Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Prologue I: The One You Drown For

“And keep my eyes above the waves. 

When oceans rise. 

My soul will rest in your embrace. 

For I am Yours and You are mine.”

Oceans (Where My Feet Fail) — Brett Blondell

You can love many people in a lifetime.

Some loves arrive like good weather. They move through your days without clatter, laying themselves down like sunlight across a kitchen table. They are the easy habits — two mugs on the same hook, a hand finding yours without thinking, the comfort of a shared silence that doesn’t demand explanation. They steady you. They soften your edges. If you are lucky, they teach you the kindness of staying.

And then there’s the other kind.

The kind that doesn’t ask permission. The kind that slams into shore, all surge and drag, and leaves the beach a different shape than before. The kind that gets under your ribs and rewires the room where your heart lives, rearranging furniture you thought was nailed to the floor. It makes a battlefield of your chest. It moves like weather you cannot predict — blue sky one minute, sirens in the distance the next. 

It is not gentle. It is not safe. It is not reasonable.

It hurts. Not because it is cruel by nature, but because it is vast. Because it refuses to be contained by the small stories you told yourself about what you’d settle for. It blurs borders — between want and need, between devotion and fury, between the person you were and the person you become when their name is in your mouth. It is flame and flood at once: burning from the inside while the tide rises around your throat, daring you to admit how badly you want to breathe.

Most people meet many loves. Almost no one meets this one.

But if you do, you will know.

Because something in you goes quiet the instant you see them. Not the world — no, the world gets louder: keys, laughter, a door closing, the weather — everything heightens around the stillness they make in you. Your pulse learns a new language in a single afternoon. The air tastes like the moment just before a storm breaks.

This love is a singular geography. A map that only exists once, even if you spend years pretending you can navigate by other stars. You can try to outrun it. You can cross continents, switch cities, switch names, switch the way you sign your letters. You can fill your days with good things and better people and a calendar so crowded there’s no space left for ghosts. You can build a life that looks solid from the outside — neat corners, clean lines, proof that you did not drown.

Some people call it a curse — to carry one person the way a coastline carries the memory of waves. They are not wrong. Curses are only miracles wearing the wrong name.

Because here is the quiet, ugly truth: you can love other people well. You can love them fiercely. You can choose them and mean it, lay foundations, paint the walls, call it home. You can grow beside them and be changed by their kindness. You can build a life that deserves to last.

And still, there is the one who owns the weather in you.

Some loves are meant to last. Some loves are meant to mend.

And some loves are meant to remake you — sweep through the house of you and leave it changed, even if all the furniture ends up back in its old place. You can call it ruin if you want. You can call it fate if you need to. You can call it a mistake you refuse to repeat.

But when you are honest, when the room is dark and the water is loud and there is no one there to hear you edit yourself, you will call it by its real name.

The one you drown for.

You will not love anyone the way you love them.

And maybe, you were never meant to.

Chapter Text

Prologue II: Salt In The Wound

“There's no doubt in my mind that if you could, then you would try

Crack my ribcage open and pull my heart right through.”

Swimming Pool — The Front Bottoms

Seabright Bay.

A small town carved into the coast, where the sky bleeds gold more often than gray. Narrow streets chalked with salt and sand. Gulls on the power lines like notes on a staff. The sea is only a few blocks away, but the smell of it lives everywhere — worked into the pavement, the classrooms, the frayed edges of textbooks that still cough up grains when you flip to the back. 

Seven thousand people on paper. Fewer, somehow, when you count the ones who matter.

For Izuku Midoriya, it’s both home and hell.

The first place he ever knew. The place that won’t let go. The glass-sided box he can see out of but cannot quite escape, worn by the same tide that keeps polishing what’s already broken.

His personal cage.

And at the center of that undertow stands the boy who makes it worse.

Katsuki Bakugou.

Captain of Seabright High’s swim team. Local surf legend. Too smart for his own good and too beautiful to be fair. He walks into a room and the room tips toward him, people slide into his orbit like it’s gravity and not a choice. He’s also the boy who made Izuku’s life smaller starting at thirteen and never stopped.

It’s become a routine. A pastime. A game with one rule: don’t make it easy on the nerd.

His name tastes like salt and blood in Izuku’s mouth. Chlorine sting in his lungs, sunburn that never fades. It runs hot through his veins, tangled up with hate and humiliation and a stubborn, uglier thread he can’t cut clean.

Because for as much as he hates Bakugou — and God, he hates him — Izuku still can’t stop watching.

Just like now.

Hallway between second and third period. The air tastes like sanitizer and salt. A line of blue-and-white hoodies clusters by the trophy case, laughter moves through them like wind moving through grass. Izuku feels the shift before it happens — pressure in the room, the way a pool goes quiet just before the starter horn. He keeps his eyes forward. He knows better. 

He knows Bakugou is a creature of habit.

He still looks.

A second too long. A small, stupid second.

A foot hooks his ankle. The floor rushes up. Skin scrapes, heat blooms in his palms and knees. His notebook skids across the linoleum, pages slapping open, flipping like a deck in a dealer’s hands. His pen wobbles away and taps to a stop against the toe of a sneaker.

Laughter breaks over him in small waves — snorts, a whistle, that thin-edged chorus that says this is just another joke he’s not invited to get. Heat gathers behind his eyes. He keeps his head down.

Don’t react. Don’t feed it. Don’t make it worse.

Bakugou’s friends are all there in the blur — arms slung over shoulders, girls leaning in. Faces he knows from PE, from practice, from the beach. Monoma’s smirk flashes in the corner of his vision. Another guy — dark hair tied back with a headband — hovers nearby, not laughing, not helping. Yosetsu, Izuku thinks, distantly.

Then a voice cuts through, softer but sharp enough to be heard.

"Can you knock it off, man?"

Red hair comes into view. Kirishima.

Izuku’s fingers are still reaching for his notebook when a pen appears in his line of sight — the runaway one, held out in a square, open palm. Izuku looks up. Kirishima’s face is all apology that doesn’t quite know where to land.

“You good?” he asks, quiet, like kindness might spook.

Behind him, Bakugou scoffs. He’s leaned back against the lockers now, bored already, hands sunk in the pocket of his Seabright High Swim Team hoodie like he didn’t set the whole thing in motion. 

"Tch. Stop collecting losers, shitty hair. You have a knack for stray cats."

Izuku stares between them, throat tight. There’s nothing to say that would matter. He knows the rhythm of this dance too well to pretend it ends here.

Bakugou’s gaze finds him again, the lazy cruelty of someone who never has to try. His mouth cuts into a grin.

"Stop looking at me like you wanna kiss me, freak."

The laughter this time hits bone. A whistle, a chorus of ohhhhs. Monoma’s voice climbs over the rest, delighted.

“Bakugou,” Kirishima warns, low. He doesn’t move away, though. He stays between them like a hand closing a door.

