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Shouto remembers the first time he got called Princess.
He and Hanta were dating back in second year of UA. Don’t get him wrong, Shouto really did like Hanta and he liked being with him.
Nothing bad made them break up. It was a mutual agreement and the two decided to stay friends. They both had realized some things and had realized it would be easier if they just ended things instead of trying to stay together when they knew they couldn’t do that.
And now, years later after graduation, Hanta was Shouto’s closest friend besides Izuku and Katsuki. They would go to each other with their problems, would trade mangas. Hanta was big on showing Shouto all these old tv shows and movies from his childhood that Shouto never got to experience as a kid.
It was nice.
When they were together, Hanta would always be coming up with new nicknames for Shouto. Ranging from baby to sugarplum, etc.
The day Hanta called Shouto “princess”, it made him freeze, but not in the way you’d think.
Shouto was in the living room on one of the couches while Katsuki and Izuku were on the loveseat. A random movie was playing on the tv while Shouto played some block game on his phone that Izuku got him addicted to.
Hanta walked out of the elevators and immediately walked over when his eyes landed on Shouto. He got behind the couch and leaned over it, kissing the top of Shouto’s head.
Shouto smiled as he tilted his head up and saw Hanta.
“Hi, Princess,” Hanta said, smiling.
Shouto’s eyes widened at the new nickname but other than that, it didn’t affect him.
Then a snort was heard and the two looked over to Izuku and Katsuki.
Izuku was smiling at the two while Katsuki was smirking at Shouto.
“Princess? It suits him,” Katsuki said.
Next thing everyone knew, Shouto’s face had exploded in a deep blush and he hastily tried to cover his face before they noticed.
But of course they did. Especially Izuku and Katsuki. They rarely took their eyes off of him.
“Aww. You’re so cute,” Hanta said, giving Shouto a kiss before walking into the kitchen.
Shouto stared at the ground, rubbing at his face to try to get the blush to calm down.
“You okay, Shou?” Izuku asked, smiling.
Shouto silently nodded and tried to focus on his game again when Katsuki laughed.
“You sure, Princess?” Katsuki asked, playfulness laced in his voice as he used that name.
Once again, Shouto blushed hard. And it was a sight to see.
Shouto coughed as he gripped his phone and got off the couch.
“I’m fine. I need to go, though,” Shouto said, not waiting for a reply as he jumped over the couch and walked towards the stairs.
Katsuki and Izuku were left confused on the couch while Shouto was trying to figure out what he was feeling. His stomach was in knots, but it was like the feeling he used to get with Hanta, but just multiply that feeling by a hundred and there you go.
So yeah, not the best situation but shit, he felt like he was on cloud nine.
He went to his room and immediately toppled onto his bed, squealing and kicking his feet. He didn’t understand why he felt so giddy and worked up just because his best friend called him that. He has never been called that before. It didn’t affect him much when his boyfriend called him that, so it was weird to him that his best friend calling him that made him feel that type of way.
Nevertheless, Shouto went to bed that night feeling ecstatic. He would deal with figuring everything out another day.
Right now, Shouto is not feeling ecstatic or like he’s on cloud nine.
He feels tired. Mentally, emotionally and physically.
It’s been years of Katsuki calling him that name. It’s been years of Shouto loving that he calls him that. But it’s also been years of Shouto having to hide his feelings for the two, and the name they called him was starting to wear him down.
He’s terrified of the rejection and everything changing between them all. He liked how things were.
He liked the late night dinner runs after patrols. He liked the training and how they’d tease each other to put more effort. He liked being able to let his guard down and just live in the moment with them.
But then things took a turn for the worse.
It hurt when the two would kiss and cuddle in front of him. The flirting would fill Shouto with such a big needy feeling in him, that over the years, he started feeling sick when they did it in front of him.
It hurt when all he wanted to do was to hang out with his best friends/crushes, but they were having a date night. It hurt when one of them would ask him to help for their date night. But still, no matter what, Shouto just couldn’t tell those two no for the life of him.
Even when they would offer to cancel their plans and instead spend time with Shouto, he would decline and tell them to go have fun before trying his best to smile at them and leaving. Those nights were the worst.
There were so many nights where Shouto wished he never moved out of the apartment they all shared. One they got right after their graduation and they become pro heroes. It would have made things so much easier if he just stayed.
He didn’t have to wonder if he was bothering them. He could just walk into one of their rooms and fall on their bed and they’d understand. They’d open their arms for him and let him just lay on them for a while.
And then it all came crashing down when Izuku and Katsuki started dating. In the end, he couldn’t stay in that apartment without crying himself to sleep every night.
So he moved out and got his own apartment about twenty minutes away from the other two. He felt like he could breathe again… before the loneliness kicked in.
