Archive of Our Own

>

you’re so cool you make me afraid

eyes they shake, i can’t look away

Steady hands pulling at my heart

Beating faster as it restarts

Catch my pieces as they come apart

but you pull and we bend

‘Healing,’ Oh Honey

>

Katsuki’s hand-washing dishes at the kitchen sink when Eijirou sidles up behind him, big hands sliding warm and broad around Katsuki’s sides.

“Busy, asshole,” Katsuki says, without looking up. He’s working on the big mixing bowl that’s too big to fit in the dishwasher. “Unless you’re volunteering.”

Eijirou laughs, ducking low to nibble at the curve of Katsuki’s ear, working his way down to the lobe. Katsuki shrugs up his shoulder, shaking his head to dislodge both Eijirou and the pleasant tingles going down his spine, but Eijirou just burrows in anyway, undeterred.

“Nooo, don’t wanna,” he warbles, and Katsuki resolutely does not smile at his newest and goofiest boyfriend’s antics, especially because if he cracks, Eijirou’ll feel the smile rising under his lips while he’s peppering Katsuki’s cheekbone with little kisses. “Don’t want you to, either. It can wait, can’t it?”

“And what exactly’re you suggesting instead?” Katsuki keeps his hands moving, sudsy to the wrists. The early evening sun comes in the window over the sink at just the right angle that it lights everything up warm and soft-edged. Eijirou hums into Katsuki’s ear and, okay, Katsuki melts back into his embrace. A little. He bats Eijirou’s hand away from his belly - he knows where that was going - but he lets his head fall back onto Eijirou’s shoulder, chin tipped up, and Eijirou lays down a soft path of kisses just as asked, and then some more besides.

“Oh, that so?” Katsuki asks, hands going lax in the sudsy water as his focus drifts.

Eijirou hums against Katsuki’s skin. “Mm-hmm.”

Katsuki sighs, tension seeping slowly out of his shoulders. Arms around his middle, Eijirou begins to sway, and Katsuki lets himself follow, drifting in the soft warm moment. The music playing on his phone fades out of focus, and for a few long moments, everything shitty in the world fades away. There’s no stupid landlord, no shitty bills, no ever-mounting pile of voicemails from the campus and from the utility company that he still hasn’t listened to. There’s nothing but Eijirou’s breadth and warmth and his mouth. 

Into that quiet, Eijirou’s hum against Katsuki’s jawline and his lips working Katsuki’s earlobe over until his toes tingle are welcome diversions. 

“Do you think Midoriya could go down to the coffee shop on the corner for a couple hours?”

“Hmm?” Katsuki sighs, wishing at least one of his hands wasn’t sudsy, so he could reach up and grab Eijirou’s hair, move his mouth exactly where Katsuki wants it.

“Well, could you ask him?”

“If you want a coffee, just go get one yourself,” Katsuki says, distracted. “He’s on deadline.”

“Mm, it’s not that,” Eijirou hums. “Just feels kinda shitty to ask your other boyfriend to clear out of his own home so I can bang you.”

Katsuki’s toes curl. Just a little. “Cheeky bastard,” he growls, and Eijirou laughs and nuzzles in, laying kisses all along the column of Katsuki’s reddening nape.

“You looove~ it.” It’s like Eijirou can actually hear the oh hell yes going off in the back of Katsuki’s head, the absolute cheater. Eijirou’s hips sway gently, leading Katsuki’s along to match. Despite the generous mental images inspired by the firm warmth of their bodies moving together, Katsuki isn’t that easy. He clicks his tongue irritably.

“I’ve got shit to do.”

“Yeah, me,” Eijirou laughs. Katsuki walked into that one. “C’mon. The baristas love him down there,” Eijirou presses, and Katsuki snorts.

“They love him, yeah, but the giant rug on legs doesn’t hurt, either.”

“Everybody loves Snow,” Eijirou beams. “She gets him so many numbers. Sooo…?”

Katsuki sighs, drying his hands off enough to turn around and look at Eijirou. He’s still pinned between the sink and the man, but Katsuki feels a little less dreamy, a little more clear-headed when he’s not snuggled up against Eijirou’s very convincing warmth.

“ Soo, slow down, horndog.” Katsuki’s eyebrow is arched as judgily as he can manage, but Eijirou’s not deterred, his grin utterly shameless. Katsuki rolls his eyes. “Look, even if Izuku clears out, which he hasn’t yet, Shoto’s still here. And I know somebody-” Katsuki pokes Eijirou in the chest- “Who can’t stay quiet.”

