Chapter Text
“Are you sure this is alright?” Shouto asks, eyeing the keys in his hand wearily. It feels odd. He’s never had a key before, now that he thinks about it. He’s never had to with there already being someone around at his family home, be it one of the maids or another one of his father’s apprentices.
Midoriya waves his hand before his face rapidly, and Shouto takes half a step back at the odd gesture. “Of course! The place is way too big for just two people, and they’re having a hard time paying rent with just them, so they’d love to have you!”
Shouto clenches the key in his fist. It digs into his skin, but rather than being painful, it feels like something he’s spent his whole life longing for. It feels like hope.
“I can’t imagine what it must be like to live with the Endeavor, though!” Midoriya continues, and he appears to be shaking with excitement. His green curls bounce around the frame of his face, fanning over his freckles a few times, yet it doesn’t seem to bother him. “I mean, the things you could learn there! Although, I suppose as his son you must have learned everything already, of course! But still!”
Shouto nods along, despite the twisting in his stomach. Despite Midoriya’s mouth continuing to move at high speed, Shouto doesn’t hear him. Instead, his ears are filling up with an overwhelming buzzing noise. He thinks he’s gonna throw up.
He startles when a hand lands on his shoulder, almost jumping back in surprise as his heart drops down to his stomach, but Midoriya’s concerned expression soothes him quickly. “Are you alright? You look a bit pale.”
Shouto swallows a lump and looks down at his fist. There’s a key inside it, he reminds himself – squeezes tighter just to feel that it’s real – a key to so much more than just a shared house. “Yeah. Maybe I'm just nervous.”
“Nothing to be nervous about!” Midoriya says brightly, and then pauses. “Or, well, one thing to be nervous about, perhaps. But that’s just until you get to know him!”
Shouto doesn’t ask. If they’re Midoriya’s high school friends, they can’t be anything less than wonderful.
The house looks nicer than Shouto had expected from two college students. The front yard seems to be taken care of, and the windows look crystal clean. As far as Shouto can recall, neither of the inhabitants are spellcasters like himself, which means they must have achieved it with hard work alone.
… He triple-checks the address, just to be sure.
Midoriya offered to accompany him to the house on his first visit so he wouldn’t be overwhelmed, but Shouto had declined; it’d mean Midoriya skipping a couple of his classes, and Shouto guesses that wouldn’t make the best impression on their professors as they’re still on their first month. Besides, he’s sure he can handle his two new roommates just fine. Midoriya had seemed hesitant, but ultimately let it go.
Shouto steps along the stone-paved pathway up to the pitch black front door, his heels click-clacking to the beat of his heart, the wheels of his luggage rumbling like thunder behind him.
Shouto presses the button for the doorbell, and then takes a step back from the door. He doesn’t hear it chime out, but it might be a soft, undisruptive sound inside the house. So he waits.
The doorbell might not be working after all, though, because he’s still standing in front of an unopened door after a couple of minutes. He steps back up to the door and presses the doorbell again. And then again when he still doesn’t hear it ring out. With a frown, he presses harder on the button, frustrated that it isn’t working.
He’s just about to knock when the door bursts open, and he’s met with a slightly frazzled, out-of-breath man.
“ What? ” the guy asks, but Shouto is too distracted to register the question. Instead he’s focusing on the guy’s flaming red hair that’s currently sticking out at all angles, like a wild flame fighting for survival, and at the sweat dripping down his neck to his bare chest. His eyes are an even deeper red than his hair, impatience swimming in the orbs. And then, of course, there are the slightly downturned fluffy, reddish-brown ears poking out of the unruly hair.
He’s a shifter, Shouto realises belatedly. He hasn’t met many shifters before. Probably because his father abhors them. Leaning to the side, Shouto peers behind the guy and amazingly he’s got a tail as well, in the same earthy colour as his ears. “Astounding…”
“Er… Can I help you?” the shifter asks, frustration no longer coating his words. Something else has taken its place, though, and Shouto isn’t sure it’s much better.
Shouto blinks and stands back up straight. “Yes. I’m your new roommate. I think your doorbell is broken.”
The shifter lets out an audible sigh and untenses – Shouto can see the muscles relaxing in his chest and biceps. “Of course! Izuku’s friend! Welcome!” He steps away from the door and gestures for Shouto to follow him inside. “The doorbell works just fine, by the way. A little too well, maybe.” The last part is mumbled, and probably not meant for Shouto’s ears, so he just nods and lets it slide.
