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When the patrol schedule for the second week of January comes out, Izuku spends thirty seconds looking it over with unparalleled intensity before whipping his head toward Shouto at a speed unsafe for the human body.
He then makes the saddest face known to man.
A truly sorrowful face. Bereft. Like a puppy who just rolled their ball underneath the couch and knows, in their little puppy heart, that it’s gone forever.
It makes Shouto want to pet the top of his curly green head.
There’s also a slight hint of disappointment to it that makes Shouto want to get up from his desk, exit the building, and walk straight into the sea.
He hates disappointing Izuku.
“Did you not request your birthday off?”
Ah.
He may have not done that, yes.
There are many things Shouto didn’t do and that is indeed one of them.
If he’s being completely honest, he didn’t even consider the possibility of taking his birthday off. Celebrating by sitting at home, puttering around, and wondering what everyone else is doing at work doesn’t sound like a good time to him no matter which direction he looks at it from.
He’d rather be here, at his rickety desk with the folded square of paper tucked underneath to combat the slight tilt. Would rather be with Izuku, arguing the finer points of the drug trafficking ring they’ve been tailing for weeks, watching him nibble pencils and monologue to himself and lose pens in his hair.
Would rather be out and about, busy and challenged and perhaps a bit tired, but useful all the same.
What it comes down to is the day itself means very little to him. Nothing more than yet another day in a finely woven string of them.
Shouto doesn’t mind birthdays in general. He doesn’t particularly love them either.
He has even fewer feelings about his own.
His mom will call him, bright and early, the soft wisp of her voice easing him into the day, followed by a cheerful text from his sister before she heads to work and a good-natured but slightly awkward video call with Natsuo between classes.
His friends will likely have a cake of some sort. And tiny, dizzyingly thoughtful gifts that they’ll present to him at staggered intervals throughout the day, so he doesn’t get overwhelmed.
There will be dinner with his dad, quiet and mostly comfortable until Hawks drops in and tries to get the waiters to sing happy birthday to him or something equally as embarrassing, and then he’ll go home, pleasantly tired but ready for the day to be over nonetheless.
It’ll be fine. Good, even. But nothing he needs to take time off for.
It’s just another day and he really doesn’t mind that.
*
The night before his birthday, they’re on a rooftop somewhere in downtown Musutafu and Bakugou is perched on the edge like a gargoyle.
After a handful of quiet minutes spent glaring down at the street below them, as though he’s daring crime to occur, Bakugou shuffles his steel-toed boots around and settles into a sitting position, legs dangling over the side of the roof.
Shouto quietly joins him, slipping both feet over into the empty air and chancing a look down at the city. When he sits back up, he leans his weight back, arms holding himself up and palms catching on the rough cement.
It’s quiet tonight, thankfully. An easy night shift if they’ve ever had one.
He likes night shifts with Bakugou. He’s more subdued at night, to a point. The drastic change in his circadian rhythm making him softer around the edges, less prone to trying to put Shouto in a headlock or working himself up into a blustery, furious rant about who knows what.
And so they sit on the rooftop edge and wait until something happens, but it doesn’t feel like a chore.
There’s space between their thighs where they sit next to each other, but not much. Shouto can feel the heat of him.
He always can. Tonight is no different.
Continuing to shuffle around, Bakugou pulls what appears to be a clementine out of one of the many, many pockets of his hero uniform pants. In particular, the little green pocket off to the side with the snap.
Now that Shouto is actively squinting at said pants, he realizes they have a truly great deal of pockets.
What does he need that many pockets for?
Pants-considering tabled for later, he watches Bakugou’s hands as he peels said clementine, unraveling it all in a singular winding strip. Completely whole.
His broad fingers are quick, nimble.
Thick knuckles covered in ever present scratches and scrapes from the day-to-day of their job, tipped with well-manicured nails, cut short. For all of Bakugou’s posturing and exploding and his hands-as-weapons way of existing, he’s careful. Purposeful.
Gentle enough to peel and not burst the slices of the clementine, holding the fruit itself with a sense of surety that speaks of both practice and of ease.
It’s no surprise that Bakugou is diligent enough to do such a thing—to peel the clementine in one spiraling twist. Knowing what Shouto knows about him, it stands to reason that he’s able to peel an entire fruit in one smooth go.
When Shouto eats clementines, he has to peel the skin off in little chunks and the juice gets all over him and he has to lick it off his fingers like a child. He eats them anyway, quite frequently. But it isn’t a dignity-preserving task, that’s for certain.
“Here,” Bakugou grunts, his voice rough in the quiet. The only sounds are their breathing and the cold wind lightly rustling across the rooftop, the din of the city too far below to be much more than a quiet hum.
And now Bakugou, speaking.
“What?” he asks, eyeing the clementine half Bakugou’s got resting on the palm of his hand.
Shouto makes no move to grab it.
”Here,” he repeats, while holding the clementine half out a little harder, his voice even louder. A touch gruffer, like Shouto’s unintended rebuff of his clementine-gift is testing his patience.
It probably is.
Shouto says, “What?” again, as if repeating what he asked previously will shed any light on the situation.
“It’s a clementine, dipshit. Like an orange,” Bakugou replies, voice shot through with agitation. Like Shouto asked what it was specifically.
As if he doesn’t know what a clementine is.
Shouto knows what a clementine is.
“I know what it is,” he returns, eyes caught on the way the wind makes the fluffy tips of Bakugou’s hair dance like grass in the summer. Snakes of wind in wheat. “Why are you giving it to me?”