“Todobro?” Katsuki blinks. Eijirou blinks, processing. “What? Oh. Oh, no, I mean, I dunno, that’s between you two-” Katsuki’s glare shuts up further speculation down that path. “But, anyway, he’s not here? He just cleared out. Maybe ten minutes ago? That’s why I asked.”

Katsuki cocks his eyebrow. “No? He told us both to leave him the hell alone tonight, said he’d be studying all night. Big nursing final tomorrow or something.” Katsuki frowns, trying to remember exactly what Shoto had said it was. Honestly, he hasn’t seen much of Shoto lately. Earlier in the afternoon, he’d kissed Katsuki on the forehead and tucked himself away in his room, like he’s been doing for the last week or so. Katsuki and Izuku both know how much this grad degree means to him, so they’ve been giving him as much space as he asks for, and some he doesn’t, just making sure he remembers to eat enough every day.

“I dunno about that.” Eijirou frowns. “But I just saw him, and he was dressed up fancy , too. All black tie and stuff. He cleans up good!”

Katsuki stares. “What.”

Eijirou’s expression goes from vaguely amused to ashen in two seconds. “Oh, shit. Shit, was I not supposed to say that? I know you guys have a, a kinda-” He waves a hand vaguely in the air. “About your relationship, I mean, um, but it still seems unmanly for him to go around behind your back like that.”

Katsuki’s paying very little attention to Eijirou’s discomfort, standing himself on the boundaries of angry, confused, and hurt, and trying to figure out which direction to go. “He said he had a hot date?”

“Yeah, I asked 'hot date?’ and he did that eyebrow thing he does and goes, you could say that, and–”

“Oh, that motherfucker– ”

Eijirou’s hip bounces against the counter as Katsuki shoves his way free from between the sink and his boyfriend.

“Bakugo? Oi, Bakugo, where are you going?”

Izuku’s just poking his head around the doorframe to the living room to see what the commotion is as the apartment door slams closed behind Katsuki.

>

Katsuki catches up with Shoto just shy of the bus stop. He's wearing a long boiled wool peacoat over his best black tie attire, and in the unseasonably chill snap of the darkening evening, both his cheeks are pinked as he turns his head, looking down the street to judge the traffic, and whether he's got enough time to cross. His hair blows artistically into his face, catching in the corner of his mouth, and Katsuki has never wanted to punch him more.

"Oi!" He yells even as he's still running, closing the distance between them like a doppler scream in reverse. " Oi! TWO TONE!"

Shoto turns, recognizing the voice before he recognizes the form of address, and his eyes narrow once he does. Katsuki comes to a skidding halt in front of him, catching his breath in sweatpants and a long-sleeved henley and Kirishima's crocs. He grabs Shoto's coat sleeve cuff, bracing himself up with his other hand on his knee. He's in shape, but six blocks of cold air with no warm-up is going to wind anyone.

Shoto presses his lips together, frustrated.

"I prefer Half-n-Half, if you won't call me my name, Katsuki."

"And I know that, which is why I fucking didn't, cause I wanted your attention."

Shoto does the eyebrow thing. "You have it."

"Fuck are you doing?" Katsuki challenges, standing up to his full height. Still a bit shorter than Shoto, even with the boost from the unreasonably thick plastic soles of the crocs, and Shoto in his good dress shoes. His glare more than makes up the difference.

"I'm going out for the evening, obviously," he says. So level, so clipped, and Katsuki is kicking himself for not seeing it sooner.

"You said you were staying in to study."

"Plans changed."

"More like plans lied, " Katsuki snaps. A woman walking her dog gives them a wider berth, but he's so focused on Shoto he doesn't even flip her off. Growth, see. "This was your plan all along, you just didn't want me fucking finding out until you were already gone."

"I still keep my own room and my own schedule, Katsuki, despite our...new relationship," Shoto sniffs. He almost didn't stumble over the words, too. It would be impressive if Katsuki wasn't so mad.

"Oh, fuck off. We've been dating six months. That's past 'new.'"

"My mistake."