The inside of the house is neat as well, with nice furniture and lovely pictures on the walls – mostly of nature, but there’s also a few of the shifter and what appears to be his family, based on the collective resemblance of their eyes and noses.
When Shouto looks back over at his new roommate, he’s grabbing a shirt that’s hung over the back of the couch and pulling it over his head. It looks a bit tight on him. “Would you like to see your room first? You can set your luggage down before seeing the rest of the house.”
Shouto nods and follows the guy down the hallway. There are four doors, two on each side, and he stops in front of the one furthest down on the left.
“This is yours. If you need anything else, let us know. I’m not sure how much we can do about it, but, you know…” The guy seems a bit flustered, with his hand scratching at the back of his head and an uncertain smile on his face.
Shouto steps around him and opens the door to his room. It’s small, way smaller than his room at his father’s place. The bed is half the size, and the wardrobe takes up even less space, and Shouto can’t help the smile that spreads on his face. It’s perfect. And it’s all his.
He rolls his luggage into a corner and turns in the room, taking it all in. There’s a window above the bed, with a nice, flowy curtain, and a lounge chair in another corner.
“Oh,” the shifter suddenly exclaims, and Shouto turns to blink at him, curious. “I’m Kirishima Eijirou. You can call me Eijirou, though, seeing as we’re going to be living together.” He holds out his hand at Shouto, expectant. “And you? Sorry, Izuku never gave us your name.”
Slowly, Shouto reaches his own hand out to Eijirou’s. It’s warm, a bit rough to the touch, and so big that it dwarfs Shouto’s own as it clasps around him. “I’m To–” He stops abruptly.
It seems like they don’t know. Shouto has never known anyone that didn’t know. He’s always been Endeavor’s son . For once, he’d like to just be Shouto. So he clears his throat, and tries again.
“I’m Shouto.” It won’t last forever – it might not last very long at all – but Shouto revels in the way Eijirou simply nods. There’s no widening eyes, no silent gasp, no raised brows in surprise. It’s refreshing, and completely abnormal.
“Alright, well, it’s nice to meet you, Shouto,” Eijirou says, and he sounds like he means it, too. “Now. Would you like a tour?”
Eijirou shows Shouto around the house, commenting on each room with a pleasant tone. There’s the bathroom right across from Shouto’s room – he can hear water running inside, so he supposes the other roommate it home as well – and the other rooms down the hallway belong to Eijirou and the other roommate respectively, Eijirou’s being the one across the hallway, furthest away from Shouto’s own. There’s a dining area, which Shouto already passed on his way in, with a connecting kitchen in a decent size, and then a sitting room with a big couch, a lounge chair and an impressive TV setup.
“And that’s about it,” Eijirou finishes, hands resting on his hips proudly. “And of course there’s the backyard. It’s fenced off pretty well, so it’s really private, which is nice.”
Shouto nods. He loves the natural lighting in the house; he doesn’t think there’s a single room that lacks a window. Even the hallway has a window at the very end of it, allowing in plenty of light. “It’s… perfect.”
Thunder roars from down the hallway, Shouto thinks for just a second, until he realises that it’s stomping footsteps getting closer. He turns quickly to the sound.
“Who. The fuck . Are you?” The question comes out like a chopped up low rumble. The guy, whom Shouto assumed is the other roommate, stomps closer with a dangerous glare settled on his face. He’s smaller than Eijirou, both in height and in width, and his hair is a light blonde that is currently dripping water down the sides of his head and neck, contrasting violently with his fiery ruby eyes. He’s wearing an oversized shirt that is slowly getting drenched around the collar, and pressed down threateningly against his wet hair are a set of ears, white as snow.
Now all the way up in Shouto’s face, the guy studies him with quick eye movements. “The fuck kind of scar is that?” he asks, eyes now fixed on the left side of Shouto’s face. He’s used to that, though. The doubletakes. The stolen glances. At least this guy is upfront about it. Before Shouto can think of something to say, the guy takes a few whiffs at his face and scrunches his nose. “Deku.”
Eijirou decides on that moment to jump in between them hurriedly. “Yes, he’s Izuku’s friend, and our new roommate .” The last word is said pointedly, like a reprimand.
