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Eijirou didn’t remember deciding to come to Coney Island. One moment he’d been somewhere on the Q train, watching strangers reflected in the dark window; the next he was spilling out onto Surf Avenue, carried along by families in hats and toddlers with sticky fingers.
The boardwalk breathed sugar and salt. Cotton candy machines whirred in pastel clouds, frying oil snapped and hissed, and somewhere a vendor barked about three throws for five dollars. Above it all, the old wooden ribs of the pier creaked like tired bones.
He kept walking.
Past the gaudy prize booths and sun-bleached plush sharks. Past the faded murals and the blinking lights of the arcades. He didn’t look at the rides, didn’t look at the towering lattice of the Wonder Wheel turning slow against the sky, or the Cyclone rattling along its ancient track with an ugly scream that split the evening open.
He kept his eyes on the water.
The Atlantic stretched out in a sheet of dull silver, the late sun breaking into shards of orange across its surface. The glare stung. For a second, it was too bright, it was too bright and too loud and it reminded him of-
Eijirou swallowed and shook his head.
Four years.
Four years, and red eyes and spiked blonde hair still haunted him in fragments: in the sharp scent of cologne drifting past him in an airport terminal; in the wheeze of a stranger’s laughter; in the snap of a voice raised in irritation somewhere behind him. The world kept handing him pieces of someone who wasn’t there anymore.
He reached the end of the pier, where the boardwalk thinned and the carnival noise dulled to a distant hum. Here, the air was colder. The metal railing bit into his palms, wind slipping through the gaps and tugging at his jacket like impatient fingers.
Below, the tide slapped against the barnacled pilings. The wood beneath his shoes felt soft in places, swollen with years of salt and storms.
His soul felt like that, waterlogged. Split clean down the center, each half drifting in opposite currents. He’d been so close. So damn close.
He leaned forward, letting the wind press against him, grimace relaxing as the salt air filled his lungs. For a heartbeat, the sounds of the boardwalk blurred into white noise.
The wind pushed harder.
His foot shifted on a warped plank. The world tilted. His stomach dropped as wood scraped beneath his soles, and suddenly he was weightless - tumbling past rusted beams and sun-bleached supports, the ocean rushing up in a violent glitter.
He closed his eyes.
A hand caught him by the back of his shirt, yanking him upright with bruising force.
“Oi, Shitty Hair,” a voice growled in his ear, rough as the Cyclone’s tracks. “You’re going to get yourself killed if you carry on dangling over the fucking railing like that.”
His eyes flew open and were instantly met with a blaze of crimson, ruby irises fixed on him with an intensity that made his breath catch. The stare felt heavy, searching, as if it could see straight through him, and with his experience, it probably could.
“Ka… Bakugou?”
The name felt strange on his tongue, fragile and disbelieving. How long had it been since he’d said it?
At the sound of it, Bakugou’s eyebrows pulled together, a crease forming between them as a faint frown touched his mouth. He looked almost annoyed, and something about that pulled on Eijirou’s heartstrings. Without answering, he turned his head toward the sea. The late afternoon light spilled over the water, and the waves rolled in slow, steady breaths. Reflections shimmered across his face, tracing the sharp line of his jaw and catching in his hair as the wind stirred it.
And that face. He would be lying if he said it hadn’t appeared in his dreams every night since that fateful day. Sometimes clear and vivid. Sometimes distant and blurred. But always there. Always watching him with those same burning eyes.
The salty air clung to his skin, and the distant hum of voices drifted from farther down the shore. Laughter, music, the restless movement of people enjoying the warmth before evening fell. It felt unreal, like the world was carrying on as if nothing had changed.
But what was Bakugou doing here at all? This was supposed to be a long haul, so how’d he get here so soon?
He was stationed in northern Brooklyn, not the south. That alone made no sense. Best Jeanist’s agency was not known for transferring or having particularly big patrol areas. And besides, Bakugou hated crowds. He hated the noise, the press of strangers, the lack of control. This stretch of beach was scattered with people, towels and umbrellas dotting the sand, children racing toward the tide.
Yet here he was.
Standing close enough that he could feel the warmth radiating from him. Close enough that if he reached out, just slightly, their hands might brush.
The wind shifted, carrying the scent of salt and sunscreen between them. Bakugou still had not looked back at him. His gaze remained fixed on the horizon, on the endless line where sky met water.
“Do you know the date?”
Bakugou’s voice cut cleanly through the rush of the tide and distant chatter, low and steady, yet sharp enough to make Eijirou flinch. He had not expected him to speak at all.
“Date? Yeah, it’s the seventeenth of October. Why would you…”
The words died in his throat.
The seventeenth.
His stomach dropped as the weight of it settled over him. Four years. Four years to this very day since they had gone their separate ways, angry and raw and too stubborn to bend. Four years since they had stood in the middle of their living room and said things neither of them could ever take back. They had sworn never to speak again.
And they had kept that promise.
Until now.
The memory rose up without mercy. It had been the night after his birthday. They had come back late, still buzzing from drinks and loud music and the warmth of their friends’ laughter. The apartment had been small and cluttered, the kind of place that forced them into each other’s space, but it had been theirs. Their cramped little kitchen. Their uneven couch. Their bathroom shelf that never seemed big enough for both of them.
It had started with something stupid.
It always did.
Eijirou had nudged one of Bakugou’s heavy combat boots with his foot, nearly tripping over it in the narrow hallway.
“Seriously? You’re going to break my neck one day leaving these here.”