Katsuki is quickly losing the last of what little patience he has. Shoto is so controlled, so pulled-in. He's a sculpted statue standing here in the midst of the bustle and casual mess of the street corner, something set above. Other . There's not a single trace of his Shoto, of the smirk and quiet judgment and sharp, careful kindness delivered the only way he knows how; of tactless curiosity and of blunt observations followed by the tenderest of hands. No, there's nothing but a marble statue here, and the only hairs he has out of place are tousled artistically by the wind, not scrunched and standing up at stupid angles from spending the night mashed into the cotton cases of Katsuki's pillows.

Katsuki is going to murder someone. A very specific someone.

"You're coming home," Katsuki declares, grip sliding down Shoto's cuff and into his hand. His leather glove is cool against Katsuki's hot palm. And Katsuki's grip is ready, fingertips digging in behind Shoto's knuckles to hold him as soon as he starts to pull free.

"I'm not," Shoto says. "I am going to my event." 

"Oh, your event," Katsuki echoes. "Let's see if I can guess what it is, huh? I guess right, you come home."

A muscle in Shoto's jaw flickers. Good. "I'm not making such a ridiculous wager."

Katsuki grips Shoto's hand harder, hard enough to make him wince. From behind Katsuki, the loud huffing panting of Izuku’s mobility dog Snow heralds Izuku's late arrival. He's more appropriately wrapped up for the weather, thankfully, but he's clearly pushed himself to get here as fast as he's able, too, and he's leaning heavily on Snow's handle bar as he looks them both over, fat green gaze seeing everything.

"Shoto..." he begins. Shoto, meanwhile, has cracked his facade; Izuku out in this weather isn't itself cause for worry, but the breathlessness with which he covered the same distance Katsuki did in only twice the time - that has his brow furrowing, before he's thought to control it.

"It's not time for Snow's walk," Shoto says. The facade is back - it was only a flicker. Still, Katsuki feels his snarl grow, like he’s glimpsed something he can dig his teeth into. Izuku clearly feels the same about Shoto ducking the question.

" Shoto. "

" Midoriya, " Shoto parrots back. They glare at each other.

"Why did you lie to Kacchan?" Katsuki snorts. As if that's the bigger issue here? Shoto's brow flickers again, lips pressing thin. Huh, maybe it is, at least to Shoto. Katsuki's infinitely grateful Izuku caught up with them. He knew he couldn't do this by himself.

"I have my reasons," Shoto decides on, sounding about eighty percent confident in himself. The other hundred and twenty percent are pure stubbornness. He's digging in his expensive Italian leather heels.  "Now let me go, Katsuki, I'm going to be late if you keep making a scene like this." He yanks at his arm again, but Katsuki's grip on his hand holds firm.

"Yep, that's kinda becoming my intent," Katsuki drawls, meeting Shoto's furious glare with anger of his own. But where Shoto's is sharp, explosive, the anger of something cornered, Katsuki's is a well-rooted blaze, and it's only growing broader. "How 'bout this, you tell me what's so important that you gotta get to, and I let you go get to it. Easy as that. Hah?"

Shoto's upper lip presses white . A tiny, tiny furrow settles between his brows and doesn't smooth out again. Katsuki barely dares breathe or lose this ground he's gaining.

"I don't owe you an explanation," Shoto snaps, clipped.

Izuku's voice is round and warm as a rock in the sun, and just as immovable. "No, but we want one, Sho. And we're not stupid. I think I can guess, already, just from looking at you."

"Then stop looking at me, if it's causing you so much distress." Shoto's gone acidic , mean and unfocused. Katsuki hates having to be glad that they've managed to drive him this far.

He hates how fucking easy it was to drive him this far.

The frost on the kitchen table last month flickers back into his mind. Snow's big tongue licking the wood, rounding the edge of the table in that floppy way dog tongues do, until it was clean of ice and dirty in dog slobber was cute, silly at the time. But now Katsuki realizes he had been focusing on all the wrong parts of that moment.

"It's been since that electric bill, hasn't it." Shoto's gaze snaps to him, and Izuku presses with blunt  warmth against his side. Bracing him. "The one you said was a misprint."

"It was," Shoto insists. "I spoke to the company myself." The light turns; traffic honks and coughs its way past. Shoto's attention flickers anxiously down the street, looking for his escape. Katsuki yanks on his hand to demand that attention back, but Shoto won’t look at him.

"And what did you tell the fuckers when you spoke to them?  Just ask nicely, and they knock a whole zero off the bill?"

"It was more complicated than that, Katsuki," Shoto says, going for condescending. He hits the target pretty well, Katsuki has to admit, and his chest puffs up with offense, like Shoto's so much fucking smarter than himself, that he thinks Katsuki can't understand a goddamn utility billing company?