Izuku swallows the heat clawing up his throat, clamps his teeth on the hurt before it can show. He stacks the last paper, grips the notebook too tight, and stands. He doesn’t trust his voice. He doesn’t trust the shaking in his knees. He doesn’t trust himself not to do something he can’t take back.

He leaves. Not a run — he won’t give them that — but faster than a walk, head down, shoulders tight. Slurs follow him down the corridor, aimed with the awful accuracy of practice. 

He doesn’t turn to catch the faces they come from. He doesn’t need to. He knows the voices by heart.

The corner saves him. He presses his back to cool cinderblock and tips his head against it, eyes closed until the sting burns itself out. He counts his breath. One. Two. Three. Don’t break. Not here.

Two more years. That’s the contract he makes with himself. 

Two more years of hallways and beaches and small-town collisions. Two years of pretending the hurt is simple. Long enough to get out. Far enough to breathe different air.

He tells himself he’ll cut Bakugou out the second he leaves — dig out whatever’s left and leave it bleeding in the sand. He tells himself the ache is only anger, only habit, only the body remembering the first person it learned to fear.

But even now, even with humiliation buzzing under his skin, the truth sits where it always has, quiet and stubborn: for all the ways he hates Bakugou — and he does — something else coils beside it. Unwanted. Unkillable. The part of him that has never stopped watching. The part that heard “Stop looking at me like you wanna kiss me” and, for a blink, imagined answering.

The thought makes him sick. He breathes through it until the floor steadies.

Then he tucks the pen behind his ear, stacks his notebook against his chest, and pushes off the wall. He doesn’t look back. He doesn’t give them more story than they already have.

He turns the corner and disappears into the noise of Seabright High, carrying the same weight he started the day with and a new bruise blooming under his sleeve. 

Two years, he tells himself again.

Two years, and then the tide won’t reach him anymore.

Chapter Text

Chapter 1: Back to Seabright Bay

“I’m leaving home for the coastline

Some place under the sun 

I feel my heart for the first time 

‘Cause now I’m moving on.”

Coastline — Hollow Coves

You ever dreaded something so much that just the thought of it knocked you off balance? Left you drowning?

Like paddling out on a day the ocean’s in a mood — every set breaks wrong, every pop-up fails, and the sea keeps dragging you under. Again. And again.

Every. Time.

And the water fills your lungs, slowly, deliberately — not enough to kill you, just enough to make you choke. Just enough to make you feel like you’ll never break the surface again.

That’s what it feels like when Izuku passes the sun-bleached Welcome to Seabright Bay sign.

The road threads the cliffside in mean little switchbacks, guardrail nicked and dented from salted air and years of being exposed to sunshine and weather. Below, the coastline knifes out and curls back on itself, waves blow apart on the rocks in long white wrecks, glittering like broken glass. It’s beautiful in that dishonest way Seabright has — postcard at a distance, splinters up close.

Something inside his chest cinches. It’s not a squeeze, it’s worse. A pull. The ugly tug of a knot yanked tight. He can taste the salt already, slick on his teeth, sunk into his skin the way it never truly washed out. The memories come with it, brined and bitter.

He never thought he’d return.

Because the last time he passed that sign, he had sworn — sworn on everything — that he would never set foot in this hellhole again.

Not for the town. Not for the people in it. Not even for his mom.

That did its own kind of breaking — every time she came to the city, every time she asked when he’d visit.

When, not if.

Like she believed the answer would change if she kept loving him hard enough. And every time he told her no, he watched the smile falter just a fraction. 

But now — things have changed.

Drastically.

Forcing him back.

And it makes him feel like absolute shit that it took his mom getting sick for him to finally give in.

For him to finally come… home.

The word feels wrong in his mouth. Like chewing a cracked tooth. Too sharp at the edges, too heavy to swallow. Home shouldn’t sting. Home shouldn’t feel like an old cut opened back up with salt ground into it by a careless hand.

Still, theoretically, it’s true.

He grew up here. Took his first steps on these sidewalks, scraped his knees on these streets. He went to school here. Had friends here.

He discovered one of the few things — besides his mom — that helped him survive it all.

Surfing.

The only thing that ever made him feel weightless, free. Like maybe — just maybe — he wasn’t completely drowning. 

And he hates that he loves it, because it braided itself to a person he’s spent years trying to excise from his head. A name that lives at the back of his tongue like a scar he refuses to trace.

This place has hurt him more than anything else ever has.

It’s a cruel paradox. How the things that should be dearest to us — the places, the people, the memories that should feel like home — are often the very things that have the power to destroy us.

And Seabright Bay?

It’s already done its damage.

He spent years trying to outrun the wounds this town left behind. But no matter how far he went, the salt still clung to his skin, the past still festered beneath it.

And now, here he is.

Driving straight back into the wreckage.

An even bigger one this time, because he’s not just coming back to old wounds — he’s coming back with the knowledge that there will be new ones.

More bad memories to lie on top of the old.

Layer after layer, like the tide dragging him slowly under.

He drives back with a fear so deeply ingrained in his bones that he’s had to stop several times on the way, pulling over to the side of the road, chest heaving, nausea curling in his stomach.

By the time he hits the neighborhoods, his grip has carved crescents into his skin. Everything here is a map his body remembers: the peach house with the busted gutter, the corner store that never fixed its flickering E, the cul-de-sac that floods after the first heavy rain. His brain catalogs and rejects on autopilot.

He doesn't turn toward the beach. Doesn’t let himself even glance down Tisswell, where the ocean peeks between houses like a dare. He takes the opposite way, past the elementary school with the faded mural, past the chapel, past the turnoff that would take him home-home.

Straight to the hospital.

Seabright General’s a thirty-minute drive from his old house — the one that overlooks the ocean. The one he would rather not stay at.

But his mother had refused to let him book a hotel.

"This is your home, sweetie," she had told him over the phone, her voice softer than usual, weaker. One of the rare moments she had been strong enough to call him herself.

Izuku had swallowed against the lump in his throat, knowing what she was going to say next before she even said it.

"I wouldn’t feel good knowing you’re staying at some hotel rather than the house."

And then, like she had sensed the hesitation cracking through his resolve, she had added a quiet — "please."

And just like that, he was done for. He couldn’t have told her no. Not now. Not after all these years. Not when he’s already spent too much time being a disappointment. Not when her heart is already full of splinters, all from the same wound — the one he carved into her every time she asked when he’d visit, and every time he told her he wouldn’t.

Every time he let the distance stay between them.

And now, he’s twenty-five, successful by most standards. A well-paid job at a construction firm in the city, working as an architect. A life built far away from here, far away from her.

And yet, none of that matters now.

Because the first time he’s coming home — really coming home — isn’t for the holidays, or a long-overdue visit.

It’s because his mother has been diagnosed with freaking leukemia. 

Cancer. 

The call came from Toshinori, the local reverend of Seabright Bay. A man Izuku barely remembers beyond the occasional mention in his mother’s stories and the vague childhood memory of a kind voice during community events. 

He called on her behalf.