The other shifter rolls his eyes and takes a step back with a slight shiver. It could be that he’s cold from the dripping water, Shouto thinks. He lifts his hand towards his wet roommate, and waves it once before him with a silent incantation.
The water dripping from the blonde hair and drenching the shirt quickly evaporates with a small hiss and a puff of steam. The shifter’s eyes widen as he stumbles back. “What the fuck !? Don’t touch me with your fucking magic shit !”
“Okay,” Shouto agrees easily. He reckons he should have asked first either way.
“Look, I’m sure Shouto just wanted to help,” Eijirou interjects placatingly. “Right, Shouto?”
Shouto nods. “I won’t do it again if you don’t like it.”
“Well, I fucking don’t .”
Eijirou chuckles awkwardly. “Katsuki has this thing with spellcasting. Sorry.”
The blonde – Katsuki – wrinkles his nose, his arms hugging around his chest tightly. “Just don’t touch me with it, and I won’t maul you in your sleep. Probably.”
“Agreed,” Shouto says. So he can still practise his spells around the house, just not on him. That’s fair.
“Oi,” Katsuki says, turning fully to Eijirou now. “Did you steal my fucking shirt?”
Eijirou looks down at his torso and groans. “It was the first thing I could find, and we had company ,” he says, gesturing to Shouto, who simply follows the conversation curiously, ping-ponging between them as they speak.
“Yeah? Well you’re fucking stretching it. Take it off.”
“Bro, come on, I’ll change in a bit, just let me–”
“No. Fucking take it off, it’s one of my favourites.”
“Kats,” Eijirou says, exasperated. All he gets in return is a nasty grin that reveals Katsuki’s sharp canines.
“I could fix it?” Shouto offers, drawing both their attention back to him. From their looks of surprise, they might have forgotten that he was even there. “If it’s stretched. It’s a simple spell.”
Katsuki scoffs. “No thanks,” he says, words dripping with malice. He turns back to Eijirou. “Get it fixed. Without the help of scarface, over here.” Then he plunges his hands deep into the pocket of his sweats and stomps back down the hallway.
Eijirou lets out a long breath. “I’m so sorry about him. He’s a really nice guy once you get to know him. Really… really know him.”
Shouto nods. It’s not what he’d expected from Midoriya’s friend. Then again, he might not have gotten off to the best start if Katsuki is uncomfortable with spellcasters.
“Well,” Eijirou mumbles apologetically. “I should probably go do something about this shirt. But make yourself at home!”
When Eijirou bursts into Katsuki’s room, he finds him brushing his hair, expertly and gently avoiding his ears. He’s dropped the shirt he was wearing of Eijirou’s to the side, straight onto the floor, revealing raised red lines from accidental scratches that make Eijirou swallow with an audible gulp. He gives Eijirou a glance through the mirror, but doesn’t turn. “What do you want now?”
“Could you have been any more of a dick towards our new roommate?” Eijirou asks, seriously wondering. Katsuki is always rude, but Eijirou’s gotten used to his more ‘affectionate’ rudeness, rather than the unpleasant kind. Sure, Shouto caught them at a bad time – a really bad time, Eijirou can still feel his skin tingling distractedly – but that’s not an excuse.
Brushing the last few strands, Katsuki finally turns, nose raised high in indignation. “I told you we don’t need another roommate, I could just get a second job!”
“And I told you you don’t need to do that!” Eijirou shoots back, stepping further into the room, getting closer to Katsuki, who sidesteps him and heads for his wardrobe. Eijirou sighs and settles on following him with his eyes. “ Two jobs on top of your schoolwork? I just don’t want to see you overworking yourself, Kats. Definitely not when it’s so unnecessary.”
“It’s not unnecessary,” Katsuki grumbles back, muffled from being buried deep in his stuffed wardrobe.
Eijirou lets out a sigh. He supposes it doesn’t matter what he says; no matter what, they’ve got a new roommate now, and Katsuki will be mad about that right up until he isn’t. Now the question is just how long that’ll take. “Right. Well, try not to make any enemies. This is Izuku’s friend, too.” Eijirou waits to see if Katsuki will answer, but he seems to be taking his sweet time picking out a shirt. Eijirou leaves before he resurfaces from the wardrobe.
When Eijirou returns to the living room, having changed into one of his own shirts at last, Shouto is nowhere to be seen. Turning his ears left and right, he does hear rustling coming from his new room. Unpacking, then.