Izuku's hand on his arm - then, his hand on his hand, covering both Katsuki's and Shoto's - brings Katsuki back down to ground. His voice is steady and certain and really, Katsuki thinks, he was just the pre-show here. 

"When will you believe us, that we don't need you to save us?"

Izuku's the ringer.

Shoto’s reaction is entirely in his face, shoulders and spine wound too tight to suggest the hurt that he feels. But it’s in his eyes; Katsuki knows the fight, the struggle to keep it off your face, keep it concealed . And he knows, as well as Shoto does, how useless it is to try that shit on Izuku. Shoto’s still trying, though, gaze only swinging back around to them when Izuku tries to slide his touch higher up Shoto’s wrist, seeking the warmth of skin to skin above the leather of his glove. This time when Shoto pulls, his hurt and anger are enough that his hand flies free of both of them. "I will do whatever it takes to protect you both," he hisses, eyes only for Izuku. " Not because you need me to. Because I need to."

"This is too much," Izuku murmurs. He takes a step forward, Snow at his hip; Shoto shifts half a step away. "This hurts you. Every time you go to him for our sake, you're destroying yourself a little more."

"There is plenty of me left," Shoto says, shoving both hands in his coat's deep pockets. The night air is crisp, but not cold enough to explain the glitter growing across Shoto's right cheekbone. His left, where the fall of his hair is styled thicker, remains in shadow, downlit by the yellow iodine glow of the corner lampposts. Sometime during their argument, the sun's finished setting, and its warm romantic sort of glow is replaced just with this, a distant chemical buzz from overhead and stark black curtains of shadow cutting across all their faces.

"There is more than enough of me left. I know what I'm doing."

"Do you, though?" Katsuki's trying to stay quiet, trying to let Izuku's greater skill with talking guide this mess of a conversation, but there's a fucking drum in his chest and it smashes the words out of him when they build up too much. "Do you fucking know what you're doing to us? Every goddamn time you go back--"

Shoto whirls on him, and flame flickers through his long eyelashes. "I do not go back to him ," he hisses. "I am free of that bastard. I am using him for my own purposes these days."

"That why you dressed up like a penguin for him?" Katsuki shoots back. "That why you don't wanna be late? Gonna get in trouble?"

"Getting something out of anyone requires knowing what they want, what will flatter them. This is a costume, Bakugo. This is the bread and circuses he and his pea-brained contemporaries think is important. I participate, and carve out his wallet in recompense."

There's silence for a moment. Silence amongst them, that is; around them, a bodega keeper shouts, someone who still hasn't learned what earbuds are struts by with a boombox over his shoulder; the light changes, traffic hissing and groaning and rolling obediently forward. A truck's horn echoes down from the freeway overpass a dozen blocks down the way.

Izuku clears his throat. Like he's almost apologetic. "He knows what you want, too, Sho. He knows how to get what he wants out of you, too. And he does, every time you do this. Every time you let him make you do this."

"It's a banquet, " Shoto snaps. "It's hardly torture."

"I didn't say it was," Izuku responds, quiet.

The flames around Shoto's eye flare again, then go out.

"Why are you going, Sho?" Izuku asks. "Why is it so important you go tonight?"

Silence.

" Answer the man, Two-Tone," Katsuki growls. Shoto's shoulders go impossibly more tense. Not a flinch; never an actual flinch. Katsuki's never seen the man flinch once in their years of knowing each other, not even when he burned himself fucking making soup. But that's what this is, anyway.

Even still, Katsuki's surprised when Shoto actually does speak.

"It was an agreed-upon condition of services rendered." He barely sounds like he's even in there, and it makes Katsuki's teeth ache . He wants to rip something in half.

He takes Shoto's hand, yanking it out of his coat pocket and slamming their palms back together.

"Services rendered, huh? Sounds like tonight's the services rendered, and what he's calling 'services' is your payment."

"In essence, it is the same thing, Katsuki," Shoto sighs. "I made an agreement."

"Nah, not the fuckin' same at all," Katsuki counters. He tugs, til Shoto looks up from contemplation of his stupid Italian leather wingtips and looks at him . At them.

"He already paid you. I say it's time to fucking cut and run."