Izuku remembers exactly where he was when the phone rang this morning — his apartment in the city, the smell of coffee filling the air, the blue glow of his laptop screen as he scanned through morning emails, preparing for another day at the office.

And then — his phone buzzing against the wooden table. An unknown number.

His gut had twisted instantly. A sensation cold and heavy.

He had almost let it go to voicemail. Almost.

But something in him — that instinct, that quiet, nagging dread — had forced his hand, had made him reach for the phone and answer with a hesitant, "Izuku Midoriya."

And then came the words that changed everything.

Toshinori’s voice was calm, steady in a way that only made it worse. Like he had already delivered this news too many times before. Like he knew what it would do to the person on the other end of the line. His mother was sick. Very sick. She needed him.

Izuku had been speechless.

For the first few seconds, he had just sat there, fingers going numb around his mug, the bitter taste of coffee turning sour in his mouth.

Everything else had blurred into the background. His schedule. His responsibilities. His perfectly structured life. None of it mattered anymore.

His boss hadn’t even hesitated when Izuku told him he had to leave. 

"Take as much time as you need. Work remotely when you can, don’t worry about the rest."

And just like that. His bag was packed. Thrown onto the backseat of his Jeep. And Izuku was already on the road, heading back to the one place that had cost him so much pain.

Just to inflict more upon him.

When the building finally comes into view, Izuku realizes just how long it’s been. Seven years.

Everything had looked different in his imagination — bigger, more imposing, like a place that could swallow him whole. Maybe because it had felt like that at the time. Like a black hole full of sorrow. 

But now? 

The hospital is smaller than he remembers.

Even though he’s only been here a handful of times as a kid — a broken arm from school activities, a deep gash on his thigh from surfing when he miscalculated a landing and cut himself on the sharp edge of a cliff, a broken nose from the times he was brave — or stupid — enough to fight back in school.

Seabright General has always been more of a glorified clinic than a real hospital.

Just a few wings, old linoleum floors, the scent of antiseptic thick in the air. The kind of place where everyone knows everyone, where nurses remember your name, where people don’t get sick enough to stay for long.

And now his mother is here. And she isn’t leaving anytime soon.

Izuku barely pulls the car into a parking spot before his fingers finally loosen from the wheel.

For a second, he just sits there.

Sweaty palms drag over the fabric of his cargo shorts — the left one lingering over his tattooed knee, fingers absently tracing the ink, the other threading through his hair.

The air is thick, heavy, humid, sticking to his skin, clinging to his neck and temples. 

But it’s always been like that in June here.

Seabright Bay doesn't seem to change. No matter how much he wants it to.

Minutes tick by as he sits in his roofless Jeep, letting the occasional breeze cool the sweat on his skin. He should go inside.

He knows that.

But instead, he just stares through the windshield, watching the way the trees bend in the breeze, the soft sway of the palms lining the parking lot.

It doesn’t feel real.

None of this feels real.

Because when he thinks of his mother, he doesn’t think of her here.

He thinks of her in the kitchen, humming softly as she makes tea. He thinks of her waiting on the porch, watching the tide roll in, smiling when she catches his eleventh old self sneaking glances at the waves.

Not here.

Not behind these sterile walls, beneath fluorescent lights, surrounded by the quiet hum of machines keeping people alive.

The bitterness swells in his throat, tightens, until he finally forces himself to move.

His sneakers hit the pavement harder than they need to. His steps feel too loud, too heavy, like he’s walking straight into something he isn’t ready for.

The sliding glass doors part with a hush, and suddenly, the air inside is colder than he expected.

Or maybe it’s just the weight of it.

Hospitals always radiate this unnerving stillness that makes his skin crawl — too white, too quiet, too full of things he doesn’t want to face. It’s as if death and sorrow have seeped into the very walls, stripping them of color, leaving nothing but the sterile emptiness of white.

Lifeless.

A blank canvas for grief.

A place where people come hoping to get better — but some never leave.

Soft murmurs of conversation drift through the halls, accompanying his steps as. People move in and out of rooms, heads bent, voices hushed.

Nurses push carts of meals, check vitals, fill out endless paperwork. Doctors move from patient to patient, clipboards in hand, ready to deliver good or bad news.

And somewhere, behind one of these doors, in one of these too-small, too-bright rooms. 

His mother is waiting.

The lump in his throat swells, thickens, as he steps up to the reception desk.

Behind it, a woman sits, her age etched into the soft wrinkles around her eyes, a pair of lilac-rimmed glasses perched on the bridge of her nose. Her already greying hair is pulled into a tight bun, practical, precise. Her fingers move methodically across the keyboard, eyes focused on the screen in front of her.

She only looks up when Izuku clears his throat. "Excuse me."

Her eyes find his, and she offers him a polite, practiced smile. The kind hospital staff probably give a hundred times a day. "What can I do for you, sir?"

Izuku swallows.

"I’m here to see…" He hesitates, the words sticking to the roof of his mouth. As if saying her name out loud makes this all too real. "Inko Midoriya."

Her fingers tap against the keyboard again, the screen reflecting faintly against her glasses. Then, she looks up, expression shifting. "I’m sorry, sir, but her visits are strictly monitored right now. Only family is allowed."

"I’m her son."

For a second, nothing happens.

And then — the slight parting of her lips, the subtle widening of her eyes.

She reaches up and pulls off her glasses, as if seeing him without them might make something click into place. Which is kind of ridiculous, because that probably does the opposite.

"Izuku?" she asks, and now he feels like an asshole, because clearly, she remembers him.

And he… doesn’t remember her.

He doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t know what to say. He just shifts on his feet, uncomfortable. But then, so has he been since he set foot back in this town.

The woman stands, but it does nothing to add to her tiny frame.

"Chiyo… Chiyo Shuzenji," she supplies, and that name stirs something faint in the back of his mind. "I took you in back then, with your cut and your broken arm."

Oh.

Izuku rubs the back of his neck, a guilty heat creeping up from the collar of his shirt.

"I’m sorry," he mutters.

Apparently, he did a better job at forgetting faces than he thought.

But Chiyo just waves a hand. Brushed off, forgiven, just like that. "Oh, it’s okay, sweetie. It’s been so long." Her gaze runs over him, warm and nostalgic. "And look at you," she muses, eyes crinkling with a fondness he doesn’t think he deserves. "All grown up and handsome."

Izuku shifts again, feeling awkward under the attention. 

"Your mother said you’re working and living in the city."

"Y-yeah." His throat works around the answer, dry and thick. Because suddenly, this isn’t just a casual conversation anymore. It’s a reminder.

Of all the years he stayed away. Of all the times he told his mom he was too busy, too swamped with work, too wrapped up in his new life.

And now, here he is. Not because he finally made the time. But because she got sick.

It’s not his fault. He knows that. But still.

That’s the thing with guilt. You can’t exactly tell it to shut the fuck up. It lingers. It festers. It never really leaves.

"Can I see her?"

