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Katsuki’s car breaks down. In the middle of nowhere.
Katsuki’s car breaks down in the middle of nowhere, and he can’t get cell reception, so he spends a good half hour using all iterations of the word fuck in multiple colorful sentences, and only then does someone finally pass by.
It’s a kid. On a bike. A bike with goddamn tassels.
They’re pink. The tassels.
And the kid stops right in front of him and says, “Your radiator is probably shot.”
Katsuki blinks.
Did candy cane princess just give him car advice?
“Yeah,” he says. “You happen to know anyone who can fix it for me in this shithole?”
The boy pouts. “It’s not a shithole,” he says. “Reception is just spotty on the highway. And everyone’s at nee-san's reception, or you would have gotten a ride into town by now.”
The whole town is at one wedding reception? Yeah, sure. Totally not a shithole.
“And you, princess?” Katsuki asks. “You spend your time helping out at the local repair shop in those shorts?”
The boy’s mouth twitches. “Mm,” he says. “My nii-san runs it. The old man was really mad about it, because he wanted him to take over the family business, but now that he’s making decent money, he says the rest of us should be more like him.”
“Family dinners are fun, huh?”
The boy shrugs. “Nee-san’s reception wasn’t bad,” he says. “I just skipped out because my dad started his speech.”
“Not a fan of speeches?”
The boy shakes his head. “Nuh uh. Not his.”
He’s kind of cute. Makes Katsuki’s teeth itch. Which is probably stupid, because he looks like you could drop him into a high school class and he’d fit right in, but. Well. Katsuki has probably already done a bunch of stupid things in his life just to end up stranded on this particular highway.
“Lemme guess,” he says. “God had bigger plans for you today? Like being my guardian angel?”
The boy’s nose scrunches. “I don’t know if God has enough free time to go around assigning people personal guardian angels,” he says. “But I don’t mind helping. Your engine might blow otherwise. It’s, uh, starting to steam.”
Katsuki turns his attention back to the hood of his car. Which is, in fact, letting off a bit of steam.
“Fuck,” he hisses.
Candy cane princess laughs.
“Here,” he says, “let me just. Uh. Find a tree. So I can call my nii-san's shop.”
“I’m coming along,” Katsuki says. “I’m not gonna let some kid fall to his death in pink denim for my sake.”
“I like pink,” the boy says with a shrug. “My name’s Shouto, by the way.”
Katsuki snorts. “How old are you?” he asks. “Seventeen?”
“Nineteen,” Shouto says indignantly. “And I’ll be twenty in January.”
“Almost old enough to drink,” Katsuki says. “You excited for that?”
Shouto shrugs. “Nii-san would let me get those low-alcohol fruity beers at the store ever since tenth grade,” he says. “I actually think they’re kind of gross now.” And then, a little quieter, “How old are you? Thirty?”
Ouch.
“I’m twenty-six, you brat,” Katsuki huffs. “Respect your elders.”
“But,” Shouto says, stopping to bat his eyelashes exaggeratedly, “didn’t you say I was your guardian angel?” And then he pouts, all big and theatrical with his lower lip jutting out. “And I don’t even know your name yet. Shouldn’t you be nicer to your angel?”
“It’s Katsuki. There. Happy now?”
“Kind of,” Shouto says. Damn brat. “Hold on. There’s a good tree coming up.”
And then he rushes off ahead, and he actually starts climbing the thing. In his scuffed sneakers and pink denim shorts. What the actual fuck? Katsuki watches him find a sturdy branch and sit and start swinging his feet back and forth before he pulls out his phone and dials a number.
It’s just high enough that he can’t hear clearly, but he makes out some clueless city guy and can you send someone quickly? well enough.
Damn brat, he thinks, mouth twitching.
And then—
And then.
And then Shouto climbs back down, except his foot slips just before he hits solid ground, and suddenly—suddenly and lamentably for Katsuki’s heart, really—Katsuki has his hands full with pretty boy.
Quite literally.
“Um,” Shouto says. “Oh, your biceps are really firm.”
“Thanks, princess,” Katsuki blurts. “I owe you a treat.”