" Bakugo-- "

"Name's Katsuki , asshole," Katsuki snaps back, "And you just caught a cold. I'm sure he wouldn't want you snotting all over his fancy friends. So you're just gonna haveta cancel. Too bad, so sad."

"You're mocking me," Shoto tries, voice shaking. With the hand not gripping Snow's handle, Izuku grabs Shoto's other hand, squeezing gently.

"Nope. Mocking him, if anything," he says. "I'm cold, Sho. Can we go home, please?"

Shoto stands between them, lip pressed between perfect white teeth, cheeks reddened by the cold. Katsuki remembers he's the only one of the three of them not wearing a coat and dismisses the thought in the same breath. The tremor in Shoto's eyes is way more fucking pressing than the tension knotted up his own spine.

Behind Katsuki, a rumble and a roar coalesce into the squeak of poorly-maintained hydraulic brakes. Shoto's eyes fly wide, and his head jerks up. Illuminated by the yellow light pouring from the windows of the bus, gray and blue track over the length of the vehicle, looking at it and looking through it, replaying conversations Katsuki can't imagine and feeling a fear he'll never truly know. His hands shake, and Katsuki and Izuku hold on.

A short eternity later, Katsuki thanks a god he doesn't believe in when he hears the hydraulics of the bus doors closing. The engine rumbles, the brakes groan and squeak, and the vehicle lurches back into motion. It pulls away from the curb, belching the stink of its exhaust over them all. Snow barks at the monster, and Izuku tugs her handle to quiet her, make her sit and wait with them. 

They're all waiting for him.

Shoto closes his eyes, tension in his jaw. Katsuki wonders if he wanted to watch the damn thing go, if he wants to run after it. If he wanted to not want to watch it go, and that's why he's got his eyes pressed so tightly shut you'd think he was facing down a gorgon or something.

Well. Maybe not so far off.

Down the block, the bus pauses at the light, then turns the corner. A moment more, and its sound is swallowed up by the rest of the city’s clattering. It’s gone. And only then, Shoto finally draws a breath again, shuddering. Though his shoulders remain rounded, he regains a bit of his height as he straightens up, making an effort to square them even though he can’t quite succeed.

“...Fine,” he murmurs. “Let’s go home.” His deep smooth voice is neither deep nor smooth; Katsuki’s heart is snapping like a shattered glowstick inside his chest to hear this light, nearly timid flavor of cooperation coming from his boyfriend. It’s all wrong, but for tonight it’s all they have.

Katsuki turns Shoto’s hand in his own, shifting their grip into something more comfortable. Lacing their fingers together, an embrace in the aftermath of the fight. Shoto sways a little on his feet, and Katsuki’s right there, propping him up with his shoulder against Shoto’s bicep in a way they both can deny is anything but accidental proximity.

They turn, and start walking. At first, there’s a tension in Shoto, some sort of anxious, clawing pull to scramble his way back to the bus stop. His fingers twitch against Katsuki’s knuckles. Is he thinking about calling a rideshare? One of his father’s private cars? Katsuki just walks, and doesn’t ask, and by the time they’re half a block from the bus stop, Shoto’s drawing full breaths again, and Katsuki feels like he can start to draw any of his own.

“I’m hungry,” Izuku says, bunting Shoto’s waist with his shoulder. Shoto slips his arm around Izuku’s shoulders with ease, with grateful warmth. Katsuki watches and is a little jealous, but only a little. The important thing is that someone can fit into that space for Shoto. Katsuki fills spaces Izuku can’t, too.

“What do you want me to do about it?” Shoto hums. Snow looks up at him with her dopey grin and shoves her fuzzy bright white head against his knee, cheek dragging across the hem of his coat. That fur isn’t coming out any time soon. “I’ve been banned from the kitchen for life, remember?”

“Well, seeing as I don’t have any dinner plans,” Izuku says, wrapping his arm through Shoto’s and squeezing. “And your dinner plans for the evening sucked.” Shoto snorts. “I thought we could maybe go someplace together. It’s my favorite. ”

“Oi, you just gonna steal Halfie away on a date?” Katsuki grumbles, leaning half a pace forward to glare at Izuku around Shoto’s chest. “Fuckin’ rude.”

“Yes, I am,” Izuku chirps, prim. “I know there’s still a table free at my favorite place. They make the best soba, and I think Shoto needs comfort food. You think, Sho?”

