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It's Saturday when the story shows up in the newspaper, a blown up black and white photo of a middle-aged man almost glaring at the camera printed on the front page. He's dressed in a suit and tie with the collar of his dress shirt starchy and creased like it's fresh off an ironing table, and his shoulders are firmly set in the way that soldiers in the army do, as if something terrible would happen if they were slouching in pictures. His jaw is harshly defined, masculine to a t, square, and there's what looks like the beginnings of a neckbeard inching up his chin but it's still too pubescent to grow in smoothly all at once. The man's hair is cut short and cropped close to his head, once again giving the impression of someone in the army. The photo's in black and white so his hair color's unidentifiable other than vaguely dark.
It's Saturday, two days since Tomura ushered Dabi into his car with the backpack he carried around filled with his meager belongings and drove two and a half hours out to the mountains and left him to live in utter solitude for a little while Tomura works out a plan. There's no cell service there and radio signals don't reach either, and the cabin he'd offered Dabi was tucked into a grove surrounded by thick forest aside from the path up that took 30 minutes more to climb from where they'd had to park. Alone and only existing to the ants in the grass and birds amongst the treetops, Dabi's going on 30 or 35 hours now. Tomura hopes he's alright because that was all he could do and Dabi hadn't complained for a second. He'd just cracked a grin and dipped his head and said, where to?
There hasn't been any news of the mountain having spontaneously exploded, so he's probably alright. Dabi's a tough cookie.
Tomura traces the man in the photo's features with his fingers, gliding along his nose, cheekbones, brow, and tries to think of what's catching his eye here. He looks like someone he'd entirely abhor from day one if they ever met; the rest of him might be passable as just clean-cut, but Tomura could recognize the empty frost in those eyes no matter whose they were. That's a very specific kind of look. You don't have it by accident. He draws his gaze down and skims the text packed into the page below.
Todoroki Enji, 56, had been found dead in his home two days ago, on Thursday morning, by his secretary who came to check on him when she called his phone and it went to voicemail every time. Apparently he was a murder victim and the cause of death was suffocation, apparently by way of a convienence store shopping bag. Classy. But he died anyway and now journalists are falling over themselves to publish paraphrased biographies in the post detailing his grand litany of achievements. He worked in the government or something, which renders it all moot. Tomura's mouth twists into a scowl, but he retains his composure and folds up the paper then tucks it in his bag instead of crumpling it for the wastebin. His father's always been a stickler for treating words with respect. Even trashy ones. Tomura supposes he trained him well.
The rest of the day is business as usual; he continues to slave away at the reception desk between affording a quiet greeting to the occasional visitor. Hikiishi-san handles her tours with her usual grace then spends her free time at her desk upstairs, composing music amidst the tall shelves. The acoustics in the library are amazing, which tracks with how old the building is despite its recent renovation, so if anyone were to stop to listen they'd hear a rhythmic humming echoing from somewhere, accompanied by a nail tapping out a beat on wood in a semblance of a metronome. Hikiishi-san wrote a real piece once, one she made lyrics for and played and sang and everything. It wasn't intended to be, but somehow she ended up recording it in a studio with one of the microphones propped up right near her fingers on the ivories, and it sold a ton of copies. Enough that she can live just fine off the library's salary because she gets paid royalties whenever it gets played.
She never recorded another one, forever a one hit wonder. She swiftly and smoothly segues away from that topic when it comes up in conversation. But Tomura gets to hear what might've been and Hikiishi-san likes him enough that she'll bestow the honor of playing for him every now and then if her mood allows, so he won't pry. He likes Hikiishi-san too, and the paper cups of tea she kindly forces onto him when it gets chilly outside. If his father agrees, she might start doing that to Dabi too, and he'd either react like one of the hissy street cats around town or like the awkward teenager he really is below his jaded exterior. Futile either way.
Morning drips into afternoon into early evening and soon Tomura's already locked the windows and swept and locked the front door behind him. He drives home and walks inside and just like that the rest of the world splinters away, shrinking down to one house then one hallway then one study. It's in this bubble that his father says yes and dismisses Tomura, who has nothing more to say. He obediently shuts the lacquered black door behind him before trudging to his bedroom.