“So you can have some, idiot.” With an incredulous look, Bakugou peels a slice off of one of the clementine halves and waves it at him, impatient.
When Shouto doesn’t immediately take it, he huffs, rolling his eyes heavenward.
“You like clementines, don’t you?”
He’s speaking slowly, measured. As if it takes a massive reserve of carefully collected effort to not call Shouto a blithering idiot dumbass and beam the clementine at his head. It probably does.
Quite a lot of effort, Shouto would guess. But he likes that Bakugou expends it all the same.
“Well enough, yes.”
“You eat them all the damn time in the canteen,” Bakugou says, like Shouto hasn’t even spoken. He’s glaring out into the middle distance, staring at the horizon like he’s challenging it. “They were also the only fruit I saw you eat in high school.”
Lightly offended, he parries with, “I ate other fruit.”
It’s true, he did. He likes strawberries and grapes and cherries. Occasionally a pear, if he’s feeling daring. Although now that it’s pointed out; he may have a propensity for clementines. Citrus in general, honestly.
“We can fucking share it.”
“Why?”
He genuinely isn’t trying to be difficult at this point. Just curious.
“Holy fuck, why? What do you mean why? See if I ever do anything nice for you ever again.”
He closes his fist around the clementine pieces and holds them tight to his body, looking at Shouto like he’s trying to set him on fire with his mind.
“No, no, it’s good,” Shouto cajoles, bumping their shoulders together and trying to hide his smile when Bakugou bumps him back much harder, nearly tipping him over. “I like nice. I also like clementines.”
With that, he darts his hand out as quick as he’s able, forces Bakugou’s fist open, and snags the proffered slice before Bakugou can do something wildly petty, like throw it over the side of the roof or jam it in his mouth before Shouto can put it into his.
It’s perfectly sweet, when Shouto finally does eat it. Made even sweeter by Bakugou carrying it in his pocket until this specific moment.
“Why the clementine though?” he asks, after a few moments of silence and another slice for the both of them. Shouto takes it readily, this time.
“‘Cause it’s your goddamn birthday.”
Shouto hums, a bright, frothing happiness lapping at the edges of his chest where it glows like the sun. A clementine. For this birthday.
“Got your real birthday gift at home,” he mumbles eventually, tucking his face into the wide collar of his winter uniform top, like he’s embarrassed. “I’ll give it to you at the dumb party Deku is without a doubt scheming up as we speak.”
“You think he’s planning me a party?”
“Icyhot, I fuckin’ know he’s planning you a party. He found out you didn’t take your birthday off last week and sent me 35 goddamn texts in a row about it.”
Shouto reaches to grab another clementine slice as he considers the possibility.
The second his fingertips touch the warm skin of Bakugou’s palm, Bakugou tightens his grip, trapping both Shouto’s fingers and the clementine slice in his hand.
He squeezes once, gentle enough not to explode clementine juice all over the both of them but forceful enough for Shouto to feel it, to memorize the warmth and the pressure and the soft rasp of their skin touching, then releases Shouto’s hand and keeps bitching about all the work that goes into planning a birthday party.
Like he didn’t do anything at all.
For some reason, it makes Shouto’s face flame, cheeks going pink in the dark.
“If the two of you are planning a party, I’ll go,” he decides, right then and there. He’s typically not a party guy, but these are rare circumstances. He’s impressed Izuku’s managed to corral Bakugou into whatever party planning shenanigans he’s cultivated.
“The fuck you mean you’ll go? It’s for you. Of course you’re going.”
“Alright,” he acquiesces, quietly delighted. “Thank you for co-planning my birthday party and for this birthday clementine.”
Snorting, Bakugou cradles the disrobed clementine in the gentle curve of his palm and gives Shouto another slice, popping one in his mouth for each one he shares.
They eat quietly, staring out over the flickering city lights.
“You’re supposed to start your birthday with how you want the next year to go, right?” Bakugou picks back up eventually, circling back around to the “why” of it all now that he’s free to do so at his own pace. Shouto likes the way his mind works, the way his emotions unfurl when he’s no longer pressed. Like one of those ferns that closes when touched, sensitive in an odd sort of way. “Wanted you to eat something you liked as it started.”
“I think that’s a New Year’s superstition,” Shouto replies absently, leaning just a touch closer to Bakugou’s ever present warmth.
“Huh,” Bakugou murmurs, shrugging his shoulders. He’s not agitated in the least bit and the easy concession makes something inside Shouto hum. “Damn.”
All of a sudden Shouto is paralyzed by the thought that if he points out how Bakugou is wrong, he won’t do this again. Won’t bring Shouto a clementine on his birthday patrol, won’t share it with him. Won’t peel it gently, his dangerous hands doing something so sweet for Shouto that it makes his heart feel sticky.
“I do have something I like though,” he says, looking down at the most recent Bakugou-given clementine slice. With someone I like, he thinks but doesn’t say. “It can be for birthdays too, I’ve decided.”
“Glad that you’ve decreed that, your highness.”
Shouto smiles to himself, pressing ever closer.
“This is good.” It’s true. And easy to say. “More than enough.”
Bakugou hums, divvying up the final slice for both of them. Shouto leans forward and nudges his clementine slice against Bakugou’s, an informal cheers.
Rolling his eyes into the back of his head but looking pleased all the same, Bakugou bumps him with his shoulder again. Shouto rocks to the side and ends up closer than before when his momentum stops.
Neither of them move away.
“Happy birthday, dumbass.”
“Yes,” Shouto says, “happy birthday indeed.”
Shaking his head in disbelief, Bakugou glances at him and smiles, laughter pressing behind his teeth.