Chapter Text
At first, the distance calmed him down. He didn't have to deal with the hag anymore, out of sight out of mind. But then someone would mention the arrangement with his mother, that she could see him if his father was around, like that meant something. While he waited for his father to join them, he wavered between a buried longing for the affection his father offered, and rage over everything a few hugs could never fix.
Masaru knocked like he was interrupting a board meeting, timid and cautious even after Six beckoned him in. Nervous eyes land on Katsuki with a weak smile.
"Hey, Kiddo. It's been a while."
It had, but he couldn't say if that was a good or bad thing at this point, so Katsuki gave only an ambiguous hum of acknowledgement. Masaru sat as far away as possible, fidgeting unsuccessfully to get comfortable.
"How has school been going?"
He didn't quite roll his eyes, but the desire to laced his voice. "That really what you want to talk about, Old Man? My fucking grades?"
"Katsuki." Not quite a scold, but Six's request to reign it in was clear. She assured him Masaru’s fragility had downgraded from porcelain to more of an Ikea furniture grade, but advised him to try to stay calm until they got to what he was actually mad about. Something about the man getting too overwhelmed to hear him when it mattered.
Masaru faltered, but recovered fairly quickly. "What did you want to talk about?"
The passive courtesy scraped into his skin, leaving a prickling sting in its wake. Sure, the man might say they could talk about whatever he wanted, but Masaru said a lot of things.
“Why didn’t you ever try again?”
Masaru grimaced in understanding. “To leave, you mean?”
He doesn’t grace that with an answer, just glares expectantly.
“Going to court against your mother would have been…” He floundered for a while before deciding on, “difficult.”
“Difficult.” Katsuki repeated dryly. "You knew it was bad and only getting worse, but you just ignored it because doing something would have been fucking difficult? ”
“I don’t mean difficult like unpleasant." He waved his hands urgently. “I mean I didn’t think I could win.”
“Win what ?” The man wasn’t making sense, hadn’t in a long time.
“You.” He tugged at the back of his hair in a too-familiar gesture. “If I filed for divorce, I mean. I threatened to do it once and she called my bluff because… she’s your mother. I’ve never even won an argument with her, so how would I convince a judge to let me take you from her?”
Katsuki froze. He threatened divorce? But he was always defending the bitch, why would he do that? “Did you… did you want to leave?”
“Sometimes,” he admitted. “Most of the time, when you two were fighting a lot.”
“Then why- Why didn’t you fucking do something?” The pieces didn’t fit. His father’s weak attempts to intervene only ever lasted the moment. Sometimes Mitsuki backed off, sometimes she ignored him. Masaru only ever touched her once, grabbing her arm when she went for a second strike. Sure, she never got as out of control in front of his father, but he saw enough to know what was happening.
Masaru glanced at Six, receiving a slight nod Katsuki didn’t understand.
“My mother wasn’t as physical, but she shouted a lot. The way she would… twist things was a lot like Mitsuki. My parents would scream at each other for hours and I would try to calm them down, but it never helped much. Eventually my father left and things were a little better. She didn’t get as angry, didn’t scream so much, so long as I didn’t- Well, as long as I acted the way I did around Mitsuki. Appeasing her was the best I could do for myself, and I guess… I guess I thought it was the best I could do for you too.”
Something still didn’t sit right, wasn’t connecting, leaving him silently unsettled until eventually his misgivings gained shape. “Then why did you defend her?”
“I didn’t want to give you more reasons to fight with her.” He at least had the decency to look ashamed.
“So you fucking lied to me?” He latched onto the vice, trying to pin down a clear reason for how blindingly angry he was. “You told me she loved me and was just bad at showing it when you knew it was abuse. And you told me to suck it up and ignore it!”
“I guess I did.” Masaru cringed. “That wasn’t what I meant to- You were so headstrong. I thought if you didn’t fight back so much you would be safer. So I said whatever I thought would help you two get along. In a few more years you would be an adult and then you wouldn’t have to come back unless you wanted to, so I would just… try to limit the damage until then.”
“You could have just fucking said that!” The words catch and crack, red eyes even redder, spilling. “When you would act like it wasn’t that bad, it felt- I fucking- Sometimes I picked a fight with her in front of you just so you would fucking believe me!”
Which would only have confirmed Masaru’s idea that Katsuki’s own temper and antagonism were making his situation worse.
“No- Oh god, Kat, no. I know what she’s like, I always believed you. I thought encouraging you to focus on everything bad she did would make things worse, but I believed you.”
He always knew his mother was fucked up. No one said it that way, but he could see it in glances when she yelled in public, the whispers that followed her around the workplace. ‘She can be a bit much,’ Inko put it politely. But Masaru was only ever described as sweet and patient and good . He was all the kindness in an otherwise harsh childhood. So when Masaru made excuses or told him to ‘try not to let it get to him,’ it meant not only did the demons abuse him, but the angels approved.