Bakugou had barely looked up while shrugging off his jacket. “Oh yeah? At least my ridiculous hair care routine doesn’t take up every available surface in our bathroom.”
It should have ended there. A petty jab. An eye roll. Maybe even a laugh.
Instead, something in the air had shifted.
Eijirou could still feel the way his smile had tightened, the way the alcohol in his system had made everything sharper, louder. “You’re one to talk about space. Your gear is everywhere. I can’t even open a closet without something falling on me.”
“And whose fault is that?” Bakugou had shot back immediately, voice rising. “You’re the one who keeps buying useless crap we don’t need.”
The words had grown harsher after that. Faster. Each one designed to hit something tender.
Eijirou inhaled sharply now, the present and the past blurring together. He remembered how quickly it had escalated, too quickly. The way their voices had filled the tiny apartment, bouncing off thin walls. The way frustration that had been building for months finally spilled over. Old grievances dragged into the light. Accusations neither of them fully meant but said anyway.
He could remember the heat in his chest, his pulse pounding in his ears as the alcohol rushed to his head. He had felt cornered, unheard, desperate to be understood and too angry to explain himself properly. And Bakugou had looked just as furious, just as wounded beneath the fire.
By the time silence finally fell, it had not felt like victory and it had not felt right.
The waves crashed louder against the shore, pulling him back to the present. The salty wind stung his eyes, though he could not tell if it was only the wind.
Four years.
Slowly, he lifted his gaze to Bakugou’s profile, still turned toward the sea, jaw tight, shoulders rigid.
The words hung between them, thin as sea mist.
“Is that why you’re here?” Eijirou said quietly.
Bakugou did not answer right away. The wind pushed at his shirt, snapping the fabric softly against his frame. The tide rolled in and out, steady and indifferent.
“I didn’t plan it,” Bakugou muttered at last.
Eijirou almost laughed at that. “You don’t just accidentally end up here.”
Silence again. Then, more tightly, “I had patrol nearby.”
It was a lie. They both knew it.
Eijirou turned fully toward him now. “It’s been four years.”
Bakugou’s jaw flexed. “I know what day it is.”
Something inside Eijirou tightened, and released, a breath he didn’t know he was holding on to.
Eijirou swallowed. “You’ve been waiting at our old spot, by the gold clock? How long?”
Bakugou’s eyes flicked to him then, sharp and bright and almost defensive. But beneath it, there was something else. Something raw.
“Were you?” Bakugou shot back. “Waiting somewhere for me to show up?”
The question knocked the air from his lungs.
“No,” Eijirou said too quickly. Then, softer, “I- I don’t know.”
He had not meant to come here. He had avoided it, avoided anything that felt too much like them. But that did not mean he had not thought about it. About this stretch of sand. About the way they used to walk along the water after long shifts, talking about nothing and everything all at once.
Bakugou looked back toward the horizon. “I kept thinking you’d say something.”
A pause.
“Say what?”
“Anything.” His voice was quiet now, stripped of its usual bite. “That I was being an idiot. That we were being idiots. That it wasn’t worth throwing away.”
Eijirou stared at him, full of disbelief. “You told me to leave.”
“You said you were done.”
“You told me not to come back.” It felt strange to finally talk about this and something small and hopeful bloomed in Eijirou’s chest.
Bakugou inhaled sharply, like the memory still burned. “I thought you’d fight me on it.”
The confession almost took the next words right out of his mouth but still; “I did fight you.”
“Not like I needed you to.”
The wind gusted between them, carrying the distant sound of laughter from the boardwalk. It felt wrong, almost cruel, that the world could be so light while this moment pressed so heavily on his chest.
Bakugou’s hands curled at his sides, fingers flexing once before going still.
“Did I make it impossible?” he asked suddenly, the words quiet but cutting. “Did I close my fist around something delicate, did I shatter you, Eijirou?”
His breath faltered.
Four years ago, he would have answered with anger. With pride. With something sharp enough to wound back, but now, all he felt was tired.
“You didn’t make it impossible,” he said slowly. “You just… never said you wanted me to stay.”
Bakugou stepped closer then, close enough that their shoulders brushed. The contact was tentative at first, like they were both waiting to see if the other would pull away.
Neither of them did.
“I’m not who I was back then,” Bakugou said. “I’ve learned how to say things. Not perfectly. But better.”
Eijirou let out a shaky breath. “I’m not who I was either.”
Another wave rolled in, soaking the hem of their jeans. This time they both laughed, quiet and surprised, the sound soft and familiar.
“So what now?” Eijirou asked.
Bakugou hesitated, and for a second Eijirou thought he might retreat again into pride, into silence.
Instead, he reached out.
Just his hand, open.
“I don’t want to lose you again,” he said. “But I’m not asking you to pretend the last four years didn’t happen. If you’re willing… we could try. Slowly. No slammed doors?”
Bittersweet did not begin to cover it. They could never get those years back. They could never be the boys in that cramped apartment again, arguing about boots in the hallway and bottles on the sink.
But maybe that was the point.
Eijirou looked at his hand, then at his face. At the fire that had once burned too hot and now felt warm instead of scalding.
“I’m not waiting another four years,” Eijirou said softly.
He slipped his hand into Bakugou’s.
The grip was firm. Familiar but also different.
The wind carried the scent of salt and sugar from the boardwalk. The lights shimmered against the darkening water, and the world kept moving around them, unaware of the quiet mending happening on the shore.
They would never be what they were.
But as they stood there together, watching the last of the sun sink beneath the horizon, it felt like they did not have to be, they were something new, mature.
This time, when the tide pulled back, neither of them let go.