No matter what, Shouto just wasn’t having a good time.
Shouto heard his phone buzz again for the umpteenth time and sighed as he sat up in his bed.
“Let me guess… another threat from Kats or an apology from Izu,” Shouto mumbled.
He grabbed his phone and turned it on. Immediately, a slew of notifications popped up.
Hundreds of messages, hundreds of calls, a hundred voicemails… great.
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Shouto groaned as he fell back in his bed. He did NOT want to deal with any of this today.
So he didn’t.
Instead, he called off of work for the day and decided to invite Hanta over.
“Listen, I’m always happy to call off work, but you better be dying or in immense danger,” Hanta joked.
“I am dying,” Shouto grumbled from his couch, not getting up just yet.
Hanta walked into Shouto’s living room with a bag of food and some manga under his arm.
Shouto smiled when he saw Hanta and moved onto his back.
“Thanks for spending the day with me. I really need this,” Shouto said.
Hanta smiled and ran his hand through Shouto’s hair, knowing it was something that helped Shouto when he was feeling down.
Shouto sighed as he felt his throat close up and tears came to his eyes.
“I don’t know what to do, Han,” Shouto whispered.
Hanta chuckled sadly and moved to sit on the couch Shouto was on, moving Shouto’s head onto his lap.
“What happened, Sho?” Hanta asked.
“I can’t keep doing this to myself,” Shouto started. “I feel like I’m dying whenever they call me that stupid fucking name and I hate it! I used to love it when they called me Princess, now every time they say that nickname, I’m always thrown into a panic attack and end up running away! It’s pathetic!”
Hanta nodded and smiled softly.
“I think you and them need to talk. You need to tell them how you feel, Shouto. It isn’t going to get better unless you finally own up to your feelings and tell them. After that, who knows. I can guarantee you that it will be anything but bad,” Hanta said.
Shouto immediately shook his head.
“No! No way! They’re just gonna tell me I’m a freak for liking two people at once and they’re gonna kick me to the damn curb an-”
“Woah! Woah, okay, slow down! No one thinks you’re a freak, Shouto. You like who you like. Fuck anyone who says some shit about it,” Hanta said, grabbing Shouto’s arm.
Shouto sighed.
“But-”
“And they’re not going to throw you away. In fact, I’d bet you they’d be happy to know how you feel,” Hanta said. “Shou, it’s been years since you’ve realized that you like them, even love them. I hate seeing you so messed up because of this, you need to talk to them. Things will be fine, you guys just need to talk.”
Shouto looked into Hanta’s eyes and saw nothing but honesty.
Fuck.
Shouto whined and smashed his face into Hanta’s thigh.
“Fine. I’ll talk to them. Can’t promise when, though,” Shouto grumbled, muffled by Hanta’s thigh.
Hanta groaned and rubbed his hands across his face.
“That’s it! Get up! We’re going to the park!” Hanta said, shooting up and grabbing Shouto before he hit the floor.
“Wha- hey! Why?” Shouto asked.
“Because your apartment is too depressing.” Hanta answered.
So the two went to the park.
They hung around the swings a bit. Got some ice cream and sat down at one of the benches while they ate.
“You know, this isn't so bad,” Shouto said.
Hanta smiled big and laughed.
“Good. This shit was expensive,” Hanta joked.
Shouto laughed and took another bite.
All of a sudden the hair on the back of his neck stood up.
Hanta coughed and slightly moved to try to get Shouto to look at the swing.
“Look Sho, a kid is about to do a fli-”
Next thing he knew, Shouto jumped off the bench right before a tendril of black whip grabbed his arm.
“What the fuck!” Shouto yelled.
His eyes were wide as he stared at the three near the bench.
Hanta looked apologetic while Katsuki and Izuku were looking at him like he was a mouse and they were the cats.
Uh oh.
“Sorry Sho, but y’all gotta talk. And this was the best way for it to happen any time soon. Forgive me?” Hanta asked.
Shouto glared, making eye-contact with Hanta, which gave Izuku enough time to try and grab Shouto with black whip again.
“Fuck all of you,” Shouto said before shooting ice and taking off running.
They three dodged the ice and Izuku and Katsuki took off after Shouto.
With the two being in their hero costumes, this will be on every news station headline by the morning. Whoopee.
Shouto could hear the heavy footsteps following close behind. He could hear the small explosions. He could hear Izuku’s grunts when he was concentrating on using black whip.
“Shouto please! We just want to talk!” Izuku yelled, throwing out another tendril of black whip.
Shouto saw a tendril get close to his head and he immediately used his ice to freeze and break it.
Izuku groaned in pain but didn’t stop chasing.
