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It’s almost past twelve when Katsuki’s door creaks. Almost. Not yet, though. Still a few more minutes left of it being his day. His and whatever percentage of the population also happened to be born on the same day, but—people need milestones, don’t they? Katsuki, regrettably or not, is human. The heart beating inside his chest is the perfect reminder of it. The sharp edge. The infinitely breakable, flimsy thing.
(And now it risks breaking in an entirely different way, because—)
Shouto pokes his head tentatively inside. “Hi,” he says, like he’s not sure he’s allowed to fully step in, still. Even after all the times they’ve saved each other’s lives. Although, Katsuki supposes this is different. Even if only in connotation. Because Shouto saves his life a lot more often than he probably gives himself credit for, but they don’t talk about that part.
About the specifics of belonging to someone else by choice. Of your heart not being your own as much as it is something to share, to carefully hand over. Of lo—
Well. It’s just a word. (Shouto isn’t just a boy though.)
“Hi,” Katsuki echoes, indulging and resigned to the crushing fondness he feels.
Shouto has bits of confetti stuck in his hair, still. Because they’d stretched you gotta let us do it right, eighteen is a big one, to its very limit. Got cake and sung him Happy Birthday and stuffed the place full with cheesy decorations. They even orchestrated a sneak attack that culminated in Shouto smearing cake on his cheek. (Katsuki had been too enraptured watching him thoughtlessly lick his perfect pianist fingers clean of the bits of frosting stuck to them to even register it for a few pounding, too-loud heartbeats. Like a fool, obviously.)
“Um,” Shouto says. Lingers like he’s unsure. Which is—
Kind of strange to witness, after so long and so much and knowing personally intimately thoroughly that Todoroki Shouto is only unsure when he’s unpracticed. When he doesn’t have a handy little step by step guide up in that deceptively empty-seeming pretty head of his.
“Spit it out, princess.”
Shouto huffs. “Don’t call me that,” he says. “I just—I was wondering.”
He’s cute. Like a hissing kitten. Except—he’s stronger than Katsuki. His quirk is more versatile, and he laid more, sacrificed more at the soulless altar of accomplishment than Katsuki ever had to. Katsuki got a childhood. Katsuki got a best friend. Katsuki got a family who loved him unconditionally. Katsuki gets this too, apparently. Todoroki Shouto in his bedroom, looking like maybe he could be too close by choice instead of by coincidence.
Shouto who—
Unquestionably deserves better. And is here, still. Is waiting or hoping or asking for Katsuki. (Or maybe Katsuki’s just delirious and self-centered.)
“About what?” he asks, throat scratchy. Too dry. Too tight. Too something.
“You didn’t get a birthday kiss, did you?”
Katsuki goes rigid. He can’t— “Why?” he asks, despite himself. “You offering?”
Shouto smiles like it’s the kind of question that doesn’t need to be asked. “Izuku said you might like it,” he says. “If it was me.”
(And that’s such a Deku thing to do, isn’t it? Nudge gently in a way that results in a shift of the earth’s axis.)
Katsuki coughs. They have a good thing going. Katsuki makes too much food and brings extra blankets during class hangouts and Shouto nods and smiles and eats it and saves him a seat. They don’t talk about it. It’s functional. It’s minimal risk. It works.
“Yeah,” he admits. It’s his birthday, still. He gets to be selfish for a little bit. (He’s always stupidly selfish with Shouto.) “I want my—my fucking birthday kiss.”
Shouto laughs.
And then he’s obediently stepping closer and for a delirious breath Katsuki’s eyes linger openly on his mouth and he hopeshopeshopeswantswantswantspleasepleaseplease and—
Shouto’s lips press softly on his forehead.
It’s not disappointment, exactly, because willing touch from Shouto could never be disappointing, because Shouto could never be disappointing, is too good and too kind and too smart and too pretty and way too fucking good for Katsuki, but—well. Katsuki wants, still. Aches with it. With craving the nameless. The soft sounds Shouto would make under him, willingly unraveled, unraveling, coiling tight tight tight.
“Happy Birthday, Katsuki.”
Katsuki has an excuse for what he does next. For basically grabbing Shouto by the wrist and refusing to let him pull away, pulling him into his lap on his rickety desk chair, and hoping that however they might fall, they fall together.
It’s late. He’s tired. Constant want is exhausting. The build-up is worse than the fall sometimes. The almost not quite of it all.
Shouto’s a bit taller than him, but he’s looking down, and Katsuki could probably kiss him if he wanted, could press their mouths together and answer his most shameful questions one after the other with roaming hands. “You gonna be my present?” he asks. “My coming of age gift?”
Shouto’s eyes widen. “You said—,” he starts, only to pause and swallow. “You fervently insisted that gifts were off limits. I’m pretty sure you threatened Denki with physical harm and told Momo you’re not a charity case.”
