Chapter Text
Deku thought he was hallucinating when he saw Bakugo’s small endeared smile, his arm resting on Shoto’s shoulders as he kept the boy closer to him, Todoroki peacefully sleeping against the blonde’s chest.
He knew the two were getting closer, having himself caught them hanging around a few times, but he never thought it’d end up this way.
So… openly in front of everyone?
Deku found out about their gradual closenessness the first time when Shoto took a picture of his lunch and sent it to Bakugo under the smaller’s surprised look.
“Did you just send a picture of your lunch to Kacchan?” Deku asks discreetly as the ice bender closes his phone, separating his chopsticks while nodding.
“Bakugo taught me how to take pictures with my phone.” He explains, getting Uraraka’s and Iida’s attention, both looking weirdly towards their friend.
“Why did he taught you that?” asks the brunette, tilting her head to the side.
“During our supplementary classes, a lot of people were taking pictures and smiling.” The white-haired boy explains as he starts eating, and Deku can’t help but look around, searching for the messed up blond haired head that usually sits not too far from them, catching him looking in their direction with a small grimace. “And I wanted to know why people were so happy about, so I asked Bakugo about it. And apparently, people take pictures of the things that warm their heart or things they’d like to remember in the future.”
Deku reports his attention back into Todoroki as the boy was pointing his soba, munching slowly. “I like the taste of cold soba, so I wanted to keep a memory of it. Isn’t this how it works?” Uraraka and Iida were laughing, endeared by their friend’s behavior and Midoriya smiles a little, kind of happy to see his best friend actually behaving like a normal human being for once, keeping his rivalry with Todoroki to the side and helping him out improving his social skills.
Shoto’s phone lights up, and Deku smiles a little more at the sight of the message his friend just received.
“From: Bakugo Katsuki
Not bad. Keep going.”
The second time it happened, Deku was having trouble sleeping and went out of his room to get a glass of water, casually looking across the window as he was headed towards the kitchen before stopping, noticing two forms walking around the garden in front of their dorm, recognizing the mixed crimson and white hair on one side and the messy blond hair on the other side quicker than anyone.
What were Shoto and Katsuki doing outside in the middle of the night? Did the blonde challenge his friend once again?
It sadly won’t be the first – nor the last time.
Deku leans in forwards, checking out in case he needs to interfere if they were actually fighting, only to stop as he sees the blond pointing out something into the sky, and Shoto’s bright eyes caught the smaller boy off guard. He quickly looked towards the sky, barely catching a shooting star passing by, widening his eyes in surprise as he looks back down on the two boys.
Shoto had now his phone in both of his hands and spinning around, trying to catch a picture of a shooting star as the blond was staying careful beside him with an amused smirk, arms open and ready to catch him in case the white-haired boy would lose balance and fall from spinning so fast, not wanting to miss one second of the night's sight.
Midoriya kept his eyes a little longer onto Bakugo’s face, smiling a little at how relaxed his best friend actually looked – perhaps the most relaxed he has ever been.
It was nice to see his two best friends finally having a sort of common ground together.
But Deku wasn’t stupid, and he knew Bakugo’s longing eyes weren’t only friendly whenever they settled onto Shoto’s frame.
So, as he stepped back from the window to continue his walk towards the kitchen, Izuku decides he’d pay closer attention to these two, trying to find out the relationship they actually have.
The third time it happened, Deku somehow was dragged into this.
“Fishing?” the black-haired boy repeats as Shoto simply nods, holding a fishing magazine close to his chest.
“Bakugo had a picture of him fishing a medium-sized fish and I want to try it out.” The white-haired boy gives as a simple explanation, drowning Izuku into more confusion.
“Why don’t you go with him then?
- He said you guys used to fish together when you were kids and he’s busy today.
- He refused to accompany you?” asks Kirishima, leaning his seat back, taking part into the discussion he was eave-dropping on.
“No, he just said he was busy today.” Deku looks curiously towards the red-haired boy that laughed, patting Todoroki’s back as he did so.
“Go tell him you want to go fishing today with Midoriya and I, and he’ll join us for sure.” Shoto frowns a little, clearly not understanding Kirishima’s point but nodding still, walking towards Bakugo’s seat.