He lets himself fall onto the couch with a heavy sigh. It’s not that Eijirou expected this to be easy right from the start, but Izuku could have definitely warned them that their new roommate was a spellcaster, too. Wouldn’t hurt to have prepared Katsuki a little. But either way, they seem to have already laid down some ground rules, and Shouto hasn’t run off just yet, so Eijirou supposes he should consider it a win.
Soft footsteps alert Eijirou of an approach, and he turns to watch as Shouto enters the living room. He looks a bit uncertain, like he isn’t sure what he’s supposed to be doing with himself now, and he’s holding a couple of books close to his chest. “I’ve unpacked,” he informs, then looks to Eijirou expectantly, as if awaiting his next order.
Eijirou nods, slowly. “Alright. Well, that didn’t take that long.”
“I didn’t have much stuff,” Shouto admits simply.
“Okay…” Eijirou waits for Shouto to move, or to say something else, but he doesn’t. “Okay, well do you… I mean, is there anything I can help you with?”
Shouto seems to consider this question for a moment. “No. Is it alright if I study at the dining table? I don’t have a desk in my room.”
“Oh, of course!” Eijirou says, getting up from the couch to head for the dining table. He means to clean it up a bit, but there really isn’t much to clean; the only thing is yesterday’s paper, along with an empty mug. Eijirou removes them swiftly. “Okay, just let me know if you need anything.”
Shouto nods and sits down on one of the middle chairs, and Eijirou busies himself with washing the mug in the sink. As he turns off the water, he can’t help but overhear Shouto’s quiet mumbling; he can’t make out the words, or at least understand them, and when he turns to glance over at the other, he’s moving one hand over one of the pages of a book, the other hand moving fluidly through the air. His eyes are fully focused on the words in the book, and Eijirou is unsure whether he realises that his hand flickers with a faint glow.
“What are you doing?” Eijirou asks, surprising himself. He didn’t mean to interrupt, but the faint light fades immediately as Shouto looks up from the book. “I’m– Sorry, I didn’t want to–”
“It’s alright,” Shouto assures him, lowering his hand to the table. He turns the book so Eijirou can see the page properly.
“ Orb of Light ,” Eijirou reads aloud, watching the messy scrawls in every blank space of the book. “That’s why your hand was shining?”
Shouto shrugs. “I know it sounds easy, but the trick behind it is creating an indestructible orb of light that will only go out when you break the spell. I’ve been able to produce flames since I was a toddler…” As he says this, he flicks his wrist and opens his palm around a small flame. The light of it dances in his eyes – in the grey and the blue alike. Eijirou hadn’t realised that they were different before now. Shouto seems almost split down the middle; his right side is light and innocent, white hair, soft skin and a light grey eye. His left, however, seems to belong to a completely different person; his hair is a fiery red, the skin surrounding his eye is badly scarred like it was burned years ago and never healed properly, and the eye is such a deep blue it feels like you could swim in it.
Shouto snuffs the flame by closing his fist around it, and a small cloud of smoke seeps out from between his fingers. “But Orb of Light is very different.”
Eijirou lets out a low whistle. “Doesn’t seem easy at all, actually. I mean, even the flame you just made… How do you just… create something out of nothing?”
Shouto blinks up at him, and although his expression doesn’t change, his eyes seem surprised. “You do the same, do you not? By shifting into a beast at will.”
Eijirou isn’t sure if he’s meant to take offence to being called a beast, but examining Shouto’s eyes, he sees only curiosity swimming in them. “I wouldn’t call Katsuki that if I were you,” he warns with a half-smile.
“Oh! No, of course not, I didn’t mean– That’s just what my–...” He cuts off, turns his gaze to the table. A painful expression seems to cross his face, but when he looks back up, his features are relaxed once more. “I’ll be careful not to bring outside prejudice into this house. I apologise.”
Another contrast of Shouto’s; the muttered, hurried words, overshadowed by a controlled, polite apology. It’s odd, almost like Eijirou is talking with two different people. “Okay. I’m glad. And anyway, when we shift, we don’t turn into something else, or create something that isn’t there. Our other form is always right underneath the surface.”
