wool coat over his well-fitted black suit. It appears as though he’s come from the now quickly-dispersing line of disappointed shoppers, though he must have come a lot later in the day than Shinsou, because he doesn’t look nearly as weary.
“What is it?” Shinsou asks, regretfully hearing his own terseness. It can’t be helped. He’s about to miss his train, and it’s now so cold that it’s become painful, his denim jeans (his nicest pair, the ones that Kaminari once commented make his “ass look thick as hell”) stiff and chafing his frozen skin red-raw. Shinsou’s ears sting with cold in a way that has him starting to worry about frostbite, and he can’t help crossing his arms tightly over his chest in an attempted reprieve from the chilly air, which has grown thick with falling snow.
The man fixes a pleading expression upon him. “You were able to purchase a Pear watch, yes? One of the new “lightning yellow” ones?
“Yes,” Shinsou admits warily. This season’s most coveted accessory does have a nice design, and the little gold lightning bolt on the butter yellow vegan leather band is one of the main reasons Kaminiari’s been so rabid about the thing. He fawns over electricity designs and tech gizmos the way their old highschool teacher not-so-secretly collected cat themed merchandise.
A flash of relief crosses the man’s face. “Listen,” he says, leaning in close, “can I buy it off you? I really, really need it.”
Like a flashback before dying, the day’s torturous events flicker in a horrible slideshow before Shinsou’s eyes. “Absolutely not. I have to go-”
“Please!” the man cries, audaciously grabbing on to the elbow of Shinsou’s too-thin coat. “It’s… it’s for my daughter!”
“And this is for my b- for my friend, and he’s important too,” Shinsou snaps, wrenching his arm free. He means to storm off, but pauses incredulously as he sees tears gathering in the man’s eyes.
“She’s sick,” he explains tearfully. “Really sick, she’s been in the hospital for a month now. This watch is all she talks about lately, all her friends in school are crazy about Pear stuff. I thought that maybe… Maybe…” The man sniffles. “Maybe, if she has it, she’ll get better. So she can wear it to school and show them all.”
God.
Fucking.
Damn it.
“Fine,” Shinsou sighs, exasperated. He clumsily opens his bag with frozen fingers and pulls out the package he’d poured all his hopes into.
“Oh my god! Thank you so much!” The man’s tears vanish as he hastily shoves a thick wad of bills into Shinsou’s hand, at least as much as Shinsou paid for the watch. With one last joyous call of gratitude, the man hurries off into the snow.
Heart heavy, Shinsou continues on to the station. He’s missed his train, because of course he has. His phone has died, because of course it has. At least the station is heated. By the time the train arrives, his toes have nearly regained feeling.
The automatic doors pull open and Shinsou hesitates, one foot in the entryway. What’s the point? By the time he gets to the restaurant, he’ll be an hour late. Kaminari and their friends will be well into their meal, maybe even finishing up. Maybe getting ready to go to a bar for drinks or to karaoke or to Mina and Kirishimas’s generously large flat for Mario Party. Shinsou should just go home to Mothball. Even though he gave her more than enough food for the day earlier, she’s probably meowing at the door for him to come home and feed her a second dinner.
He turns away from the waiting train, then stops again.
What if it really was a date?
Is Kaminari still waiting?
He barely makes it inside before the doors close. In fact, they catch on his foot, and Shinsou endures the judging stairs of the other passengers as he curses and pulls it through.
When Shinsou finally reaches the fancy Italian restaurant where he’d agreed to meet Kaminari, he’s just in time to see Kaminari stepping outside of it. The door swings closed behind Kaminari. A sudden snow-filled rush of wind blows into Shinsou’s eyes, forcing them shut. When he reopens them, it is to the sight of Kaminari’s face illuminated by cheery Christmas lights, the colorful lights reflected in fresh tear tracks.
Kaminari is crying.
Fast as he can, Shinsou runs toward him, dodging the couples who fill the busy sidewalk. “Kaminari!”
He looks up instantly, whipping his head around for the source of Shinsou’s voice. “Shinsou?”
Their eyes meet through the snow. Kaminari’s eyes are red-rimmed, and Shinsou has a nasty feeling that his eyes look about the same.
“I’m so sorry,” Shinsou gasps, grasping Kaminari’s shoulders. “I’m so late, I got held up buying - uh. And then someone stopped me, and I missed the train, and my phone died…”
Kaminari uses the end of his own scarf to hastily dry his tears. “I thought you weren’t coming,” he says in a choked up voice that does horrible things to Shinsou’s heart. “We lost our table. There was another reservation after ours.”
Shinsou feels lower than dirt, lower than the icy pavement beneath his feed. “Did you guys at least go ahead and eat without me?”