Showered and in bed within that confined space, Tomura decides he'll go get Dabi tomorrow. The library's closed on Sundays and it'll give him a chance to get settled in. And like that thought alone flipped a switch, he falls asleep and his hands curl into loose fists beside him, unconsciously.
He returns to the mountain and arrives sometime midday, and when he treks up to the cabin he's caught off guard to Dabi, sunbathing on the porch and totally nude. Tomura's kneejerk response is to flush bright red and clear his throat, just as Dabi blinks his eyes open. He startles just the tiniest bit when he notices him but makes no move to cover himself, so Tomura douses his brain and walks over.
"Back already?" He yawns, scratching the top of his head like he'd been napping. He at least has the decency to cross his legs now that Tomura's right there, thank god. "Shouldn't you be glad I am?" Tomura grumbles. "I worked something out so I came to get you. Unless you'd rather stay at the mercy of mother nature."
Dabi grunts in lieu of thanking him, then stands and walks back into the cabin to dress and pack his stuff into his bag again to take back. Tomura lingers for a second, captivated by Dabi's naked backside and his twiggy arms and legs. They're streaked with loud and violent red and purple scars. A first aid booklet would be more equipped to explain what degree of burn would do that to someone than Tomura.
The nonperishables get stored away and the perishables tossed and in no time at all they're back on the highway to town. Dabi is oddly silent the whole time, opting to stare out the window at the scenery morphing from lush wilderness to sleepy modern civilization to cityscape then back to the former, a far off look cast across his face as reflected in the window. Tomura taps out a beat on the steering wheel, and after a minute he recognizes it as Hikiishi-san's one hit wonder. He follows the tune with a bit more rhythm as he watches the lyrics transpose onto road signs and ward limits around him. Dabi just keeps watching everything else.
"You get the room to yourself since it's not gonna be used otherwise, but don't be a slob." Tomura warns as he pushes open a door to a discreet back room in the library. Dabi ducks in after him and whistles. "Damn, all this for little ole me?"
Despite the mocking words he sounds genuinely pleased; Tomura glances at the decrepit cobwebs in the corners of the ceiling and the dust on the thin windowsill and wonders faintly what it looks like to him. This might really be high living to him. That kinda makes Tomura feel better about letting his jitters get the best of him and hop in a car without stopping in to clean first. He drops his own bag on the floor and wastes no time in giving Dabi the rundown of everything in here and not, too. At his baffled expression Tomura sneers, and drawls, "Did you really think you'd just get to freeload?"
Dabi wrinkles his nose and glowers at him then says petulantly, "Sue me for being destitute." That yanks the mirth right out of Tomura-- he laughs.
"Text me if you need anything." He reminds him, and Dabi smiles at him with the same air of a well-fed and content cat that is going to delight in shattering three mugs later. Tomura rolls his eyes. He turns to leave and is only a step from the door when Dabi calls out to him with, "Wait, y'got a--"
Abruptly, he goes silent and doesn't say another word. Tomura looks over his shoulder then faces him again and notices the greyish papers in his hands, recognizes it as the newspaper from yesterday. The one with the picture of the man with the subhuman eyes and soldier's gait plastered on the front. 56 year old Todoroki Enji who died bravely by way of plastic bag. Dabi clutches it in his hands with tight fingers with a vacant expression. The stark lack of feeling is almost frightening.
"Dabi?" Tomura asks tentatively, and he startles and drops the newspaper as he snaps back to reality. "Yeah, sorry, it uh-- fell outta your bag." He blurts out. Emotion floods back in quicker than Tomura can blink, but it's frenzied. His eyes keep darting around instead of looking at him head on. "Sorry, here." He holds it out.
His hand is shaking minutely. Tomura gingerly takes it from him, then ventures, "Are you okay?"
Dabi's gaze shoots back to his, and he stares at him like he just said something insane. "Yeah." He says it mechanically, then again like he's convincing himself. "Yeah, it's nothin'. Dude on the front looked familiar and tripped me out for a sec."
Tomura raises an eyebrow at him and Dabi fidgets under his scrutiny but doesn't back down because that would mean being a pussy. "You know him?" He questions. Dabi looks a touch queasy when he answers, but it sounds honest. "Yeah, jus'." He gestures aimlessly. "Y'know."
Tomura, as a matter of fact, does not know, but he lets it be in favor of what he's pretty sure is common courtesy when someone just croaked. "Um." He flounders despite himself. "Sorry about-- for your loss."