“My—my nii-san is picking us up himself,” Shouto says. “He, uh, also wanted a reason to get out of being around the old man.”
“Is that gonna take long?” Katsuki asks. “If my engine actually explodes, I’m guessing that’ll be harder to fix.”
Shouto laughs. “Yep,” he says. “Pretty much. But don’t worry. Nii-san usually thinks speed limits are suggestions.”
“You drive around with him a lot?” Katsuki asks. “Is that how you know?”
“Mm,” Shouto says. “But he won’t speed if I pout about it.”
“Spoiled,” Katsuki huffs.
“Is that bad?” Shouto asks. “I like being spoiled.”
“Yeah,” Katsuki says. “I can tell.”
And then Shouto pouts at him and asks won’t you put me down? so. Katsuki sees his point. The spoiled thing is probably working out just fine for him.
...
There is a distinct possibility that Shouto’s older brother might want to kill him. The other possibility is that maybe he just stares bloody murder at people for fun, who knows? He’s certainly glaring like that at Katsuki.
Katsuki, who—oh.
Shouto is blushing.
And Katsuki’s hand has, somehow, ended up on his thigh in the back of Touya-nii's car, and. Well. Now the glaring makes more sense, at least. But Shouto’s skin is soft and warm, and he visibly shivers when Katsuki’s thumb brushes the inside of his thigh, so. If Katsuki dies for this, it will be well worth it.
“What are you in town for?” Touya asks. “You don’t seem the type to swing by just to connect with nature.”
“Work,” Katsuki says. “I, uh, manage the technical stuff for my parents’ business.”
“Rich kid,” Touya says. “Figures.”
“Nii-san,” Shouto whines. “Our parents, like, own half the town.”
“Don’t see me taking their money,” Touya huffs. “Wouldn’t catch me dead going places for the old man’s business.”
“Well,” Shouto says. “Maybe Katsuki likes his dad.”
Katsuki laughs. “He’s alright,” he says. “Has his hands full with my mom.”
“See?” Shouto says. “His parents are probably in love. Isn’t that sweet?”
“Wouldn’t know,” Touya says. “But it must be nice.”
“Don’t your parents get along?” Katsuki blurts, because he has never, once in his life, kept his damn mouth shut when it counted.
“Kinda,” Shouto says. “Dad used to get mad a lot. But these past few years, he’s, uh—dunno. He’ll bring flowers home for mom and stuff. And she smiles more. Fuyumi says they’re in their honeymoon phase again. We, uh, got her divorce papers for mother’s day once. The four of us, I mean. I think when dad saw them, he kind of figured it out. You know?”
No, actually. Katsuki doesn’t know. The most he’s seen his parents fight about is what color to paint an accent wall, and that fight was mostly spurred on by going through a hundred nearly identical, but just slightly different versions of the same color. So. He doesn’t know.
“If you ask me,” he says, “she should have filled out those divorce papers.”
“Hey, Shou,” Touya says. “I think I’m starting to like your new friend.”
“Mm,” says Shouto, “I like him too.”
...
The rest of the drive is quiet. For the most part. But Katsuki keeps his hand on Shouto’s thigh, and Touya doesn’t pull over just to stab him, so. He counts it as solid progress.
...
The radiator is shot, it turns out.
“Gonna have to order a new one,” Touya says. “Might take a second. Hey, Shou, you better show Mr. City Boy here where the hotel is.”
“Hotel?” Katsuki says incredulously. “There’s only one?”
“I mean,” Touya shrugs. “If you want the seedy motels where married men take girls they don’t want anyone to see them with, be my guest. We have a few of those.”
Shouto, for some reason, blushes at this.
“Don’t worry,” he says. “I can take him. It’s on the way home, anyway.”
“And Shou?”
“Yeah, Touya-nii?”
“Behave, okay?”
But he’s looking at Katsuki when he says it, and, suddenly, Katsuki feels barely eighteen again. Except back then he didn’t even act like this, and he didn’t have a single goddamn reason to worry about anyone’s older brother, and now—
Now, Shouto tugs on his wrist and says, “We’re leaving. Bye, Touya-nii.”