It’s his way of cutting the conversation short. His way of getting to his mom without more small talk, without another reminder of how long he’s been gone.

But Chiyo’s hand is already moving. She reaches for the phone on the desk, fingers dialing a number with a familiarity that makes Izuku’s stomach twist. "I think it’s better if you talk to Dr. Torino first before seeing her…"

Her voice shifts — softer, more careful.

And that’s when he feels it. The pity. Seeping into her words, settling into the lines around her eyes. Like she needs to prepare him. Like she needs to console him, the way you would a child who just scraped his knee. "It will make seeing her easier."

Easier. Izuku isn’t sure that’s possible.

"Sir, Midoriya Izuku is here," she says into the receiver, nodding along, humming in agreement as the voice on the other end responds. She mutters a quiet, "of course," before hanging up.

Then, her gaze flickers back to him. "Dr. Torino will be out in just a moment."

It doesn’t take the doctor more than half a minute to appear.

Izuku catches sight of him coming down the hallway — a man about the same age as Mrs. Shuzenji, with deep lines carved into his face, the kind that come from years of knowing too much, seeing too much.

Just like Chiyo, Izuku doesn’t really remember him.

Even though the name had sounded familiar when he first heard it.

He isn’t a tall man, but his presence makes him seem taller, heavier, as if he carries something unseen on his shoulders.

He moves with purpose, unhurried but steady, his expression unreadable until he stops in front of Izuku and gestures forward.

"Let’s have a talk while I bring you to your mother, shall we?"

They walk side by side down the hall, their footsteps absorbed by the sterile hush of the hospital. The afternoon sun filters through the row of windows on the left, streaks of light cutting through the white linoleum, but it does nothing to lessen the weight in the air.

The darkness in this place isn’t the kind that can be chased away by sunlight.

It clings. Settles into the walls, into the people who walk these halls.

Izuku doesn’t wait. Doesn’t bother with small talk.

"How bad is it?" His voice comes out flat, steady, but his fingers twitch where they hang at his sides.

He doesn’t beat around the bush — not when the doctor doesn’t offer anything first, not when Dr. Torino walks with his arms clasped behind his back like he’s taking a casual stroll.

Still, it’s a stupid question.

It’s cancer. It’s goddamn bad.

Dr. Torino doesn’t react right away.

They keep walking, past closed doors and quiet rooms, past the distant murmur of conversations that Izuku doesn’t care to make out.

“The truth. No sugarcoating,” Izuku makes clear, running a nervous hand through his hair.

Then, finally, the doctor sighs, a slow, measured exhale.

"It’s serious," he admits. "But not hopeless."

Izuku’s stomach tightens. Serious. That word feels like a placeholder. 

"Your mother was diagnosed with acute leukemia," Torino continues, his voice level, practiced. Izuku already knows this. But he doesn’t interrupt, doesn’t cut the doctor off to tell him so, because this is routine for him. This speech — this delivery of life-changing news — he’s given it a hundred times before. "We caught it relatively early, which is in our favor," Torino goes on. "But treatment needs to begin immediately."

Izuku nods, his throat working around the dryness lodged there. "And what does that mean, exactly?"

He needs facts. He needs solutions. Something to ground himself. Something to keep his head above water before the worst-case scenarios drag him under, before the negativity festers and grows, spreading like—

Like the cancer inside his mother.

Dr. Torino stops walking. Turns to face him fully. "Chemotherapy, to start. We’ve already begun the first round," he explains. "If she responds well, we’ll continue with a targeted approach. If not, we’ll need to consider a stem cell transplant. It’s aggressive, but her body is still strong."

Strong.

His mother has always been strong.

Izuku clenches his jaw, trying to grasp onto that. Onto the idea that this isn’t as bad as it could be. That it’s not a death sentence. 

"So… she has options?" he asks, forcing his voice to stay steady.

Torino nods. "She does. And she’s willing to fight. That’s the most important part."

Willing to fight.

Izuku swallows hard.

His mother has spent her entire life fighting. Working herself to the bone to provide for him, never complaining, never asking for more.

And now, this.

"How long?" 

Torino pauses. Not hesitant — just careful. "It depends on how she responds to treatment. Months, maybe longer. If we stay on top of this, if everything goes well… she could make a full recovery. But it won’t be easy."

Izuku exhales through his nose. He hates that word.

Easy.

Nothing in his life has ever been easy.

But this?

This feels insurmountable.

They turn a corner, and Torino slows his pace, stopping in front of Room 430.

"She’s been asking about you," he says, glancing at Izuku from the corner of his eye. "I think she’s just relieved you came."

Izuku’s hands curl into fists at his sides.

He shouldn’t have made her wait this long.

Dr. Torino steps aside, nodding, signaling that it’s okay to enter now.

Izuku stares at the door. And then — he reaches for the handle.

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

Seeing his mom again was something he could have never prepared for.

No matter how much he thought about it on the drive here, no matter how much he braced himself, it still hit him like a rip current dragging him under.

It’s been months.

The last time she visited him was back in February. He wishes — God, he wishes — he could have frozen that version of her in his memory.

How she looked back then.

Not like this.

Not smaller, not weaker, not the way illness steals pieces of a person right in front of your eyes. But when he walked in, her face still lit up. Pale, more grey than pink, but smiling for him. She had set her book on the table, resting it on top of her bible.

And maybe now is the time for Izuku to start praying, too. To what, he doesn’t know. But he’s willing to try anything. 

They talked for a while.

Not about the elephant in the room. Not about the cancer, sitting there between them, choking the air, making everything feel fragile, temporary.

No.

About Rody. His boyfriend.

Or — ex-boyfriend, since they aren’t together anymore. Haven’t been for a while now. There was no dramatic ending, no bitter fight. Just an understanding. They weren’t the match they thought they were.

And that’s fine.

But his mom — she seemed more devastated than he was. Because she really liked Rody. And Izuku gets it. Rody was easy to like. Charismatic, warm, the kind of person who made people feel like they belonged. But that’s how life goes sometimes.

People drift apart. Love fades before it ever fully settles in. And then you move on. 

When she got too tired to keep her eyes open, they said their goodbyes for the day. She handed him the keys to the house. He kissed her cheek. Told her, "I’ll come by tomorrow."

And then he left. And now, his mind is a mess.

Or at least, now he’s able to let himself fall into the mess. Because he doesn’t have to hold it together here. Not in his car, parked in front of the last place he should be. Not in front of the local surf shop.

But that’s where his consciousness has led him. Somewhere between muscle memory and self-destruction, between the past and the present, between what he loves and what he can’t fucking stand.

Because if he’s going to be here, in this town, breathing this air, carrying this weight—

Then he may as well drown himself in the waves.

Literally.

With his old board.

The one his mom told him is still waiting in the garage.

The board that probably needs a lot of work after sitting untouched for years — neglected, gathering dust, forgotten. Just like everything else he left behind.

So, of course, he needs supplies.