The ensuing silence hangs heavy and thick in his throat, but eventually Dabi just sighs, his shoulders sagging. "Don't be sorry, man." He mumbles, and then with surprisingly poignant venom, "Motherfucker had it coming." But he hesitates after even with the things still pooled on his tongue. Tomura waits for whatever Dabi's willing to give him, because it's good enough. Maybe he was a little overzealous, securing housing for a runaway teenager with a nicotine habit for no real reason other than enjoying his presence. Maybe Dabi feels pressured by it. He doesn't need to be because that's just how Tomura is. He does what he wants to do and nothing less, so anything extra that comes of it is all at Dabi's discretion. Tomura's not picky; a whole lot of nothing is fine too.
Dabi sucks in a breath and Tomura's about to say that you don't have to tell me, it's fine but he speaks before he can, and he tells him. The square-jawed man, the dead one, that's his old man. His dad, who Dabi can only talk about with tight fury, who happens to be the common denominator of all that led Dabi to the seaside. A heavy-set, muscled oaf of a parent with a penchant for using his fists more than his mouth. One who was more inclined to strangle than soothe. One who threw his oldest son into a campfire and didn't pull him out until he was fragrant and medium well.
Those burns spilled across Dabi's body, red and purple with time that won't heal them any more than it already has, their image chains itself to the inside of Tomura's skull. One stretches up his chest and over his throat to stain his left cheek and all the skin below his lip. There's a solitary smudge split off from the rest of them under his right eye and along the side of his nose, and someone with an eye for aesthetics might call it unsightly. That kind of person might call Dabi himself unsightly. Ugly, even, if you wanted to go that far. That kind of person might think that and would be found dismembered in trash bags on Tomura's next day off if he overheard so much as a syllable.
His low voice is still off-pitch and scratchy from the adolescent curtains flanking it and Tomura studies him as it spreads. He listens and pieces together all that's been said and that's not been right in that moment and no later. Dabi has waited long enough for this story to be told.
"The disappointing part," he finishes, "is I wasn't the one t' do it."
He gazes out the window, at the sea, at the waves toppling over the shore as afternoon relents to pink evening. Distant. Here, in front of Tomura, but miles away from the grasp of his calloused, knobby fingers. Tomura scowls. He reaches out without bothering to second guess and grabs Dabi's arm against the odds. "Stop it." He commands. Dabi's eyes flick back to him with a question mark hanging over his dimmed head. "If that-- your dad, if he's dead, you should be happy." He cringes; that came out wrong. "I mean, you should--" Tomura struggles for the right phrasing even with all he has stuck between his teeth. Dabi watches him silently but it's not the same way he did the sea-- the grimy humanity the salt water had washed away, Tomura has tracked it muddy all over his face again. "What's done is done. You can't change the past, I can't, so don't waste time regretting it." A pause, then seriously, "We should celebrate."
One second, two, three and four and then–
Dabi laughs. Not just a chuckle or an amused huff pours out of him, but laughter, and he sounds like a donkey begging to be put out of its misery. The youth tucked into his skin that's usually so hard to find bursts out like a punctured can of spray paint. Splattering over the room and Tomura's clothes. A gallery piece, hung on white walls, and not for sale but revered anyway. The large world that he's grown used to feeling so small in and the cage of one it reduces to when he goes home are both nothing like this one. As cramped as a motel bathroom with only himself in it and a mirror full of vibrant, starkly vivid color, and a shrieking Dabi on the other side. Tomura rests his elbows on the sink and his gaze goes soft at the edges.
"We should celebrate, huh." He repeats, the bare jubilance slowing down but still twinkling in his eyes. Tomura nods firmly. "Shouldn't we?"
Dabi's lips quirk up at the corner, then for a split second he glances down and Tomura realizes his hand is still clasped around his bicep. He flinches and lets go like he's been shocked, but Dabi's reflexes beat his and he catches Tomura's wrist.
With a pond voice undisturbed by even bugs, Dabi says, "You know what." Smooth as butter and seamless he slips his hand into Tomura's. Tomura can't help going red, because somehow this is just as bad as seeing his naked dick. His cheeks burn but he fits his fingers into the spaces between Dabi's own, and Dabi tells him, "You got a point."