“Hey, I make the best fuckin’ soba you know,” Katsuki growls, not interested in whether or not Shoto wants to be comfort-fooded. He’s gonna be, but Izuku’s an idiot if he thinks he’s gonna take Shoto anywhere tonight. As if anybody can do it better than Katsuki can! Katsuki knows this idiot candy cane inside and out, he’s gonna make him the best goddamn comfort soba the fucker’s ever tasted, he’s gonna–

Izuku’s smirking at him. Even Shoto’s eyes are crinkled in the corners.

Oh.

“...You fuckin’ meant my table, didn’t you.” Izuku’s smile glitters confirmation, cheeks wet. Shoto’s cheekbones, however, do not , frost-free and tear-free for now.

Katsuki’ll take it.

“Stupid fuckin’ nerd should have just said that,” he grumbles. 

“I did! I said it’s my favorite, and nobody’s cooking is my favorite more than Kacchan’s is…”

Slowly, over the six blocks back to their apartment, Shoto’s spine untwists. Katsuki feels, takes note of every notch, every ratchet click down as the tension slowly fades. By the time they’re closing the door behind them and Shoto’s bending over to untie his shoes, Katsuki’s breath follows with gratitude the easy, safe arch of his back and shoulders.

He’s still here with them, for one more night. 

From down the hall comes the familiar clatter of Snow, freshly off her harness and off duty, crashing into Eijirou’s wide-open arms. There’s muffled speech, conversation in warm tones. A moderate clatter from the kitchen tells Katsuki he needs to go rescue his tea kettle already . 

In the morning Katsuki’s going to have a long fucking hard talk with himself. How he missed the signs - so what if Shoto hides his pain like a dying cat? So what if he’s got the strongest poker face Katsuki’s ever met, literally forged in fire and blood? Katsuki should have done better by him. Will do better.

“Bro, is everything okay?” Carrying a double armful of happily squirmy fluffy white beast, Eijirou shakes Katsuki out of his reverie with a worried frown pulled low over those big puppy eyes. His tone is quietly urgent, and Katsuki realizes they’re alone in the entryway. Shoto and Izuku are well out of sight, further into the apartment. “You left so fast, I didn’t know what to think, at first I thought you were mad and then I realized you were scared, but I couldn’t follow you, you took my shoes! and you know my feet’re too big for borrowing anybody else’s, so I just waited, but you didn’t take your phone, and I had no idea what was going on…”

“S’sokay, Ei,” Katsuki mutters, kicking off the crocs in question and nudging them into neat alignment against one wall of the entryway with his toe. “I handled it. We handled it.”

Eijirou glances over his shoulder toward the quiet clatter coming from the kitchen. “So’s he not going on his date?”

“ Not a date,” Katsuki corrects him, startling himself with how much menace falls into his voice, so quickly, just at the thought. “His fuckin’ old man–”

Whatever else Katsuki was going to say is cut off; in the kitchen, Izuku rattles Snow’s bowl, and Katsuki takes a salad-plate sized paw to the face as she squirms and writhes until Eijirou lets her down, sprinting away to freedom and dinner. Katsuki pinches the bridge of his nose to get his eyes to stop smarting and glares at Eijirou, daring him to laugh. But Ei folds him into his arms instead, pressing a kiss into Katsuki’s hair, and Katsuki melts into his broad chest, suddenly feeling the weight of the past half hour in a way he hadn’t let himself notice until now.

“M’glad you went after him, then,” Ei rumbles. “He’s lucky to have you guys.”

“No, he’s not,” Katsuki says. “That’s the thing…that’s why he keeps doing this shit. He feels like he’s gotta earn us.”

“He tell you that?”

“Doesn’t have to.” Katsuki rests his cheek on Eijirou’s chest and sighs. “He thinks fucking nothing of selling himself to that bastard because he thinks it’ll help us.”

“Selling himself?” Eijirou flinches. “You don’t mean-”

“Oh.” Katsuki squeezes him around the middle, shakes his head. “No, not like that, but– I think he could handle that sort of shit easier. This, he puts his heart out in fucking traffic for us every goddamn time he answers that bastard’s calls, and he just doesn’t think that’s important or anything.”

There’s quiet for a moment; Katsuki can hear soft sounds from the kitchen. Hopefully that means Izuku’s kissing Shoto up against the fridge. Eijirou rubs one big palm down Katsuki’s back and sighs. “Look, I’m not tryna play devil’s advocate.” He pauses, like he expected the way Katsuki’s guard instantly went up - good, he’s not a total idiot - and hurries on to get the rest of the explanation out. 