That’s the only reason he’s here. The only reason his feet manage to drag themselves out of the driver’s seat, gravel crunching under his sneakers as he slams the car door shut behind him. 

The shop has definitely changed. Not much. But enough.

The building still has the same structure, the same slanted roof with sun-bleached shingles, the same wrap-around white trim. But the signage is new — bolder, modern, standing out in a way the old one never did.

HOME OF SALTY ELEMENTS.

It’s weird, seeing it written like that — a slogan, a statement, a claim to the town’s identity.

The big glass windows make it feel open, exposed, sunlight bouncing off the display boards lined up neatly along the side. Three of them — two with bright teal designs, the other stark white with sleek black details. Expensive. Well-maintained.

A chalkboard sign sits propped near the entrance, advertising sailing lessons in messy handwriting. There’s a flag banner staked into the ground, fluttering in the breeze, sporting some kind of local water sports logo.

The front porch has a worn-in look, the kind of place people linger without needing a reason. Right now, a couple of guys stand near the entrance, chatting easily, one of them gesturing with his hands, the other laughing.

Izuku doesn’t bother looking twice as he walks past them, confident that he doesn’t know them.

The soft ping of the bell above the door chimes as he steps inside, announcing his presence.

Immediately, his gaze sweeps over the shop.

It’s organized, well-stocked, carrying everything a surfer could possibly need.

Someone’s clearly put in the effort.

The layout is intentional — rows of wetsuits hanging neatly in the center, surfboards propped along the walls, each rack sorted by size and style. The lighting is warm, natural, filtering in from the large windows.

It doesn’t feel like the dusty old surf shop he remembers from years ago. Whoever owns it now has definitely stepped up their game.

Izuku’s attention drifts toward the far wall — yep.

A whole section dedicated to overpriced wax, fins, and repair kits.

Exactly what he needs.

Izuku scans the shelves, fingers rummaging through different brands, checking for the right wax, fin screws, and a repair kit for whatever damage his board has collected over the years of neglect.

He finds what he’s looking for, ready to grab them and head to the register, get in and get out. 

When a voice — deep, familiar, unmistakable — cuts through the air.

“You looking for something specific?”

Izuku’s entire body locks up. Shoulders stiffen, grip tightening around the wax in his hand, breath catching in his throat.

It’s been seven years.

Seven damn years.

But there’s no way — absolutely no way — he could ever forget that voice.

No matter how much deeper it’s gotten, no matter how much time has stretched between then and now.

He knows.

And when he looks up, he’s met with living, breathing confirmation.

Blond. Tanned. Broad shoulders, arms casually crossed over his chest, sharp eyes fixed right on him.

The surfer guy standing behind the register.

The swim captain of Seabright High.

The bully who made his life a living hell.

The guy he was maddeningly, painfully, fucking hopelessly in love with — and hated just as much. 

Bakugou freaking Katsuki.

Live and in full color.

Izuku barely registers the sharp clatter of something hitting the floor, snapping his gaze toward Bakugou’s hands — too late to see what he dropped.

Because suddenly, nothing else matters. Because Izuku is too busy taking him in. Letting the sight of him sink in, settle under his skin like salt in an old wound. His gaze wanders, slow, deliberate. From the familiar mess of blond hair to the black earplugs tucked into his ears. To the gold chain hanging around his neck, catching faintly in the light, half-revealed by the first two undone buttons of his Hawaiian shirt—

Hawaiian shirt.

Of course.

And it fits him, unfairly so — because of course it does.

Izuku’s eyes dip lower, unwilling but unable to stop. Outline of broad, firm pecs. Tan skin. Muscle thicker than he remembers.

Back in high school, Bakugou had been lean, built like the swimmer he was—

Now?

Now he looks like he switched out the swim team for the gym.

Like he gave up swinging fists in alleyway fights and started training for something that required more discipline.

The realization shouldn’t bother Izuku.

But it does.

He looks…good. More than that, probably. And that pisses Izuku off.

Because no matter how unfairly attractive Bakugou has always been, the only thing Izuku should feel toward him now is resentment. But he doesn’t. And that’s the part that makes his stomach churn.

His gaze snaps back to Bakugou’s face.

Sharper jawline, more defined and mature than before. The same red eyes that used to send cold shivers down Izuku’s spine.

But the thing is — they don’t now.

Because they’re different. There’s no animosity. No disgust. None of the terrible things Izuku had memorized, had spent years bracing himself for.

Instead—

There’s something else. Something Izuku never thought he’d see in those eyes.

Sympathy.

Maybe even  — remorse.

Chapter Text

Chapter 2: Tidebound

tidebound (adj.)

/ˈtīdˌbound/

Two souls, caught in the pull of each other like the tide and the shore — forever returning, forever retreating.

The sound of the screwdriver hitting the floor is, aside from the soft hum of Everlong by the Foo Fighters, the only sound filling the tense, suffocating silence between them.

Bakugou’s throat goes dry. His pulse pounds so hard it drowns itself out, a rush in his ears that swells like surf breaking against rock.

He knew Izuku would be in town. Of course, he knew.

Rumors travel fast in Seabright Bay, and when word spread that Inko Midoriya had been admitted to the hospital, Bakugou knew it was only a matter of time before the lost son returned home.

But knowing and seeing are two different fucking things.

He wasn’t prepared for this. Isn’t prepared to see Izuku here, now, standing in his fucking surf shop.

All he manages is a blink.

Even as Izuku strides for the counter with confidence rolling off him in clean, tidal waves — every move too smooth, too composed. Like none of this touches him.

Like Bakugou isn’t worth a ripple.

Bakugou’s eyes drag over him before he can stop himself. Past the loose cargo shorts Izuku’s wearing that end just above the knees, revealing a hint of ink wrapped around his left leg, curling down to his shin.

A broken anchor.

Split clean through at the base, edges jagged, fractured but not erased. Seaweed twines through the shards, curling tight like it’s reclaiming what’s left, dragging it back toward the deep. Like the ocean itself refuses to let the wreckage drift too far.

Bakugou doesn’t know why it makes his chest feel tight. Doesn’t know why he can’t fucking look away.

It’s just a tattoo.

Just ink.

But it feels like more. Like it means something he should get — something obvious, written right there on Izuku’s skin — and he doesn’t. That’s what digs under his ribs. Because for all the years he thought he knew Izuku better than anyone, he never really did.

And worse — there’s nothing to be proud of in what he knew. He twisted it. Weaponized it. Held every scrap of Izuku’s trust like a blade and honed it on his own insecurities. Cut with it, again and again — cover for his own bullshit, corner him, choke him until there was nowhere left to fucking breathe.

All those years.

But this isn’t the Deku he bullied. Not the one he split open and called it toughening. This one… he barely recognizes. Bakugou doesn’t know a damn thing about this version of Izuku, and the realization drops into his gut like cold iron and stays.

His fingers twitch at his sides, some stupid, buried instinct wanting to reach out. To trace the broken lines, the seaweed twisting around them. 

