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It’s not like Katsuki actually expects him to say it.
It’s a Saturday afternoon, three months before graduation, and Katsuki is making him and Izuku lunch after training.
In three months Katsuki will be out there, in the world, a real hero— as if he isn’t one already. That means he has to up his ante. He’s been testing out some new moves lately, ones he can master before graduation if he really works at it. He knows he can.
Izuku is a nosey little shit, and won’t let Katsuki train alone unless he knows Katsuki really needs it. So they train together, although half the time Izuku ends up just staring at him in awe, fingers twitching like he can’t wait to get back to the dorms so he can write out everything he’s learned about Katsuki in one of his freaky little notebooks. The thought shouldn’t make Katsuki preen, but it does.
“Kacchan, that new move you’re working on is coming together so nicely! At this point you’ll be able to master it within the next week! You’re so amazing, Kacchan, and you’ve improved so much from our first year!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Katsuki mumbles, expertly ignoring the weird feeling he gets in his stomach and the warmth bleeding onto his face. Nothing the nerd hasn’t said before.
“Do you think I could inspire my own new move off of it? I know you said you didn’t like that before, but I thought maybe if I asked…”
“Have at it, dweeb. You stewing in the knowledge that none of your moves are original is payback enough for me.”
Izuku prattles on, as if he hadn’t even heard Katsuki. “Your explosions are so controlled, too. I mean, they have been for a good while, but this is a whole new level! I wonder if you’ll get to a point where you can use AP-Shot with just one hand! Though it’s impressive either way. Speaking of, what are you planning on naming this new move? Probably something cool, because everything you do is cool. Wow Kacchan, you really are an inspiration!”
Katsuki grabs a carton of eggs out of the fridge, holding them in one hand as he rummages around for the fish he had planned on making for lunch. His heart is beating too fast in his chest. “Okay, I get it, damn. Just admit that you’re in love with me already,” he jokes, wincing at his words almost immediately after. What a weird thing to say. What a weird thing to say that will totally give away his big gay crush on his kind of best friend with whom he has a complicated past. He’s waiting for the silence to come, for the awkwardness as the joke falls flat, for the—
“I’m in love with you,” Izuku says, and. Hmm. That was not in the script.
Katsuki is shocked, in simple terms. He feels sick, nauseous and hot and shaky and… twisty. Inside and out. Is he sweating profusely? He feels like he’s sweating profusely. The carton of eggs slips out of his grasp. His shoulders hunch up to his ears as he hears them all crack apart on the ground. Izuku gasps from behind him at the sound.
“My eggs,” Katsuki says quietly, which. Wow. He wants to slam his head against the refrigerator door for the next fifteen minutes. He has such a way with words.
“Ah shit,” Izuku says. Katsuki watches egg yolk leak from the carton, puddling onto the floor. Half of his body is still in the fridge, though he’s paused in his search for his fish indefinitely. “Did I say that out loud?”
“You did,” Katsuki says. Izuku makes a weird yelping noise.
“I didn’t mean it!” he says, and that’s literally the worst thing Katsuki has ever heard in his life.
“Of course not,” Katsuki agrees easily. The yolks spread further, coming dangerously close to Katsuki’s slippers.
“Well— wait, no, okay, so, I did. But only a little! Like, like only if you… if you wanted me to actually say that then maybe I kind of meant it, but if what you said was. Just a joke, which it was, huh? Oh no. Oh god. Then I didn’t mean it and it was all a joke! Ha-ha, funny, good times! Laugh, Kacchan. Please laugh, oh my god.”
“Did you mean it?”
“Yes. No. Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. Ask me again in three to four business days.”
“Goddammit, Izuku,” Katsuki says, and he yanks himself away from the fridge and slams the door of it closed. He stomps over to the breakfast bar where Izuku is sitting, and leans over the granite to yank at Izuku’s white t-shirt. “Tell it to me straight. Did you fucking mean that, or no?”
Izuku swallows, and Katsuki can feel it where his knuckles rest against the warm middle of his throat through his shirt. Izuku's eyes are wide, and he’s grimacing, but he doesn’t look away from Katsuki when he says, “I meant it.” Then he tacks on a quiet, “Sorry.”
Oh, holy shit. Katsuki is about to combust. Literally. He can feel his palms pooling with sweat, which is not good news for Izuku’s stupid t-shirt shirt. If his face is hot then his ears are practically on fire. He’s still nauseous, and his body is shaking with adrenaline. After that roller coaster of ‘I do but I don’t,’ Katsuki’s body can’t quite tell if it should be happy or not.
Katsuki wants to kiss him, but he always wants that. He’s a gentleman, so he’ll wait until the second date. It’ll be a week from now, maybe sooner, and the two of them will have just seen that All Might movie remake that came out a few days ago, and Izuku will be rambling on and on about it as they walk back to UA campus, and he’ll look so pretty under the light of the moon, and the stars, and Katsuki will— shit, he’s planning it already. He hasn’t even asked for their first one yet.
He pulls his hand off of Izuku’s shirt and away, though he doesn’t really want to. He wipes his sweat off on the rough fabric of his sweat pants and hopes Izuku can’t tell how nervous he is. Speaking of, Izuku is currently eyeing him apprehensively.
“Good,” Katsuki says. Izuku’s head tilts down.
“I know, Kacchan, and I’m sor— wait what.”
“I said,” he waits until Izuku looks back up at him, “good. We’re going out for dinner at that shitty ramen place tomorrow. Be ready by four thirty, I wanna be home before eight.”
“Yuzu’s? I love that place…” Izuku whispers, a little taken aback. “Kacchan, did you just ask me out on a date?”
Katsuki eyes Izuku weirdly. “Yeah, dipshit. Don’t be late.” He glances behind him at the poor carton of eggs. The yolks have spread out amongst the tiles of the dorm kitchen, soaking into the grooves of them. Katsuki frowns. He can already tell none of them are salvageable. “Now help me clean those up. It’s your fault I dropped them, anyways.”
Izuku smiles at him before standing, and Katsuki wonders what he’s done in a past life to be blessed with the fucker in this one.