“It’s just, you guys, well, you’re kinda broke. Does it really matter where the money’s coming from, if…”

“ Yes, ” Katsuki snarls. His nails dig into Eijirou’s arm before he collects himself, and to his credit, Eijirou doesn’t complain. “...Yes. It fucking matters. It takes pieces out of him to let that man infest the life he has now. I’d rather be shit broke than let him poison his own fucking happiness like this.”

“You sound kinda…” Eijirou trails off. Katsuki squeezes, humming to prompt him, and Eijirou shrugs. “I dunno. Just…in love. You sound like you’d punch his face in for his own sake.”

Katsuki snorts. “Oh, and that’s what love is?”

“Well, we are talking about you.”

“ Kacchan! ”

Katsuki, halfway up onto his tiptoes to kiss the smug off of Eijirou’s face, freezes, and his head drops to Eijirou’s collarbones with his sigh.

“ What, Deku?”

“Sooooba, ” he calls back. “Soba, dinner, now. We’re hungry!”

“Hold your damn horses,” Katsuki grumbles, and Eijirou smiles down at him with a warm fondness that makes his stomach tight.

“Okay, I guess I’ll just make it myself,” Izuku calls back, and Katsuki knows he’s being baited and yet he can’t help but rise to meet it.

“Get your paws off my goddamn copper-bottomed pots!” he shouts, detangling himself from Eijirou with reluctance. Ei presses a kiss into his hair.

“If it’s okay that I stick around for dinner, I’ll stay later, too. We can pick this up later?”

Katsuki shakes his head. “Ugh, sorry, but no. After all this bullshit, my libido’s fuckin’ killed dead for the night.”

Eijirou grips the nape of Katsuki’s neck, squeezing firmly. “Not staying around for that,” he says. “Todobro’s not the only one taking pieces out of himself tonight. Somebody’s gotta take care of you, too, Bakugo.”

Katsuki tsks. “I’m not in fucking danger from what I’m doing. I’m just taking care of my goddamn people. Shoto’s playing with fucking fire and he knows it’s gonna burn him and he doesn’t fucking care–”

Eijirou quiets him with a soft, chaste kiss. “That, right there. That’s what’s burning you up. Just… lemme give you a backrub later, okay? Can I have that?”

“ Kaaaacchan! ”

“Ugghhhh. Fine. Fine, whatever, you can do whatever,” Katsuki grumbles. “Swear, you two are teaming up on me sometimes.”

“Us?” Eijirou’s grin is positively shit-eatingly broad. “Neverrrr.”

When Katsuki rounds the corner into the kitchen, Izuku is suspiciously, and stiffly, suddenly across the room at the refrigerator, all but crawled head and shoulders inside of it to paw around for something stuffed in the very back. Shoto’s standing near the sink looking unmoored, holding a kettle.

“Gimme that.” Katsuki snatches it out of his hand - glad, at least, that it was the left one.

“It’s not hot,” Shoto clarifies. “I had only just filled it with water. I thought I’d like tea.”

“I’ll make you fuckin’ tea,” Katsuki assures him, gently hipchecking him out of the way. It’s Katsuki’s hip to Shoto’s upper thigh, but he lets himself be moved anyway. There’s silence for a few awkward moments; Eijirou and Snow are noisily in the living room, and Izuku’s still spleunking for refrigerated mysteries. The condenser on the fridge kicks on, filling the small kitchen with its hum, and the upstairs neighbor’s dog drops its fucking massive beef bone off the couch again . The thud doesn’t make any of them jump anymore.

“...Can I help with anything?” Shoto offers eventually, sounding less timid than he looks. Katsuki glances up from his cutting board and scallions, eyebrow arched sharp enough to cut.

“Thought you were already taking that into your own hands tonight,” he snaps. It’s mean, it’s unnecessary, and it comes out anyway.

Shoto’s hesitance pulls into a thin, sour frown. “If you’re going to be like that all night, then-”

Katsuki’s knife thwacks down on the cutting board, handle flat to the wood, and he turns, hands braced on the counter edge behind himself. He clearly has Shoto’s full attention, if the wide-eyed grey and blue blink he’s getting means anything. 

“You scare me,” Katsuki says. Shoto’s lips part, but Katsuki barrels on and Shoto closes his mouth again.