“Shouto I swear to god! Stop being a bitch and just tell us what the fuck is wrong with you!” Katsuki yelled, propelling himself forward with his explosions.
“Fuck. That,” Shouto said in his head, throwing out more ice towards the two behind him.
At this point they ran over six blocks.
“Fuck off!” Shouto yelled.
He flew his arm back and made a wall of ice but the two easily broke through it.
It all came to a hill when Shouto ran into an alleyway to try to get away.
Spoiler: it was a dead end.
Izuku saw the perfect opportunity and used black whip to create a net covering the top of the alleyway.
So now it was either stay in the alleyway or try to fight Izuku and Katsuki to get out.
Shouto didn’t have much of an option when Katsuki rushed over to him, shoving him against the wall.
Shouto’s eyes widened as Katsuki’s hand pushed on his chest, forcing him to stay on the wall.
“Caught you, little mouse,” Katsuki seethed.
Katsuki glared while Izuku walked over to them.
“Kaachan, don’t hurt him..” Izuku said, frowning.
Shouto looked between the two, freaking out. His breathing was already in a pant because of the running, but his heart rate was now higher than ever. He looked all over for some way out of the corner he was backed into, but he didn’t find much hope.
He moved his hand to throw out more ice, hoping it would catch them off guard, but Katsuki knew better and grabbed Shouto’s wrists, pinning them above his head.
Kinky.
“Shouto… please… what’s going on?” Katsuki asked, voice going low.
He looked helpless. He looked lost. He looked… scared.
Shouto didn’t like that.
“I…”
“Sho. Did we do something?” Izuku whispered, looking almost exactly like Katsuki.
Shouto’s heart was breaking.
“Fuck- no. Well yes- no! Fuck!” Shouto exclaimed, throwing his head down, trying to calm down. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t handle what was about to happen. He loved them too much. It was gonna hurt so bad when they left him for good.
No matter what, the words wouldn’t come to him. He didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know what to think.
“Come on, you can tell us, Princess,” Katsuki urged, rubbing at Shouto’s wrists with his thumb.
That was Shouto’s breaking point.
Shouto broke down into sobs at the name and kept shaking his head.
“Shit. Pri- Shou, if you didn’t like the name then why didn’t you tell me? I would’ve stopped years ago,” Katsuki said, stressed.
Shouto shook his head more and hiccuped as he brought his head up.
“I like it too much! That’s the damn problem!” Shouto exclaimed, trying to get his wrists out of Katsuki’s hold.
Katsuki just held on tighter, his eyes wide. Shouto hated that.
“Oh, baby…” Izuku whispered, realization shown clear on his face.
“Damnit- don’t throw me away. Please… I can’t-”
“What the fuck? Who said shit about throwing you away?” Katsuki asked.
Shouto dropped his head again and shook his head.
“Shou, we would never leave you. We love you too much,” Izuku said.
Shouto just kept shaking his head.
“No. No, don’t just get my hopes up. I can’t- please… don’t-”
“Shouto, we love you. We always have,” Izuku said. “I guess we just forgot to take your feelings into consideration…”
“We wouldn’t get rid of you for the life of us. It’s always been us. Us three against everything, Princess,” Katsuki said, grabbing Shouto’s chin and lifting his head so that they were making eye contact. “We got so used to knowing that we loved you, we thought you would never leave us. But we never did ever ask how you feel about us, huh? Shit, we were so confused and hurt when you left us. And then you got distant, and we spent months wondering what the hell we did wrong. But this whole time, it was just because we didn’t tell you that we loved you.”
“Well, fuck that,” Katsuki continued. A few tears were now falling down his cheeks as he looked Shouto in the eyes. “We love you, Shouto. Have for a fucking while now, and I’m sorry we never told you. I thought our actions were finally getting to you, that we wanted you there with us on our dates ‘nd shit. But then you’d get up after a while and just go into your room. Then you started making those stupid excuses to not have our movie nights or go out to dinner with us. I thought you just didn’t like us, but shit. We should’ve just told you.”
Heavier tears were now streaming down Katsuki’s face. “I was a fuckin’ dumbass, and I’m so sorry, Shouto. But I’m not gonna back down anymore. I don’t give a fuck. You’re ours, Princess. Always will be. Always have been. You’ve always been our Princess,” Katsuki said.
Shouto held eye-contact as he processed what Katsuki told him. He couldn’t believe it. This had to have been a dream of his. But when he searched Katsuki’s face for any type of lie or hesitance, he found none. Katsuki was being one-hundred-percent honest with him. But one thing stood out the most to him. One thing made the voice in his head start screaming at him at the top of its lungs.
“I’ve always… been your Princess?”
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