To ask. 

But he won’t.

Because he lost that right a long time ago.

So instead his eyes drag back up, cataloguing everything else that’s different. And there’s a lot. The ink isn’t the only change.

His hair’s longer now, curls catching at the ends — maybe from the salt in the air, maybe not. He’s taller, too. At least a couple inches over Bakugou’s already solid six feet, and it grates for no fucking reason at all.

He’s broader, heavier with muscle, but not the kind that comes easy. It looks earned, carved out over years of work. Calves cut sharp, shoulders filling the black shirt he’s wearing like it was made for him.

But it’s more than the physical.

He’s carrying something different.

Radiating it.

He isn’t soft anymore. Not in the way he used to be. Not the breakable way.

The face is still familiar — same full mouth, same freckles scattered like sunspots across his cheekbones — but the rest is new. Changed.

Now he moves like he owns the ground he walks on. Like he doesn’t need permission to take up space. As if he knows exactly who the fuck he is and couldn’t care less what anyone thinks.

He’s not making himself smaller anymore. Not like he did back in high school, when Bakugou used every fucking opportunity to make his life a living hell. And he regrets it. Every single fucking second of it. Regrets it more since the day Izuku left this town without ever once looking back.

And Bakugou deserved that. He fucking deserved it.

But now, with Izuku standing right here — close enough to touch — there’s too much he wants to say. Words crowd his throat, knotting tight, choking him before they can make it past his teeth.

So when Izuku sets his things down at the counter, waiting—

All Bakugou manages is, “Hey.”

Fucking hell.

Izuku lifts a brow. The flicker across his face is quick but cutting — bored, unimpressed, like Bakugou’s very existence is an inconvenience. Like one pathetic word wasn’t worth his time.

Fair enough. Bakugou barely thinks it was worth his own damn breath.

But what the hell else is he supposed to say?

Hey, long time no see.

Hey, you look different.

Hey, I made your life a living hell, and now I get to ring up your shit while pretending I don’t regret every second of it.

Yeah. No. 

None of that would go anywhere.

Not with the way Izuku’s looking at him — cold, unreadable, like he’s already decided this isn’t worth his time.

The boy Bakugou used to push, test, back into corners until there was no air left — that kid’s gone.

In his place is a man. One who stands taller, broader, anchored in himself. One who carries that kind of presence that says, I’m not taking your shit. Not now. Not ever again.

And the worst part?

Bakugou doesn’t even want to give him shit anymore. But Izuku doesn’t know that. Doesn’t see it.

Why the hell would he?

The silence stretches. Too long. Long enough for it to turn sour, sharp-edged with awkwardness.

Izuku doesn’t look like he’s going to say a word. Just blinks. Slow. As if he’s giving Bakugou one last chance to fix whatever dumb shit just came out of his mouth. Waiting for proof that nothing’s changed — that Bakugou is still the same asshole he’s always been.

But Bakugou doesn’t give him that.

Because there’s no fixing this. No rewinding years. No undoing the damage.

So instead, he drags his eyes down to the counter. To the pile of stuff Izuku set there like this is any other transaction.

A tin of wax. A surfboard repair kit. Fin screws.

His hands tremble.

Not because of what’s in front of him — but because of what it means. Because Izuku is getting back in the water. And that thought alone sends a ripple through his chest, something tight, unsettled, hard to breathe around.

Because the ocean has always been the only thing they ever agreed on. The only place where they weren’t screaming at each other, weren’t testing limits, weren’t caught in the endless cycle of toxicity.

But it’s also the place where everything started to fall apart. Where Bakugou stopped trying to understand and started wanting to break him. Where he first realized that Izuku wasn’t just a rival. Wasn’t just an annoyance. Wasn’t just a… friend. 

It was out there he first caught the edge of something else. Something he couldn’t name then — didn’t dare name. Something that scared the hell out of him.

So he did the only thing he knew how to do.

For making him realize. For being the one thing that forced him to face what he was too much of a coward to accept. For being the reminder of everything he hated about himself — how he was never really himself, how he kept lying, over and over, for years.

The water had connected them for a long time. But it also became the thing that drowned them.

He swallows hard against the weight in his chest, forces his eyes down to the counter. His fingers move on instinct, scanning the items, while his throat works to push out a voice that doesn’t want to come.

“Didn’t know you still surfed.”

Brilliant. Way to start a conversation, Bakugou. Real fucking smooth.

Izuku doesn’t react at first. Just slips his wallet free, slides a bill across the counter with the ease of someone paying a stranger. And that’s exactly how it feels — like Bakugou’s nothing more than a clerk ringing him up.

Then, finally — a response.

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

Flat. Neutral. Factual. But somehow it still lands warm and rough in Bakugou’s chest — like whiskey burning down his throat, like the tail end of a summer night. Sweet for anyone else. Bitter as hell for him. 

And he knows, he fucking knows, he deserves it. Deserves worse. He’s lucky Izuku’s even talking to him at all.

Because Izuku isn’t here for nostalgia. He’s here because his mom is sick. And Bakugou? He’s the last goddamn person Izuku should have to deal with on top of that. Just another ghost of the past, standing in front of him as a reminder of every reason he left Seabright in the first place.

So what the hell is he supposed to say to that?

“Listen, Izuku—” he tries, but Izuku’s already shaking his head. Hand up, palm out—

Stopping him.

Like he knows what’s coming. As if he’s heard it all before in his head a thousand times and decided he doesn’t give a damn.

“I’m gonna stop you right there.” His voice is flat. Firm. Unwavering. “We’re not doing this.”

He gestures vaguely between them, a sharp flick of his wrist, as if to say whatever this is, he’s killing it before it even starts.

“We’re not doing this whole thing where you apologize, and I let it go because years have passed and wounds turn to scars and I’m supposed to believe that’s the same as healing.”

Green eyes that used to be bright and open — full of things Bakugou never deserved — pin him in place now. Cool. Sharp. Unforgiving.

“Because here’s the thing, Kacchan—”

The nickname cuts like a blade, venom tipped, a weapon forged from old familiarity.

“I haven’t healed. I didn’t forget. And I sure as hell am not gonna forgive you.”

Silence crashes between them, heavier than the waves outside, heavier than anything Bakugou could have prepared for.

And for the first time in his life, he doesn’t know how to fight back.

Because what is there to say?

Izuku probably wouldn’t believe him if he said something cliché and pathetic like “I’ve changed,” or “I regret it,” or “I’m trying to make amends.”

Izuku wouldn’t believe him if he reached for something pathetic and worn — I’ve changed. I regret it. I’m trying. Even though it’s fucking true — and has been for years.

“I—I‘m sorry.“

It barely scrapes past his teeth before Izuku exhales through his nose, shakes his head, looks away. Like he can’t even be bothered to hear it. Like this flimsy opening isn’t worth acknowledging.

But then, his gaze snaps back to Bakugou, sharp as glass, as jagged as the words that are about to come. And suddenly, Bakugou knows he’s about to bleed.

