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He made too much food again.
He would call it an accident if it didn’t happen every other night, and he would curse himself for it if the food ever actually went to waste, but he’s not the only person using this refrigerator.
Katsuki and Izuku have different schedules. Sometimes their patrols overlap enough that they’ll both appear at the same fight, but for the most part, they exist in loops around each other, which makes their apartment seem much bigger than it actually is.
There are two bedrooms, thanks to a real estate agent capable of making miracles happen, but the kitchen and living room exist as a single space, and for showers, well, it’s better to just take them at the agency. But they’re both still at the start of their careers, and Katsuki didn’t want to ask his parents for help when they don’t need more.
He packs the leftovers into two containers and sets them on the top shelf of their painfully small refrigerator. They won’t be there in the morning, assuming Izuku comes home and actually has dinner tonight. He made his favorite again, entirely by coincidence. Izuku’s preferences don’t affect his actions at all. He’s the one who wanted to eat it tonight, and the fact that he made enough for two people is purely a coincidence.
Katsuki cleans up the kitchen so it won’t smell like used oil all night and sulks off two steps back to the rest of the apartment. They live in a shoebox, and it’s almost annoying enough to reconsider those underwear ads.
Nope, no way, not doing them. The last thing he needs is a billboard with his crotch on it the size of a car with nothing else but his mask on. He would rather get paid for kicking ass than showing his own off. It’s a good ass, though. If he did want to show it off, no one would sell more underwear than he would, that’s for sure.
He grins to himself smugly before taking the two other steps required to get to their closet of a bathroom. It’s not the best or the most useful bathroom in the world, but he can at least wash his face and brush his teeth before bed. The rest he can take care of in the morning at his agency.
His room is big enough for a bed built on top of a set of shelves for storage. The headboard has outlets built into it along with a light that keeps him from breaking his neck in the dark, and so he plugs his phone in before turning it off.
Another night of going to bed at a reasonable hour. Let Izuku prowl through the shadows like the little spider he’s turned into, Katsuki is just fine taking the noon shifts, scorching sun be damned.
He thinks of him out there bouncing over the rooftops, slipping in and out of the dark in the blink of an eye, haunting the villain world like a ghost, and it’s always at night that Katsuki annoyingly wonders why he didn’t ever ask him to go with him.
Kacchan, we’re gonna be heroes together! Liar. Katsuki turns over onto his side and puts his back to the door with a huff. They’re both heroes, yeah, but in the same way that two dentists only run into each other at the annual tartar convention, or whatever the hell it is that dentists go to when they gather. Heroes have galas and award ceremonies, and sure, he and Izuku sit together, but it’s only because they go to them together. Oh, Izuku did float to the first one, but then he had to pay a nasty fine from the company he rented his tux from due to a bird accident, Izuku said. Katsuki didn’t ask, and he doesn’t plan to.
Fucking nerd.
He squeezes his eyes shut with a huff as pulls his blanket up to his shoulder.
This apartment is cold. He didn’t notice when they first moved in because it was in the middle of the summer, but the insulation is terrible, and it doesn’t matter what the thermostat says, the vents always blow out cold air. He thinks about Izuku jumping around in the night air and exhales again. It’s his choice and his problem for choosing it.
Exactly. Everything Izuku does is Izuku’s problem, and so Katsuki has no reason to make them his own by worrying about them. So what if he’s out all night? He’s a big boy who can take care of himself. He could fight God and walk away from it, smiling and crying at the same damn time in that familiar soggy combo that Katsuki grew up with.
He can see him now on the backs of his eyelids, perpetually overflowing with every emotion on the spectrum, perpetually in need of a haircut, perpetually under-fed and over-exhausted, despite Katsuki’s best efforts—the purely coincidental ones where Katsuki makes himself Izuku’s favorite food for dinner and happens to make too much because he completely believed he could eat four full sized pork cutlets by himself without making himself sick. Sure.