“Huh?” Kaminari frowns, looking puzzled. “What do you mean? I’m the only one here. It was…”
Kaminari blushes. “It was supposed to be just you and me tonight.”
Oh.
“It was a date?” Shinsou dares to ask.
Hiding his face in his scarf, Kaminari nods.
Shinsou is such a colossal fucking idiot, god . It’s decided. He’s going to go home and drown himself in the bath. A hot one, so at least he can die warm as well as mortified. Mothball will be fine. Aizawa will adopt her, no problem. In fact, the last time he visited Shinsou, Aizawa looked halfway prepared to commit a catnapping anyways.
What sort of luck is this?! Not only does he not have a gift, the gift, the one that would have definitely made Kaminari fall in love with him forever, Shinsou also missed their first date. And lost them their Christmas Eve table reservation! There was no way any other restaurant would have a table available, not unless they had more roaches than menu items.
As he stands, paralyzed, watching an equally stiff Kaminari continue to bury his face in the fluffiest yellow scarf Shinsou has ever seen, he happens to hear a familiar voice behind him.
“I’m just so glad you like it, darling.”
“Like it?! Sweetums, I love it! I can’t believe you got one! You must have had to wait in line all day!”
“Well, you know me. Anything for my darling Rebecaa.”
“Oh, John!”
Rigid as a haunted suit of armor, Shinsou spins around. The man from earlier is walking towards them, arm in arm with a woman who is decidedly not his daughter. The watch that Shinsou had gone through hell and back to get a hold of sparkles on her wrist, the little gold lightning bolt shining in the Christmas lights as though deliberately designed to mock him.
“You’re going to love this place,” the man tells his partner, completely unaware of Shinsou trying to manifest laserbeam eyes and melt clean through the lying liar’s stupid ugly face. “Best Italian food in the city! I know the chef personally…”
“Excuse me.” Shinsou greets him, voice cutting through the air like a deathly sharp icicle falling from a gutter.
The couple pauses. The man looks horrified, the woman merely confused. “Do we know you?” she asks.
“He does,” Shinsou replies, looking meaningfully at the man. “Can I talk to you for a moment?”
“Now?” the man asks, voice trembling faintly.
“Now.”
“So what would you prefer?” Shinsou asks in a low, menacing voice seconds later as Kaminari and the woman watch them with twin expressions of bemusement. “You have two options. You can give us your table, or, you can tell your date exactly how you got that watch.”
“Ah… What if…?”
“You have only two options. Choose.”
Shinsou isn’t listening as the man leads his date away. He doesn’t know what excuses he’s made to explain why he’s given away their table reservation. Shinsou is focused only on Kaminari, who’s tears have dried and who looks up at Shinsou with glowing amazement as they are led to their new table.
“I can’t believe you managed this!” Kaminari laughs as they sit down. “What did you do, threaten him?”
“Uhh…”
The smile fades from Kaminari’s face, turning to shock. “Wait, really?”
Thankfully, this dangerous line of conversation is interrupted by the waiter, and before long they are tucking into plates of the best pasta Shinsou has ever tasted. The conversation flows as easily as the wine, so much so that Shinsou nearly forgets that they really are on a date. Their first date. He forgets to be nervous, forgets to sweat through the back of his shirt or to spill his water. He’s far too distracted to do such careless things. Kaminari looks radiant in the candlelight, and his eyes sparkle brighter than Shinsou has ever seen.
They kiss, for the first time, in Shinsou’s doorway. Kaminari had insisted on seeing him home, since he’d been the one to invite him out.
So Shinsou thinks it’s only fair to invite him in, then.
After calming the furious Mothball, Shinsou makes them mulled wine. They sip it on the couch, right where Shinsou spent Christmas Eve last year, and the year before.
They have their second kiss there, too. And a couple more firsts.
Afterwards they go to Shinsou’s room because it’s far too late for Kaminari to take a train home and anyways, what kind of monster would Shinsou be to let him go out in this sort of weather? Of course, Kaminari could sleep on the couch, but neither of them seem to remember the existence of such a piece of furniture despite having used it quite thoroughly moments prior.
It’s the first time they fall asleep in each other’s arms.
It’s not the last.
The next morning, they have a new sort of first. Shinsou wakes up with a raging fever and stuffy nose, and Kaminari declares himself responsible for nursing him back to health, and well. All things considered, it’s a very nice Christmas indeed, Shinsou thinks, napping with his head in Kaminari’s lap and Mothball on his feet.
Perhaps next Christmas will be spent the same way, if Shinsou’s extraordinary good luck continues.
Bonus:
That coffee they went for was totally supposed to be a date. Denki panicked at the last moment and begged Mina to come along. She was annoyed with him for being a, in her words, “cowardly-ass bitch”, and was quite cranky for the entire outing.