“What, huh?”

His voice is edged, dangerous in a way Bakugou has never heard from him before. But he’s going to take it. Stand there, behind his counter, rooted to the spot, and fucking take it. Just like Izuku took it.

“Come on.” His hands press flat against the counter — not clenched, not shaking, just steady, firm, radiating something Bakugou can only describe as years of fury kept under lock and key. “You regret calling me a faggot?”

Bakugou flinches.

“A boykisser? Saying my mom would never really love me because I’m a sin to the god she prays to?”

He leans in, just enough for Bakugou to feel the heat of it, like an ember pressed to skin. “You regret embarrassing me in front of your friends every chance you got? Tripping me so I slammed my face into tile more times than I can fucking count?”

His voice breaks, just slightly, just enough. Enough for Bakugou to feel it like a fist to the ribs, like the ground splitting open beneath him, waiting to swallow him whole.

“I could go on, Bakugou.” His name spat like venom. “God, I could go on for freaking days.”

And Bakugou knows — he knows. Every syllable is a scar, an echo. A piece of Izuku he carved out and can never give back.

“So tell me,” Izuku breathes, voice like the calm before a storm, like a wave pulling back before it crashes. “What exactly is it that you‘re sorry for?”

The words land like a blade between his ribs.

Bakugou’s breath seizes in his throat, locks up, because there’s no answer, not one, that undoes what he did. No string of words in the world that erases the years he spent grinding Izuku down.

And Izuku knows that.

Of course he does.

That’s why he’s staring like this — waiting, daring him to make it worse. And Bakugou, who’s spent his whole life picking fights just to prove he could win, knows he’s already lost this one.

It’s almost funny, in a sick way, how the positions flipped. Izuku standing steady, watching, waiting for something that won’t come — just like Bakugou used to wait for him to fight back. To do anything. To give him an excuse to keep going.

Now Bakugou’s the one jammed into the corner. The one with nothing to say. Nothing that’ll ever be enough. He swallows, sets his jaw, and forces out the only thing that even gets close. “All of it.”

It isn’t enough. Not by a mile.

Izuku laughs. Not the kind Bakugou used to chase just to crush. It’s sharp and dry, a sound with the warmth carved out of it. He remembers liking Izuku’s laugh once — feeding off it, then twisting it until it went small and brittle under his heel.

This isn’t careless. This isn’t mindless.

No, this is precise. Aimed right at his throat. And Bakugou lets it hit. Lets it split him open.

"Yeah?" Izuku scoffs. "You regret all of it?"

His hands push off the counter, arms folding across his chest, head tilting slightly. Like he’s about to watch Bakugou bury himself. Like he’s giving him the rope to hang himself with. "Tell me, Bakugou — do you even remember what all of it is?"

He does.

Every. Goddamn. Detail.

Every shove. Every insult. Every time he made Izuku feel like less.

"No sharp comeback?" Izuku prods. "Nothing to say?"

He doesn’t wait for an answer. Just grabs the bag, shoves the wax and fin screws inside with a little too much force. "Keep the change," he mutters, when Bakugou still doesn’t speak.

And he should let him go. Should let him walk out without another word, without making this worse. But that’s the thing about him — he’s never known when to quit. 

Didn’t back then. Doesn’t now.

"You just wanna leave this unfinished?"

Izuku pauses.

Just barely. Just enough for Bakugou to see the way his fingers tighten around the plastic bag. 

Still, he doesn’t look at him.

Just exhales slowly, head tilting downward, jaw flexing, like he’s weighing something inside himself before speaking again.

"You don’t get to call this unfinished, you hear me?" His voice isn’t raised, but it hits harder than a shout. "You ended it the second you made me wish I was someone else."

Bakugou’s stomach turns. 

That’s what he did, isn’t it? He didn’t just make Izuku miserable. He made him hate himself. For such a fucking long time.

Izuku strides for the door in two sharp steps. It swings open, warm air rushing in, shoving out the artificial chill of the shop. Salt and sand roll through on the breeze, like the ocean itself is carrying him out.

"I don’t need your guilt." He doesn’t even look back. "I don’t want your guilt."

The wind stirs, brushing his shirt, lifting strands of hair.

"I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to see you."

And then, finally, finally — he turns. Just enough for his eyes to meet Bakugou’s. That same green he used to know.

Only now, it’s colder.

Distant. Unforgiving.

"So do me a favor."

A pause. A breath. A final fucking nail in the coffin.

"Leave me the hell alone."

And then, he’s gone. 

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

The sun hangs low above the water, casting everything in that late-afternoon gold that makes the ocean look endless, stretched wide like an open road. The waves glitter like broken glass, shifting, restless, never quite still.

Bakugou digs his heels into the wet sand, hands planted on his board where he sits, the hip-deep water sloshing against his shins and knees. It’s still warm, but not scorching like midday in August, when the sand burns and the air shimmers with heat.

Out past the break, Izuku paddles back out.

Chest pressed to his green and white board, arms cutting through the water in smooth, practiced strokes. His legs kick up, body moving with the tide, the surfboard leash wrapped snug around one ankle.

It looks effortless.

Or at least, Izuku makes it look that way.

But Bakugou knows better.

He knows how much effort it takes — how the ocean doesn’t just let you in, doesn’t just give you what you want.

You have to fight for it or become part of it.

Move with it. Let it lead, let it pull, like it’s your personal dance partner.

And Izuku? He’s the latter.

He doesn’t fight the tide, doesn’t force it — he listens to it, moves in sync, lets it carry him like it’s second nature. Not like Bakugou.

Bakugou is the kind of guy who takes, who demands, who refuses to let anything tell him what to do.

The ocean doesn’t scare him, but it sure as hell doesn’t welcome him either.

Because he fights it. Always has. Always will. Just like he fights himself in a lot of ways. But that’s another story. 

Maybe that’s why he’ll never look like one with the board and the water. And maybe that’s exactly why Izuku does.

"Oi, Deku, hurry the fuck up!" Bakugou calls, rolling his eyes. “Tide’s gonna change before your ass even gets back out here.”

It’s stupid teasing.

Because Bakugou already knows Izuku’s going to time it perfectly. Knows he’s going to hit the next wave at the exact right second, like he always does.

Izuku turns just enough to shoot him a grin, freckles bright against sunburned cheeks, water dripping from his hair. And there it is again. That weird, unsettling feeling in Bakugou’s chest. The one that started creeping in a few months ago. The one that gets stronger, messier, harder to ignore the more time he spends with him. Izuku looks…mesmerizing in this setting — with the sun dipping behind him, turning the water to gold, casting a soft glow around his curls.

Almost like a halo.

Like something holy.

And fuck, that’s a weird thought.

"Not all of us force this, Kacchan!" Izuku calls, breathless, grinning like this is the best place in the world to be. And it kind of is. "Think of it as art! The water is the blank canvas, and you’re drawing lines on it with your board." 