“You know something.” Deku simply states as the hardening-quirk man was watching the ice bender trying to wake up his friend napping on his desk.
“I mean, I’ve seen enough to know something.” The redhead ends up saying, winking at Deku while pressing his index against his lips, smiling widely. “You’ll thank me later for what I just did.”
And as Kirishima predicted, the four of them were now on the bus on their way to the nearest lake, each one of them holding a fishing rod under their arm.
Deku couldn’t help but smile, watching Todoroki taking his phone out and trying to take pictures of the scenery as Bakugo was carrying his fishing rod- not without complaining of course - and they all walked until they arrived at the quietest side of the lake– quietness quickly lost as Kirishima decides to laugh loudly, receiving a hit on the back of his head from Bakugo.
“I wanna swim first.” Finally decides the redhead as he rubs the previously hit spot, abandoning his fishing rod, and waving to the three boys goodbye before disappearing into the woods under the blonde’s sigh.
“Fucking idiot.” Mumbles Bakugo, resuming his work on fixing the bait properly on Shoto’s hook.
“Was the worm alive?” Todoroki asks, crouched down as he looked closely into Bakugo’s work.
“Why the fuck would it be dead?” mumbles the blond.
“I mean, you just pushed different parts of its body onto the hook, I think he might die soon.
- Are you here for the goddam fishes or for worms’ rights?” the ice bender simply shrugs and grabs the fishing rod, swinging the hook around to get his hands used to it under Bakugo’s yellings telling him not to and to just “throw the fucking hook on the damn water, why are you so fucking stupid today are you nuts”.
Deku couldn’t help but laughs a little at the scene, throwing his line easily into the water, and Todoroki’s eyes was so impressed by his friend’s movement, he wanted to take a picture to be reminded of it, almost dropping his own fishing rod into the water while trying to get his phone out under Bakugo’s cursings.
After smiling towards the camera and seeing Todoroki’s satisfied expression, Deku resumed his fishing, glancing discreetly at the two boys standing a little closer to each other than necessary.
“Why isn’t it working?
- You need to wait.
- How long?
- Sometimes minutes, sometimes hours.”
Todoroki obviously didn’t catch anything, moving his line way too much to actually attract any fishes, and Deku laughed at the sight of the taller’s slight look of disappointment - disappointment quickly gone when Bakugo manages to catch a small fish.
He quickly grabbed his phone to take a picture of the blonde boy posing with his small catch, and if Deku saw Bakugo’s cheeks slightly reddening, he pretended not to, complaining about how heavy the sun was hitting them instead.
The fourth time it happened, the whole class was involved.
Mineta and Denki managed to sneak in alcohol into the dorm behind Eraser Head’s eyes, and after bribing Iida with books and extra-study session, the whole class was now sitting into the living room, circling the table and the seven bottles standing around.
“So…” starts Iida, watching everyone’s impatient eyes. “How do we do this?
- No protocol, my dude. “Laughs Denki as he starts pouring the liquor into the cups before distributing them around, pushing the first cup towards their class president. “Just enjoy your time, man.”
And so, everyone started drinking, and Deku laughed when Uraraka pointed out Shoto’s grimace at the taste, barely managing to finish his glass.
Everyone was having fun, and as rare as this kind of hangout was, it was always just as memorable whenever it happened. Kyoka was in charge of the music, managing to get everyone dancing and singing around the table with happiness, and if anyone got slightly hungry, Sato was here to deliver another fresh baked cake for them.
Midoriya was smiling widely as he was sipping on his first glass still, staying still enough for Uraraka’s tipsy head against his arm, looking around the table to check on everyone’s drunken state, blinking in surprise at the sight of Shoto’s red cheeks.
“How much did he drink?” he asks, getting everyone’s attention, now looking at the ice quirk user’s red face who looked around, almost looking lost.
And to everyone’s surprise, Todoroki lost expression changed into a small smile when Bakugo got back to his spot around the table in between Denki and Kirishima, having disappeared to pee for a few minutes.
“The fuck you all looking at?” mumbles the blond and Kirishima hits the back of his head as Shoto was suddenly trying to get out of his seat, halfway standing up only to drop back down, pouting at his lack of balance.
