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It's been a long time since there was salt in Dabi's nose like this, but luckily Tomura only dragged him out here once the sun was nearly set and its daytime heat nearly extinguished. Spring should have shown its face by now but she's been holing away for half the days so it still gets a little bitey at night, even at the end of April, a time Dabi remembers exciting him plenty as a child. Spring signaled that the world outside his window was awake again and hadn't forsaken him yet. Spring reminded him there was more than the snow he was suited to. Spring was when him, Fuyumi and Natsuo would stumble over their feet in a rush to spill out and feel the dew beneath that hadn't slipped away yet.
Young and stupid, Dabi thinks poisonlessly, walking closer to the shoreline where Tomura stands. The water laps at his bare feet and soaks them in foam.
He looks calm. Away from the city like this, he looks calmer than Dabi previously thought possible. There's his face when it's taken back in time while he sleeps, there's the face he makes when Dabi accidentally lets a bit more consideration slip than intended, the face that greets him when he stirs in the middle of the night and Tomura is sitting up and watching the moon and its smoggy sky through the exposed window; none of them rouse similarity with this expression. With his hands linked behind his back, hair not quite whipping but definitely ruffled around by the breeze only seawater seems capable of and not even complaining about the sand between his toes-- he watches the horizon with eyes that are less blood and more poppy. Who needs heroin, anyway.
Tomura watches the sea. He doesn't look like the man Dabi fell in love with but he looks like someone he could. Dabi watches him and wonders what kind of expression he's making himself. Another mystery lost to the sky that goes deeper indigo the longer they stay out here.
Tomura wouldn't tell him because he wouldn't ask him these things anyway. But he can let his eyes slide down to those interlocked fingers and feel a little jealous.
"You can't ever see the stars back in Musutafu." Tomura's voice pulls him back to the present as it always has, and Dabi tears his gaze away just as he glances back. At least he sounds as hoarse as always. "Too much pollution. It's weird to have them right here." He turns his face away again. This time Dabi takes the cue and comes to stand beside him. Tomura doesn't reach for his hand and he doesn't reach for his, but his fingers twitch and Tomura leans imperceptibly to touch their shoulders together, so that's probably enough. There should also probably be something Dabi's supposed to answer with but he can't think of anything. Tomura doesn't seem to care either way.
It's relieving. Who does need heroin, anyway?
"If you don't wanna walk home in the dark, y'better get going." Dabi finally says after another lull. Tomura glances at him again out of the corner of his eye. Dabi coughs into his hand and moves to practice what he preaches before Tomura can flay him to the ocean, too, but he pauses when he feels cold fingertips land atop the nape of his neck. Tomura says nothing. The temperature can't be that low yet-- being near the water lessens the contrast more than being inland does. Yet just a light touch like that feels nostalgic enough that Dabi considers setting a human-fueled bonfire, if only to defrost the windows.
He shakes him off. Tomura must be wearing another face of his and Dabi knows which one it must be. He doesn't look back to check. But he looks enough to grab that hand and squeeze hard enough to hurt. He doesn't look to see what's there now, either. He drags Tomura back to the walkway, or he would, if he weren't following of his own accord. Equality is a bit of a juxtaposition for him, or at least Dabi thinks so, but-- that's kind of what he's been going for this whole time, isn't it?
It is.
Yeah. He can morph into as many people as many times as he wants, but his name is still Shigaraki. It's still Tomura. Dabi doesn't see the need to mourn anything but he calls him by it anyway. Incense ashes mean nothing after melodramatic sighs blow them away, but Dabi's the only one going around smushing his cigarette butts on the pavement. Smearing black spots everywhere because those are harder to ignore than dust in the wind.
He drags him back. Tomura doesn't let him pretend and keeps up until they're shoulder to shoulder again. They walk back and Dabi hoses the sand off Tomura's feet when they reach the safehouse, and off his flimsy lime green flip flops too. Dabi herds him inside before he can even get an idea to snicker about. But even after that he throws his coat in the wash to finish the job because listening to Tomura bitch is a bitch in and of itself.
"How long're we staying?" Dabi asks after getting a meal in them both. Tomura hums from where he's got his back pressed up against Dabi's, handheld clutched in his fingers as the button mashing continues ceaselessly. "How long do you wanna stay?"
Dabi leans back and elbows him. Tomura lets out an annoyed grunt, then answers, "I'm serious. I don't care how long. Timing's up to you."
Up to you. Dabi rolls the words around in his head like a jawbreaker with the sour coating already tongued off. "Don't'cha got shit to do?"
The button mashing doesn't pause for that either. "Not really." The lie is clearer than the sky and more blatant than the contrast with what they're used to. He still can't cook but he must've gotten sick of the convenience store and nabbed a candy thermometer. Bit late for that, Dabi snorts inwardly. White Day was last month, stupid.
But the boss's mind is still near impossible to budge when he's already nailed it to speech, so Dabi lets it and the ensuing quiet be. The stink will surely have him retching but if he plugs his nose beforehand he might survive an open air market out here. Or, well, no, he's still too recognizable for that, isn't he. Maybe if he glues Tomura's phone to his palm and works through a proxy. Or not at all to begin with-- but, eh. When in Rome. Change of pace and all that. It's spring, so there'll be herbs and stuff too. Everything that slept through the winter wasn't dead after all.
Toga gives him a sewer's worth of shit when they get back, because Tomura was also stupid enough to send her pictures. While she barters for making next time into a group event and Tomura pretends to need a little more persuasion until Jin starts backing her up, Dabi wonders just when this shithole of a home became that. When the assholes who visited went from assholes to acquaintances and whatever else. Have any of them even hunted a beetle before? Maybe Compress, a hundred years ago. Maybe Jin when he was a scrawny brat like Dabi'd been. Toga was too busy hunting small animals and outshining all of them. Asshole.
Acquaintance. Whatever. What kind of villains are they anyway, planning out fucking beach trips like vacations are a thing national criminals do. Dabi's got a body count in the hundreds-- Tomura's has gotta be in the thousands, and he doubts the others are as trigger happy as himself but there still can't be anything to cough at. Come on. There's more important things to do then go fishing, for God's sake.
None of them would even know how to cast a line, anyway. Christ. "Y'know that y're gonna need worms for that, right?" He spits, but it has the opposite effect. Toga turns her glittering eyes on him next and her face splits into an awful grin. Fuck my life, Dabi grouses as it's his turn to be bombarded by the two. Tomura bites his lip to keep from sniggering at his misfortune but Dabi can tell despite the hand he tries to muffle himself into. See where sympathy for the devil gets you?
Here, a young and girlish voice calls out, so clear yet so far away. So loud and sure yet so small and childish. So unbelievably dumb. It gets you here!
So, so dumb. It's laughable to try and believe any of this will matter when the earth claps once and promptly explodes. It's idiotic, just plain wrong to pretend there's any other paths left than that back to the grave with his old man in tow this time. All of it only distracts from why he's gotten this far in the first place. So, so, so dumb.
Tomura texts a calendar notification to the group chat later while he's out. Dabi taps the invite then clicks the screen off.