And Katsuki’s stupid heart kind of. Stops. For a second. And then it starts up with a vengeance.
Fuck, he thinks.
He’s probably too old for this, isn’t he?
...
It’s almost dark out. The summer heat isn’t as stifling, like this. But Katsuki’s neatly pressed suit is still a little much for the weather.
“Do you mind if I take off my patches?” Shouto says. “I hate them, but I had to wear them for nee-san's reception. And I kept them on even after I changed out of my clothes, because they hurt like hell to peel when they’re fresh, but it’s probably been enough time now.”
“Patches?” Katsuki repeats, like an idiot. And then, like an even bigger idiot, “Scent patches? You’re an omega?”
“Mm,” Shouto says. “Is that bad? Don’t you like omegas?” He frowns. “Are you one of those alphas who thinks we can’t do anything? My dad’s like that.”
“No,” Katsuki says. “I like omegas.”
Which is—
Well, it’s a fucking lie, for one, because he’s never given a fuck whether someone’s a beta or an omega or another alpha like him or whatever-the-fuck, so. The thing is that he likes Shouto. And he wants Shouto to know it. And he’s probably acting like a damn creep, because he basically runs a business, and Shouto—what? Graduated high school last year? Thinks strawberry flavored beer is gross because it’s the only drink he’s ever tried? Sits in the back of his big brother’s car and gets starry-eyed about the possibility of people he doesn't even know being in love because his parents aren’t?
That doesn’t seem fair.
None of it, really.
But especially—
Especially this bit.
The bit where Shouto peels off his scent patches, carefully, first one side of his neck and then the other, and Katsuki almost falls to his knees.
He smells like strawberries.
And suddenly Katsuki’s teeth feel too sharp for the inside of his mouth and he wantswantswants and he can’t figure it out, for an unbearably long breath, what it is and why he feels half-mad, all of a sudden, because he’s never—
Because he doesn’t give a single fuck about omegas. Usually. Under normal circumstances. Under distinctly non-Shouto circumstances.
“Are you okay?” Shouto asks. “Your scent just got all intense.”
“Yeah,” Katsuki says. “Just. You smell real sweet, kid.”
“I’m not a kid,” Shouto huffs. “Don’t be mean.”
“It’s for my benefit, okay?” Katsuki says. “Don’t think too hard about it.”
Because if he starts thinking shit like how people definitely do get mated at nineteen and fresh out of high school, especially in tiny towns like this one where everyone knows each other and the old ladies who work at the post office probably gossip about who dyed their hair a new color that month—well. If he starts thinking about that, Shouto’s beloved nii-san is definitely going to chase him down and make him dig his own grave with a rusty shovel.
And Katsuki wouldn’t even blame him.
Not really.
Because—
Because.
Looking at Shouto like this, he does want to sink his teeth in and promise him it’s forever. That he’ll do it better than what Shouto grew up with around his shitty dad, and he’ll remember all the anniversaries, and he’ll get him flowers, and he’ll get him chocolate for his heat cramps, and he’ll—
(They could paint a nursery sky blue, or something. Even if they have a girl. Because the sky is such a lovely color.)
Shouto tilts his head to the side like a cat. “For your benefit?” he repeats. “Why’s that? Because otherwise you’ll bite me? And then Touya-nii will get mad?”
He’s teasing, the brat.
He’s teasing; he probably just thinks Katsuki’s young enough to want him for a quick fuck, sheltered little omega real easy on the eyes for the spoiled rich kid who has everything he could want and then some, and—and he’s not even wrong, exactly, except that Katsuki doesn’t think the world owes him shit just because.
He thinks he’s good enough to earn it.
He thinks he’s the damn best there is.
And he wants to be that, right now, for Shouto.
“Yeah,” Katsuki says. “Yeah, princess. Something like that. Give or take a shovel.”
Shouto laughs. “Nii-san wouldn’t do that,” he says. “He doesn’t like making me cry.”
“Brat,” Katsuki huffs. “You gonna cry for me? At the little nameless grave in the woods where I’ll end up if your big brother finds out I wanna kiss you?”