"You never hurt me.” He pulled his knees to his chest, feeling suddenly very small. “But you were the reason I thought I deserved it."
Masaru rested his chin on a palm as his eyes slid closed, slow breaths measured in a way that made Katsuki wonder what weird little trick Six had taught him. Finally, the words played like a scratched record, disjointed stops and starts, unable to move forward.
“I’m- I never meant- I’m so sorry. I didn’t- I never knew about what she said to you that day. Or- I didn’t realize how bad it was until the hearing. If I did- Your shoulder was bad enough she couldn’t have talked her way out of it if I went to the police. But of course you didn’t tell me. All I ever did was brush you off, so why would you?” His brows pinched like he was in physical pain. “I’m so sorry.”
Grief and guilt radiated in deep, bruise-like blues, their echo reaching Katsuki. Satisfying, validating and… uncomfortable. This was the part where he was supposed to say things like ‘it’s okay’ and ‘I forgive you,’ but neither fit. Even Six’s recommended ‘thank you for telling me’ felt forced and hollow. For years, he sought the guilt in his father’s eyes like an achievement, moments of small revenge the only times he felt heard.
“I didn’t expect you to stop her, but… I couldn’t even talk to you. You'd find some angle to explain it away when I tried.”
“I didn’t realize…” He met his eyes, searching for something. “You always acted so tough. Like it all just pissed you off, it never showed that- I just knew you were angry. You would scream things at me like ‘fuck off and die’ and I knew that wasn’t a good sign, but I thought if you were yelling at me then you could get it out somewhere you wouldn’t get hurt. You were always so confident, I never imagined you would- You tried to kill yourself and I knew I fucked up.”
At least one of his parents didn’t assume he did it as a dramatic plea for attention. Up until that breaking point, he wouldn’t admit to anyone that he was anything but fine, so maybe it shouldn’t surprise him so much that Masaru believed him.
“So you just… thought I would be okay because I could handle it?”
“It seems stupid now.” The sad smile didn’t reach his eyes. “But yeah. You were a tough kid. I should have realized that didn’t- You were still just a kid.”
It felt strange to be angry at someone for perceiving him how he wanted. Untouched and indestructible. Masaru believed the facade he worked so hard to perfect and he was fucking furious about it.
"I didn't fucking deserve that." He hated the way his voice broke, announcing how much it hurt just to say.
"I know." Understanding echoed in the heavy slump of his shoulders. To go on would be kicking him while he was down, but Katsuki had been beaten into the ground and earned a few cheap shots.
"She told me being raped was my fault and when I tried to disagree with her about anything you just- You were the only person in the entire fucking world who said you loved me and you wanted me to try harder to understand her perspective ."
Masaru tugged at the short beard that made a regular appearance since the last year. Maybe because he wanted a change, more likely because he struggled to keep up with even the basics of taking care of himself.
"None of it was your fault. Even when you did start an argument with her, she's an adult, she shouldn't have hit and screamed at you. She shouldn't have said any of those things and I never thought…" He trailed off, at a loss. "I know what she said really hurt you, but did you- Did you think she was right?"
Anxiety fluttered in his chest as the confession ripped him open. He couldn't bring himself to speak. The simple nod still felt damming.
"Did you think I would blame you if you told me?" The soft question cut through him, wound too large to quickly stitch back up.
"I thought everyone would."
Masaru lasted longer than he expected before he cried, but for some reason that truth did him in. His son planned to take the assault to his grave because he truly believed he had earned what happened.
"I'm so sorry. I know that can never fix how bad I messed up, but I regret it every day that I didn't realize- There were so many signs, but I was too caught up in my own head. You didn't need a lecture, you needed someone to listen to you and I didn't. You've been in so much pain since you were eleven years old, maybe longer, and I didn't even notice. I'm sorry."
He dabs at his eyes with a tissue from his pocket. Masaru knew he would cry today. Knew who he was and owned up to it in ways Katsuki was never capable. If they had left, lived the last decade or so with just the two of them, maybe Katsuki could accept himself like that.
Instead his jaw locked shut, eyes glued to his lap in shame he couldn't shake.
"What can I do for you?" It carried the same desperation to fix things Mitsuki displayed during their sessions.
Katsuki hummed low in his throat, thinking. He missed the comfort of familiarity. His mother, the house, the neighborhood, all of it came with an undercurrent of fear. The reminders overwhelmed him until the unease of his history looming so close outweighed any comfort he could distill from nostalgia. Alarm bells rang until he regressed into the angry, defensive person who used to live there. His father, though, he might be safe enough to meld into his new life.
"Come over to Nakamura's place. Without Mom."
"I can do that." He looked a little too pleased, so Katsuki added:
"Just because you're invited doesn't mean I'm going to be nice."
"You don't have to be."