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Touya makes a low, humming noise against Shoto’s lips, a gentle vibration that travels between them. He pulls away shortly after, and Shoto is only slightly cognizant of the instinctual way he cants slightly forward to chase the warm contact.
Touya's half-scarred lips tick up into a self-satisfied smirk, the kind Shoto is weakest to. He figures they have time, now, that the war is finally over and society is still recovering, but Shoto’s never known himself a patient man. Luckily, Touya indulges Shoto's silent plea with a few more pecks. Shoto thinks he can taste the smirk, somehow. It's sweeter.
When they pull back the final time, Touya's smirk has melted into a lopsided smile. To anyone else it would just look like another smirk, but Shoto can tell the difference. He knows, because it’s one of the few smiles of Touya’s that makes his heart kick in his ribcage.
It’s soft yet sharp at the same time, and, paired with the low glint in Touya’s eyes, turns his expression into something adoring.
“Your lips,” Touya murmurs, eyes hooded and lingering on said lips, “are half hot and half cold. Like the rest of you.” There’s a hint of amusement in his tone, like this discovery particularly tickles him.
Shoto blinks. This is the first he’s hearing of this, since he hasn’t kissed anyone else. “I didn't know that.”
Touya raises a brow at that, skepticism washing over his expression. “What, no one ever told you?” He makes an amused hmph sound. “You’d think they would. Probably not used to it. Not like I am.” He says the last part smug, like he’s proud of that fact.
Shoto flattens his lips into a line, feels a curl of embarrassment in his gut. “I haven't… kissed anyone else.”
All movement from Touya, seemingly even his breath, stills.
Shoto flicks his eyes back to his older brother to find him slack-faced and wide-eyed. When he swallows, it’s thick, and his throat clicks.
“That was your first kiss?” he croaks weakly.
Shoto’s brow furrows, partly with confusion. “Yeah.” His eyes narrow. “Is that a problem?”
Touya looks like he’d be sweating if he could. He runs a frantic hand through spiky white hair, palming at his nape.
“I just— I mean— With… Your first kiss. With your brother? Is that really… okay to you?” The hesitance with which he speaks, like he’s treading over broken glass, paired with the stuttering over his words is completely unlike the older brother Shoto has gotten used to.
Over the past year of relearning each other, a lot is different from what Shoto expected. The softness among them. But Touya’s easy confidence, the smirks and drawling tone and teasing? That was well within Shoto’s expectations, aligning with his interactions with who he knew as Dabi— before Shoto knew the truth.
Evidently, this topic is one that bothers Touya. Even though Shoto can’t quite see why. His head tilts, back to confusion. “Yes? Why wouldn’t it be?”
Both of Touya's hands, one which was previously resting on Shoto’s hip, raise so he can bury his face in them. He makes a sound resembling a groan, and rubs up and down his scarred cheeks a few times. Shoto watches the scene in bewilderment. He really didn’t think it was such a big deal…
Obviously he’s aware of laws, he’s a hero currently training to become pro. But just morally speaking between the two of them… Shoto knows Touya makes him happy. He hopes he makes Touya happy, too. And he knows that, after everything, after fighting a war at fifteen years old, he deserves some happiness. They both do.
So what about what society thinks? Who decides whether they have any say in who Shoto chooses to love?
And anyway, Shoto stopped obsessing over what was wrong or right in his heart long before he realized his love for Touya. It was freeing to let go of those shackles of always trying to be the perfect masterpiece he was sculpted into.
He sticks to his core beliefs and what matters to him most. His dreams, his aspirations… Of course Touya’s one of them.
Touya finally raises his head once more, looking Shoto dead-on. “Look. I'm not gonna preach to you the bullshit about how ‘your first kiss is supposed to be special with someone you love,’ blah blah blah.” Touya must have experience with those kinds of talks, since he seems so disapproving of them. Mocking voice paired with air quotes and all.