Such a rare sight couldn’t just happen in front of Mina’s eyes without trying to get a memory of it. And it seemed like all the girls agreed – even though they drank the most, they were suddenly sober enough to hold their phone firmly as they were recording Shoto’s drunken state that was trying his best to stand up again.
“What the heck do you think you’re doing?” the blonde ends up asking towards him, finally noticing the white-haired boy’s struggle.
Todoroki looked up immediately when hearing Bakugo’s voice, his pout slowly morphing into a small smile once again under the girls’ cooings.
“Wanna move.” He mumbles, and Katsuki rolls his eyes before using Kirishima’s shoulder as support to stand up, walking towards Shoto’s spot and extending his hand towards the boy.
“Get up, I’m dragging your drunk ass to your room.” But Todoroki shook his head and grabbed the blonde’s hand instead , tugging down on it as Bakugo seemed to slowly lose his patience, frowning.
“He wants you to sit next to him, damn it!” exclaims Hagakure, clearly frustrated by how oblivious the blonde was currently acting, and after a few weak tugs from Todoroki and the girls’ whinings, the blond sat down next to him, frowning more in annoyance.
“Yall are fucking annoying.” He hisses towards the girls who were still recording, mocking the blond as Shoto was now looking at his face.
Which got Bakugo even more mad, pressing his palm against Shoto’s face, groaning loudly.
“Why the fuck are you staring at me, you fucking morron?” he seethes, glaring at the boy who was still looking at him despite Bakugo’s hand in the way, blinking as if not understanding the actual problem by staring at the blond, and Deku couldn’t help but snort at the exchange, his two bestfriends slowly becoming their main attraction for the rest of the night.
Not getting an answer from the drunken boy, Bakugo simply sighs and let go of his face, looking for his cup, clearly wanting to get tipsy enough to be able to endure everyone’s teasing.
“Baku.” The blond – and everyone else - froze as they looked at Shoto’s face when hearing the small nickname coming out from the drunkest boy in the room.
“Just how many cups did you gave this dumbass?” the blonde ends up asking, glaring at Denki who was swearing that Todoroki barely finished his cup, but Katsuki barely got the time to argue back as Shoto was tugging on his arm, frowning slightly.
“ ‘m not dumbass.” He mumbles before pressing one hand against his chest- almost missing it in the process. “I’m Todo- Todo Shoto.
- Oh my god why is he so cute when drunk!” screams Momo, quickly followed by Mina’s and Hagakure’s squeakings – waking up Uraraka in the process - as the blond was blinking at Shoto’s words, almost at loss for words.
“You look dumb as fuck, Todo.” Katsuki receives a quick whip from Kyoka’s earplugs, threatening him to be nice and behave as Shoto was now pouting, looking down towards his lap, looking like finally dozing off, the alcohol finally affecting his tiredness.
Everyone was slowly drifting their attention away from their drunk friend, getting either drunk or falling asleep on top of each other like a giant pile of puppies, glad and happy that the group finally got to enjoy a night for themselves together.
Deku’s eyes were still on his two best friends, smiling slightly at the discreet scene unfolding under his eyes.
The blond tilted his head down slightly to be able to look at Shoto’s face to check if he really fell asleep sitting, nudging him softly at his shoulder to get his attention when noticing him awake.
“Baku-“mumbles Shoto in response, sliding a little closer to rest his head onto Katsuki’s shoulders, looking up at the blonde and struggling to keep his eyes open.
Bakugo snorts lightly and lift up his arm, resting it on Todoroki’s shoulders, dragging the drunk boy’s body closer, getting him into a more comfortable position against him, and the white-haired boy closed his eyes as soon as his cheek was now resting against the blonde’s chest, resuming his small nap and letting out a small groan when the blonde told him that “you owe me big time, you idiot.”
And as if sensing someone looking at him, Bakugo rose his head, freezing at the sight of Deku’s eyes firmly fixed on the two of them, eyes wide in surprise.
Because Midoriya didn’t miss how comfortable Shoto looked by the Bakugo’s initiated skin ship.
Because Midoriya didn’t miss the blonde’s small smile as he was speaking to his drunk friend.
Because Midoriya now knew.
Bakugo was definitely in love.