To prove his point, he raises his hand and sharpens his nails into strong, thick claws. His are pitch black, a colour that spreads down just past his fingertips, while he knows Katsuki’s to be a soft creme – lighter and a bit thinner, but just as deadly. “It’s still my nails. They just look different. It also doesn’t hurt, like a lot of people seem to think. Just like your fire didn’t hurt you.”
Shouto watches the claws closely, captivated. When he reaches out towards his hand, Eijirou lets him. Shouto handles his fingers gently, running a slender thumb over his palm. He presses down in the middle of Eijirou’s palm to effectively curl his fingers into a loose fist, his claws hovering over the fragile thumb like a cage. With his other hand, Shouto runs a soft finger over one of the claws, from the base to the tip.
Eijirou’s never been handled so gently before, examined so carefully. His chest quivers at the attention and warmth of the fingers touching his own. Absently, he breathes in Shouto’s scent; a mix of fresh mint and earthy cedarwood.
“I’m not immune to any fire,” Shouto mumbles, and when Eijirou finally refocuses on his expression, there’s a slight frown to his brows. “Not even my own.”
Eijirou wants to ask if that’s how he got the scar. He wants to ask why he looks so sad, at that moment. But seeing as he’s known him for about an hour, Eijirou acknowledges that it is not his place. “Is that why you’re trying to create the orb? So the fire won’t burn you?” His voice is much quieter than he’d tried for. It’s like they’ve created their own little bubble, and any movement too fast or sound too loud could burst it.
“It’s an assignment for school,” Shouto replies, running his fingers over another claw.
“Oh. I’m sure Izuku would be glad to–”
“What the fuck are you doing?”
The bubble bursts.
Eijirou pulls his hand back, retracts his claws and scrambles to stand. He feels like he’s been caught in a distasteful act, shame filling him immediately as he sees Katsuki’s upturned nose judging him from the end of the table. “I was just–... Shouto needed to study, and there isn’t a desk in his room, so–”
Katsuki clicks his tongue. “So apparently anyone in this house is fair play. Convenient , isn’t it?” He turns to leave back down the hallway, and seconds later, Eijirou flinches as the bedroom door slams behind him.
“I’m sorry, I have to…” he tries to explain to Shouto, who just nods and turns back to his book, hand already glowing again. Eijirou quickly runs down to Katsuki’s room.
“Get the fuck out,” Katsuki growls, standing in the middle of the room with his arms crossed, like he’d expected Eijirou to follow him.
Eijirou closes the door behind him and steps closer. “Kats, why are you so angry with me?”
Katsuki scoffs loudly. “Oh, I don’t know, maybe because he’s been living here for less than an hour, and you’re already trying to jump him like some kind of animal !”
He doesn’t mean that, Eijirou knows he doesn’t. But he also doesn’t understand why Katsuki is so hurt about the thought. They’re not together, they just unwind sometimes because, yeah, it’s convenient, but also because they both know that’s all there is to it. “That’s not what was happening, and I’m sure you already know that.”
“Oh? How would I know?”
“Because your hearing is as good as mine, for one, so I know you could hear us,” Eijirou says, becoming exasperated quickly. “Are you this much on edge from being interrupted earlier?”
Katsuki growls, baring his fangs as he steps closer, backing Eijirou up the wall. “Fuck yeah I’m on edge , there’s a fuckin spellcaster in my house !”
With the way Katsuki presses up against him, Eijirou is sure that’s not his biggest problem right now. He sighs, his breath fanning over Katsuki’s face, and he watches as the pupils in Katsuki’s eyes dilate. He bends down slightly, enough to fit his lips around an area just under Katsuki’s ear, tongue lapping shortly against warm skin. “Want me to help you unwind?” Eijirou whispers, gently nibbling at the wet skin.
Katsuki’s arm snakes around his neck, fingers grabbing the hair at the nape roughly and forcing their faces close. And then, with a wicked grin, he growls, “Fuck yes.”
Eijirou grabs Katsuki’s thighs, hoists him up as Katsuki’s starts biting at his throat, and takes quick steps to the bed. He throws him down, and the mattress squeaks under the sudden weight. “Need to be quiet, though,” Eijirou pants, even as he pulls his shirt over his head to toss aside.
Katsuki, legs spread wide for Eijirou, snorts. “Told you it was a dumb fucking idea to get another roommate.”
“Might’ve been,” Eijirou groans, and he wonders if he might actually believe it, if only for that moment.