“But,” he continues, “There’s definitely gotta be something in some book somewhere about your first kiss being with your sibling.”
Shoto blinks in silence, because, what? Why does that even matter? Who cares?
Touya seems to take the silence for some kind of response Shoto definitely didn’t give, because his furrowed brows relax a fraction. “Not that I'm complaining,” he adds. “Frankly, I—“ and then he abruptly cuts himself off, only adding to Shoto’s burgeoning confusion.
Shoto opens and closes his mouth a few times, trying to generate a sentence that reflects his puzzlement. The longer he takes to form any concrete words, the more awkward Touya looks.
“Look, Shoto—“
“Why does it matter?” Shoto finally blurts, eyes wide.
Touya looks seconds away from explaining many things Shoto already knows, or maybe having a meltdown, so he quickly charges on with, “I like you.”
The non-sequitur seems to throw Touya for a loop for a moment, mouth clicking shut before it twitches into the ghost of a bemused half-smile. “I know, Shoto, but—“
“And you like me,” Shoto interrupts, undeterred. He stares hard into Touya’s eyes, wills him to understand. “Right?”
Touya’s brows screw up, eyes flitting between Shoto’s own, searching for hidden meaning. Either Shoto’s very bad at explaining it, or Touya’s genuinely lost on what Shoto’s trying to say.
“Where are you… going with this?” Touya asks, wary.
Or maybe it’s both.
Shoto huffs a sigh, irritated with his own inability to put these thoughts and feelings into words.
If he could just… express the way he feels… How being with Touya over this past year has lifted a weight he hadn’t realized he’d been carrying since he could walk; how Touya’s touches— romantic or familial, from hands caressing his hips to roughly messing up his hair— and teases fill his heart with a warmth indescribable. How Shoto genuinely doesn’t think he could have anyone better for a first kiss.
That, to Shoto, this bond they’re building matters more to him than anything stated in a rulebook ever could. To hell with that.
Shoto pushes himself up so he’s level with Touya’s eyes. His brother follows the movement with climbing brows, blinking at the scowl Shoto feels forming on his face.
You know what? Screw it.
“To hell with that,” Shoto repeats out loud.
Touya stares at him in silence for a solid six seconds. “…Huh?”
Oh. That was also a non-sequitur. Collecting himself, Shoto tries again.
“Other people can say what we feel for each other is wrong. They could argue it’s messed up for us to be together like we are. Hero and Villain, brother and brother…” Not that Touya’s much of a villain anymore. Shoto shakes his head. “At the end of the day… nobody but us can judge whether or not we can love each other.”
Touya’s eyes widen momentarily at love, but Shoto continues before he loses his momentum.
“I don’t care about that crap,” he spits, indignation rising in his desperation to tell Touya it doesn’t matter, “And I know you don’t either.”
Bolstering himself, Shoto resolutely meets Touya’s eyes, sparing only a passing thought to his wide-eyed, jaw-dropped expression.
“I want you. I have wanted you. And I’ve spent so long not knowing whether I could ever have anything to myself, there isn’t a damn thing that can take you from me. Not you yourself, not society, and not people who know nothing about how much we’ve fought to get to where we are.”
The last syllable rings out low and firm between them, Shoto’s impassioned speech met with stunned silence. The seconds tick on, the world continues to spin, and Shoto breathes heavily in the aftermath of his spilt feelings.
After a solid fifteen seconds pass like that, Touya clears his throat while Shoto takes the silence as an opportunity to settle the heat simmering beneath his skin. He… may have gotten a little worked up.
“I… didn’t know you felt so strongly about the topic,” Touya jokes, in an obvious attempt to collect himself after the glorified lecture Shoto just delivered him.
Shoto scoffs, still riding out the anger that had built up so quickly, now feeling embarrassment creep up his nape.
“I didn’t mean to say that much,” Shoto mutters, ears heating, head ducked as the confidence gives way to self-consciousness. His face pinches. “…Sorry.”