The apartment door opens, and Katsuki swears beneath his breath. For Izuku to be home, it would have to be well after midnight, which means he’s been lying here with his thoughts gnawing at him for the last three hours. His one compromise for getting to go to bed when he wants to is that he unfortunately has to be up at the worst possible hour, and so the longer he lies here being a loser, the shittier he’ll feel in the morning.
It’s already the morning, he reminds himself obnoxiously. They don’t call it 1 in the morning for no reason. He’s wasted the going to sleep part of his night, and now he’s stuck in the tossing and turning hours, the ones that will have him praying to his agency’s coffee maker all day tomorrow.
Izuku fumbles around in their apartment as quietly as he can. Katsuki can still hear him, but he can at least appreciate the effort. If he was asleep, there wouldn’t be a chance in hell that he would wake him.
He hears the refrigerator open, then shut, and then he hears the microwave and three quick beeps like Izuku is trying to make them pass as quickly as possible. Then it runs for a minute or more, and then Izuku opens the door before it can finish and make another noise. He rolls his eyes to himself at him.
Katsuki can sleep now. Izuku is home and fed, and now there’s nothing left to think about.
And it works, almost.
He does drift off deeply enough to consider himself falling asleep, but the sound of water from their shower head hitting the bathroom floor quickly but gently draws him out of it. It’s not the greatest setup because you have to hold it up the entire time, but at least some stinky little loser has decided to take a bath tonight.
That makes one of you, Katsuki’s brain unhelpfully supplies. He tries not to think of the oil smell clinging to his hair and instead wills himself to go the fuck to sleep.
And he does, soothed by the sound of falling water and the welcome fragrance of Izuku’s shampoo. They tried to share once to save money and shelf space, but then terrible things happened to his green little head that they agreed to never speak of again—although Katsuki will still sometimes send Izuku pictures of the most bulbous heads of broccoli he can find with a this you? caption attached. It usually earns him about a dozen angry swearing emojis, which is always rejuvenating.
A sudden weight dipping onto his bed snatches from that second drop into slumber, and Katsuki blinks at the unmistakable feeling of someone climbing into bed with him. Izuku, he knows by presence alone, tucks himself in with a slight shimmy that Katsuki would roll his eyes at if this wasn’t so damn bizarre.
He sits up and furrows his brow, but all he can see is the back of Izuku’s head thanks to his eyes being adjusted to the dark. He opens his mouth to let out a justified what the fuck, but the sound of a deep, tired sigh cuts him off.
He’s worn out.
He’s tired enough to not even notice he went to the wrong room, climbed into the wrong bed, or that another person was already sleeping there.
Katsuki frowns. Did he come home last night? He thought he did because Izuku always comes home, but does he? He’s always assumed that due to their overlapping schedules, Izuku has been popping in after he goes to sleep and popping out before Katsuki gets home, but what if he wasn’t popping anywhere at all?
He lies down next to him, still on his side because there’s no way to lie on his back on a single bed. Izuku’s breathing steadies so quickly he’s not sure he was fully awake when his head hit the pillow.
Fucking hell, nerd.
He takes an annoyed breath and pulls the blanket back up to make sure Izuku is covered, and he makes a mental note to find out exactly what Izuku’s real schedule is. There’s no way in hell he’s going to let him run himself into the ground, not on his watch. They didn’t move in together because he just likes having him around.
Then why did they move in together?
It wasn’t Izuku’s idea.
He closes his eyes with an annoyed scowl, and he ignores the way Izuku’s wet hair tickles his nose.
Some things don’t need to be thought about, but Katsuki doesn’t have a choice anymore. He fights it, sure, just like he’s fought them for years, but this time they decided to eat at him until morning.
When Izuku finally wakes up, Katsuki is still there, and one of them has some explaining to do.
At least that was the plan before Izuku, horrified, asks why he didn’t kick him out of bed.
He wishes he had an answer for that that didn’t make him want to scream.
Instead he hits him with his pillow and sulks off to make breakfast—or lunch, at this point in the day.
No, he doesn’t want to talk about that either.
But oh, Izuku asks, because of course he does.
The nerd can’t just mind his own business.
He should take a cue from Katsuki.