“You fucking scare me, Shoto. I can’t fucking stop you, I know I can’t. I know every goddamn time up to this point I’ve been lucky that you decided it wasn’t worth me throwing a fit, or that Izuku was there to be smarter than either of us put together. Shut up.” That last bit is aimed past Shoto’s shoulder to Izuku, who’s trying to scoot his way out of the kitchen in the least surreptitious sneaking shuffle Katsuki’s ever seen. He stays shutted up, and scurries out.

Katsuki sighs, raking his hands through his hair. Immediately he remembers this means his hair is going to smell like onion. He sighs again.

“...My point is, I know I can’t fuckin make you do anything, but god damn it, Shoto, I wish I could. I wish I could fucking lock you in a goddamn basement if it would keep him away from you, except then I’m no goddamn better than him. But you keep– you just–”

Shoto’s hands are gentle as they ease Katsuki’s fists from his hair, and his expression is just as gentle in its deep confusion.

“I have access to resources that can help the people I love,” Shoto says, and Katsuki very quickly compartmentalizes, because he can’t let hearing ‘ the people I love ’ and knowing Shoto is including him on that list knock him on his ass. Not right now, when he’s trying to have an important discussion. “I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t use every resource at my disposal for the people most important to me.”

Katsuki breathes in, shaky. “It’s not a valid fucking resource if the cost is too high,” he says.

“And it isn’t,” Shoto presses. “I’m choosing–”

“Then your choosing is fucking whack.”

Shoto’s jaw tightens. “I am a fully capable adult, Katsuki , despite the limitations of my upbringing. Just because I don’t have the experiences you do doesn’t mean I can’t tell–”

“Oh my god .” Katsuki groans, raking his hair out of his eyes again. The ceiling fan makes the yellow of the overhead light flicker against the ceiling, a distraction that’s pertinent to his peripheral vision every time he has to look up and stare down his idiot beanpole of a boyfriend. “Your choosing isn’t whack because you didn’t fucking see a Disney movie til you were fifteen, alright? It’s whack because he taught you how to fucking prioritize, and he taught you that you are not at the goddamn top of that list.”

“Well of course not–”

“Of course nothing ,” Katsuki snaps. “I’m not saying be a fucking egocentric asshole like me, I’m saying care about when shit fucking hurts. When it feels like you’re gonna goddamn throw up and you just ignore it and put on your little penguin suit again, that’s what I’m talking about. That’s whack.”

Shoto, lips pressed together, lifts his eyebrows in amusement. “How many more times are you going to say ‘whack’?”

“Oh, laugh, asshole.” Katsuki huffs, crossing his arms over his chest. “How many more times are you gonna break my goddamn heart getting yourself closer to him for my sake?” Shoto’s expression goes wide and blank. Katsuki presses, but grips the counter to keep himself steady. He’s a little surprised he can speak through how tight his throat’s gone. “How many more times are you going to make me watch you hurt yourself because you think that anything he can give you is more important than what you give me?”

Shoto is quiet for a long, tense moment, searching Katsuki’s face, his eyes, trying to unfold what Katsuki’s telling him, trying to make it make sense. Katsuki stands still under the scrutiny, fists clenched on the counter edge, heart pattering. It feels like the entire apartment is holding its breath with him. Finally, with little crystals of ice forming in the corner of his right eye, Shoto shakes his head.

“Not tonight,” he murmurs, and then he has to clear his throat, voice gone too thick to continue smoothly.

“Not anymore tonight, Katsuki.” Katsuki feels like that shattered glowstick is back in his chest again, but this time the gunk from inside it has gone everywhere, and it’s started to glow. He’s lighting up from the inside out with deep, bone-deep relief . He can’t say whether he folds Shoto into his arms first, or whether it’s Shoto’s arms around his middle that pull him off of his lean on the counter; only that it’s Shoto’s knuckle curled under his chin, and his own hands fisted in Shoto’s annoyingly neat hair, ruining the careful gel and spray style he’d set it in, as their mouths come together.

Katsuki will never be able to prove it, and it’s a tossup whether Shoto would ever admit to it if challenged. But Katsuki’s certain that he feels a little sob hidden in their kiss, the contents of a knot in Shoto’s throat untwisted and poured down Katsuki’s own. Surrounded by little bites and groans, it’s a tiny admission of fear, of overwhelm, that’s safe to release only in the midst of all that concealment.

Katsuki swallows it down, gentling ice off of Shoto’s cheek with one careful thumb.