Katsuki shrugs. “Maybe you’re special,” he says. “Maybe I was hoping you’d realize that and give me something memorable.”
Shouto’s eerily perceptive sometimes. Most of the time, really. He just doesn’t bother to point it out when it doesn’t serve an immediate purpose. “Oh,” he says now, as soft as it is damning. “You want—”
“Not if you don’t,” Katsuki says. “Not if it’s—," God, his face burns. “—you know, inconvenient.”
At least Shouto looks a little red too. It’s kind of comforting, to know that they’re both equally bad at talking about their feelings. To know that it’s too big for both of them. “But I’m not a girl,” he says finally, after worrying at his mouth enough to leave it slick with spit and slightly swollen.
Katsuki blinks. “The fuck’s that gotta do with how stupidly in love with you I am, you moron?”
Shouto worries some more at his lower lip for good measure. “I thought you wanted to fuck me,” he says, tone so even and just—Shouto-like that it’s almost kind of weird how much it’s doing for Katsuki’s dick precisely because if he’s being fucking honest with himself it’s really not weird at all because he’s thought of Shouto while getting off (even against his own will) since the first time Shouto touched him in training, skin tingling and breaths coming out too harsh. So—it’s not news, really. It’s just Shouto. (But not just. Never just.)
“No,” Katsuki says. Yelps, kind of. Uselessly and frantically. “I mean—I mean, yeah, eventually. At some point, I’d like to, uh, put it in, but that’s not—a pressing concern or whatever the fuck.”
“Pressing,” Shouto repeats, giggling. Because that’s a thing he does now, apparently.
Todoroki Shouto:
- has hamster cheeks when he chews,
- will pet any and all cats he spots,
- hates spicy food but will eat it if Katsuki makes it for him,
- offers birthday kisses, and
- giggles at unfortunate word choices.
“Shut up,” Katsuki hisses. Then, spurred on by dumb bravery and the lack of filter that comes with touching something perfect, having someone like Shouto pressed this close, he says, “You do know you’re prettier than any girl, right? Look at you. Course I wanna fuck you. Fuck. Date. Keep. Whatever. All that—cheesy love bullshit.”
“That’s romantic,” Shouto says dryly, but underneath it he sounds fond and pleased and like maybe this is what he wants too. To be kept. “You’re such a softie. Although I guess physiologically speaking you could contest that right now with, um, pretty hard evidence. Emphasis on—”
“Shut the fuck up,” Katsuki says, and then he’s laughing, can’t help himself as he drags Shouto down by the front of his shirt just to taste him.
They’ve survived a lot, but Katsuki might genuinely not make it through this part. The part where Shouto makes this choked-up, surprised little whine against his lips, where he goes still for precisely half a breath before starting to tentatively kiss back, where he gets a hand on the back of Katsuki’s neck and pulls him in, in, in. The part where—
Fuck.
Holy fucking shit, he’s going to die.
“Stop,” he says, pulling back. “God, stop, I—I can’t do this.”
Shouto pouts. It’s ruthlessly fucking adorable. “But you said—”
Shit. “I know what I said,” Katsuki hisses. “Just—gimme a sec, okay? So I don’t, like, spontaneously combust, or something.”
“Is kissing always this exciting?” Shouto asks, like he genuinely doesn’t know. Mildly too. Like he’s curious about the weather. Like someone just told him the difference between a cirrus and a cumulus cloud and he wants to know if there’s other kinds.
“Haven’t you done this shit before?” Katsuki asks. He’d kind of—assumed otherwise. Assumed that with everyone lining up for him Shouto eventually gave someone a chance when Katsuki wasn’t looking (when he was trying real hard not to look).
“Well,” Shouto says evenly, “considering that you weren’t available for it—”
“I was,” Katsuki interrupts, helpless and mesmerized. “You just needed to ask. Just—just needed to fuckin’ ask, sweetheart.”
“Can I ask now?”
“Yeah,” Katsuki says. It’s obvious. “You can.”
“Please kiss me,” Shouto says. “Please love me. Please—please fuck me.”
It’s—
A lot, really. But Katsuki has never been intimidated by too much. Doesn’t think there’s such a thing with Shouto. Wants to give him everything, to be the only one ever to. Wants to take, too. But he thinks that might be okay as long as Shouto’s offering.
He tucks grown out bangs behind Shouto’s ear with shaking hands. “Gonna keep you forever,” he says, and—
Shouto turns his head to press a kiss to Katsuki’s palm, smiling, and says, “So you like your present?”
This absolute idiot. “I love it.”
And really—
He does. Doesn’t need anything else for the rest of his life if he gets this. If he gets Shouto. It’s not even scary. Just—right. Just Shouto everywhere and all over and his. The best possible present.
(His.)