The two brothers continue to stew in the rapidly stretching silence, one mortified and the other awestruck— both completely unsure what to say next— until Touya suddenly snorts, and then throws his head back with an unrestrained cackle. It startles Shoto with its abruptness, his head jerking back up.
For a split second, Shoto thinks Touya is laughing at him, but as Shoto takes a closer look at his face, he finds nothing but fond amusement scrunching up his big brother’s scarred cheeks.
The shame that had begun heating the tips of Shoto’s ears gradually recedes, washed away as the laugh continues, and continues. It successfully chases away the remaining dregs of frenzied fire curling around Shoto’s muscles.
A breathless puff of air leaves him, and then he’s smiling too, because it might be one of the most genuine laughs Shoto’s ever heard from his older brother. He has no idea what’s so funny, but that hardly matters to him right now.
His hackles finally settle, and his shoulders lower from their tensed state. It’s been a while since his emotions have gotten the better of him like that. Of course it’s Touya who causes it, and also Touya who pulls him out of it.
The rough laughter scratches out of Touya’s throat, producing something akin to a needle stuttering over a disc— crackling like static. And yet, there’s real joy there. Joy Shoto caused. After his utterly embarrassing display of borderline childlike petulance, Shoto is relieved that it amused Touya more than annoyed him.
It’s a sound that fills Shoto’s chest like sunlight, leaves him feeling buoyant and relieved. In the face of that, Shoto is speechless, and he blinks his wide eyes until they soften, a fuzziness he’s unable to name traveling through his veins from head to toe. It melts him, allows him to lower back down onto the bed with a final exhale that shakes at the end.
The second Shoto’s close enough, Touya's head thunks down against his collarbone, the residuals of his chuckles being muffled there. Shoto can feel the grin pressed against the bare skin, Touya’s breaths brushing his throat. He wants it pressed back against his lips.
“I really don’t know what I was expecting,” Touya says with a final amused huff, and raises his head. “But it definitely wasn’t that.” His arms encircle Shoto’s waist to pull the younger back into him. Instinctively, Shoto tangles their legs together, feeling now-familiar warmth bloom from every point they’re touching.
Shoto goes to apologize again but, as if sensing it, Touya gives him a squeeze, and then frees an arm to cradle Shoto’s cheek— the scarred one. “What did I do to deserve you, huh?” His smile is lazy and indulgent and dangerously soft, and it’s kind of scrambling Shoto’s braincells. Apology successfully neutralized.
“Never change, baby brother,” Touya hums through a grin, and Shoto gets one last glance of his delighted expression before he seals his lips over his brother’s.
It’s hardly changed from how they were kissing earlier, yet it feels different; more purposeful. Like Touya's kissing him for a reason now, like he’s trying to memorize the feel of their lips against each other.
Like he’s trying to show Shoto his reciprocation— That he understands.
Whatever it is, it has Shoto’s heart picking up speed in his chest, his fingers clenching the fabric at Touya's shoulders.
Touya waits until Shoto parts his lips expectantly to plunge his tongue inside, and even then, it doesn’t escalate past something playful and appreciative; despite the fact that Touya kisses him like he wants to devour him, he’s tender with it.
The wet smacking sounds still make Shoto’s ears burn, but Touya keeps smiling these little half-tilted smirks each time they part only to inevitably meet in the middle once more, like it’s completely subconscious.
Shoto can’t tell if it’s joy or smugness causing Touya's lips to quirk against his own, but knowing his big brother, it’s likely the latter.
Touya still… after all that… Shoto is helpless but to mirror the smile, knowing at least part of his feelings reached his brother.
Touya knows he’s the first, knows the extent of Shoto’s perhaps unhealthy devotion towards him, and yet is still choosing to kiss Shoto despite it. Maybe even because of it.
And Shoto, selfishly, hopes Touya’s the last. He thinks his big brother might agree.