Shouto nods. “Mm,” he says. “I’ll cry a lot. You ever think—it’s really not fair, Katsuki. Alphas never have to wear scent patches. Even if their scents are the ones that always get all intense and fill up a room. I’ve seen pups cry just because an alpha got mad.”
“Yeah,” Katsuki says. “Sucks, I guess.”
Shouto nods. “Yeah,” he says. “It sucks. But I liked it today. When I met you. You smell nice.”
How long has it been since his car broke down on that highway, again? Five hours, maybe? Seems like a hell of a short time for his whole life to turn upside down.
“Yeah?” Katsuki asks. “You gonna let me kiss you, then?”
Shouto shakes his head. “Not here,” he says. “Everyone will see.”
There’s hardly a soul out on the streets, but Katsuki takes his word for it.
“Where?” Katsuki asks, arching an eyebrow. “One of those seedy motels your big brother mentioned?”
Shouto swats at his chest. “What kind of omega do you think I am?” he asks. “Don’t be mean, or we can’t have three kids and four cats.”
“Four cats, huh?”
“Mm, one for each kid. And one more for me. To cuddle.”
“What if I want to cuddle, huh?” Katsuki asks. “Then what? Poor me?”
“That’s why you don’t get a cat,” Shouto says stubbornly. “So you cuddle me.”
...
Katsuki wants to eat him up. Swallow him whole. He might be dying. He doesn’t know. He knows that they make it to the hotel. He knows, vaguely, that the girl at the reception desk is Shouto’s friend, and she’s not wearing scent patches, so she must be a beta, and he forgets her name the second she tells it to him, because his head is full of ShoutoShoutoShoutoShoutoShouto, and still he could swear she winks when she hands them a room key after Katsuki signs a bunch of shit, and then Shouto leads him up the staircase, and—
Room 33.
Katsuki should probably remember that.
Katsuki should probably remember that, so he doesn’t make a fool of himself and roam into some stranger’s room, but, as it stands—
“Can we cuddle now?” Shouto asks him with big, pleading eyes. “The beds here are so soft.”
And he bounces a little to test out the mattress, and he laughs, and Katsuki thinks that this must be what love feels like. You know. Why his dad remembers his mom’s lunch order by heart and why she only argues about shit like paint colors with him, and why—
Why, right now, he wants to keep Shouto forever and ever. Just like this.
“Sure,” Katsuki says. “Why the hell not.”
And he starts loosening his tie, and Shouto pouts about him taking off his jacket too with his nose all scrunched, because you don’t cuddle in a suit, Katsuki, and—
And they cuddle.
And then he tips Shouto’s chin his way and kisses him.
It’s pretty nice.
(And, eventually, after Shouto convinces him to order way too much room service for two people—one of whom, it merits saying, is a deceptively tiny omega—they fall asleep. Just like that. Pressed real close together on the same bed. Like they’re already mated. Like they’re already each other’s. And that’s pretty nice too.)
...
The next morning, Katsuki is late for his meeting.
And he doesn’t have a car, and Shouto’s big brother will most likely probably definitely kill him.
And—
And when he does get there, hair still messy from sleep, in yesterday’s clothes because he didn’t even have time to do more than splash some cold water on his face, the CEO of Endeavor Industries looks at him and says, “I hear you met my sons, the other day.”
Sons, Katsuki thinks.
And then nii-san, our parents, like, own half the town.
“Yeah,” he says. “I definitely met them.”
“And?” Todoroki Enji asks. “Do you plan to give Shouto back any time soon?”
“No,” Katsuki blurts. “I’m keeping him.”
It’s ridiculous. It’s stupid. It’s probably directly harming his parents’ profit margins.
And Katsuki doesn’t give a single fuck.
“Oh,” Enji says. “I see.”
...
(When Shouto finds out, he won’t stop laughing. And, just for that, Katsuki pins him to the bed and kisses him wherever he can reach, even while Shouto pouts about his stubble pricking him and how it tickles, alpha.
And then he asks if they can practice for those three kids they’re going to have, and Katsuki is only a man in the face of powers much greater than him, so. Obviously, he kisses Shouto’s soft pink mouth until he’s about to run out of breath.
And then they practice.)