Bakugou snorts, sharp, abrupt. Of course that’s how Izuku would see it.

So him coded.

Always seeing meaning in shit that doesn’t need it. Always making things bigger, deeper, something they don’t have to be. But Bakugou doesn’t argue.

Doesn’t tell him how fucking stupid that sounds. Because for some reason, the way Izuku says it, makes it almost make sense. 

"Just hurry up, nerd."

Izuku laughs, breathless and easy, and for some reason, it only digs that weird feeling deeper into Bakugou’s chest.

Eventually, Izuku makes it past the break, straddling his board, shaking out the water from his curls as he watches the sets roll in.

Waiting. Timing.

Bakugou can see it — the way his body shifts slightly with the rhythm of the ocean, the way he’s feeling it out, watching for the right one.

Then — there.

A clean, peeling right-hander, just starting to crest.

Izuku doesn’t hesitate. He pivots smoothly, drops to his stomach, and starts paddling hard.

Bakugou watches as he angles himself, keeping just ahead of the peak, catching the momentum at the perfect second.

Then, just as the wave starts to lift him. He pops up. Effortless.

Feet landing square, body low, weight perfectly distributed.

And then he’s carving.

Shifting his stance, cutting into the wave with precision, letting the rail bite just enough to keep control as he glides along the face.

The spray kicks up behind him as he leans in, adjusting for speed, reading the water like it’s his favorite book. 

Bakugou watches, silent. Because it’s fucking perfect. 

The way Izuku moves — fluid, sharp, instinctive.

He takes the wave all the way to the inside, riding the shoulder just before it closes out, kicking his board up at the last second and falling back into the water with a splash.

When he pops back up, laughing, bright-eyed, running a hand through his hair, Bakugou clicks his tongue and looks away. 

"Show off."

Izuku just grins, shaking the saltwater from his hair as he swings a leg back over his board, paddling toward Bakugou with ease. His cheeks are flushed, eyes alight, skin kissed by the ocean and the sun.

Like this — this moment, this feeling, this entire damn summer — is something he was meant for.

Something that fits him better than anything else ever could.

"I don’t want the summer to end," Izuku admits when he halts beside Bakugou, sitting up on his board, feet dangling in the water.

He’s looking out over the horizon, watching the endless stretch of ocean, the rolling, restless movement of it.

Like it’s something he could stay in forever.

Like it’s home.

Bakugou was doing the same. Was watching the water, thinking about the next set, about the feel of wax beneath his fingertips.

But now?

Now, he’s looking at him.

"Yeah, it’s gonna suck."

He nods along with his own words, but his focus zeroes in on something else entirely. On the single drop of saltwater trailing down Izuku’s cheek, catching on his upper lip. And his tongue that wipes it away with a quick and absent-mindedly flick. 

Bakugou clears his throat, yanking his gaze away immediately when Izuku catches him staring. His hands move to adjust the velcro strap around his ankle, fingers tightening a little more than necessary.

"I want to keep surfing every day."

Bakugou snorts. "You’re already doing that, dumbass."

Then, just because he can — he splashes water at him.

Izuku sputters, laughing, shoving a hand through his hair to shake the water out. "Yeah, I guess you’re right." 

He rolls his shoulders, shaking out his arms, his eyes already scanning the water for the next good set. Then, softer, "But it’s more fun when it feels like…"

He doesn’t finish right away. 

Just keeps looking at the red and orange horizon, the sun sinking low. "Like this."

Bakugou doesn’t know what the hell that means.

But Izuku keeps going anyway, like he’s figuring it out as he speaks.

"When I don’t need the wetsuit to not freeze to death." His right hand skims the surface, fingertips brushing along the water like he’s painting something only he can see. "When I can feel it on every inch of my bare skin."

Fuck.

Something in Bakugou’s chest pulls tight, coils up, ready to snap. Something that makes his fingers twitch with the stupid, impulsive urge to reach out.

To touch.

To see if Izuku’s skin is as warm as it looks, sun-heated and salt-slick.

But no fucking way.

Instead, he kicks up more water, hard enough to send a splash right at the nerd’s face. To disrupt whatever the hell this is before it can settle in.

"You’re always so cheesy."

Izuku yelps, laughing as he wipes at his eyes, only to splash water right back at him.

"You’re such a dick, Kacchan!"

Bakugou shields his face with a hand, scowling, but there’s no real heat behind it. He swings his feet in the water, feeling the occasional brush of sand against his toes as the tide shifts around them.

He really needs to steer this conversation away from all that deep shit.

From Izuku talking about things against his bare skin.

It’s distracting as hell.

"I’m so ready for high school," he says instead, switching topics fast, before his brain can keep lingering on the last one.

Even though — honestly? He couldn’t care less.

Izuku just shrugs. "School sucks no matter what."

And yeah. He’s sort of right.

"Some of the girls are cute, I guess." It’s casual. Lazy. Just something thrown out into the space between them, meant to be nothing.

Or maybe…not. Maybe Bakugou wants a reaction. Wants to see if Izuku gives a shit.

But Izuku just keeps looking at the water, dragging his fingers through it, watching the way it moves with him.

His skin’s probably wrinkled by now.

And then the shift he’s been waiting for.

Subtle. Barely noticeable.

But Bakugou catches it immediately.

Izuku goes quiet. And not a normal quiet. Not the comfortable, tired quiet that settles over them sometimes after a long day in the waves.

No.

This is something else.

This is tense shoulders. This is lips pressed together a little too tight. This is his gaze staying locked on the water like it’s the only thing keeping him afloat.

And Bakugou wants to dig into that.

Why?

Fuck if he knows. But it itches at him, scratches at the inside of his skull.

So he tilts his head, watching Izuku closely. "The hell’s that face for?"

Izuku blinks, like he’s been caught off guard. "What face?"

"The weird-ass face you just made."

"I didn’t make a face!"

"You totally did."

Izuku shoves a hand through his hair, exhaling like he wishes the conversation would just float away with the tide. "I dunno," he mutters, eyes on the water. "Guess I don’t really think about that stuff yet."

That’s…weird. Like, really weird.

Izuku always has an answer for everything.

But now? Now, he just sounds uncomfortable.

And everything in Bakugou tells him to leave it alone. Drop it. Let it go.

But for some reason, he doesn’t. For some reason, he wants to prod deeper, push, get under Izuku’s skin the way he always does.

He frowns, brows pulling together, nudging Izuku’s board with his own. "That’s dumb," he says, even though — fuck — it’s not.

It’s not, and he knows it’s not, because he’s not interested in any of the girls either.

But that’s not what this is about.

"What about that girl from gym?" Bakugou pushes, watching him carefully now. "The one with the short hair. She’s kinda cool."

Izuku’s lips press together. He shrugs. "Guess."

And that’s not a real answer.

"Or the one from math," Bakugou continues, ignoring the way Izuku’s shoulders tense. "The one who always borrows your notes. You talk to her all the time, don’t you?"

Izuku just shrugs again, staring hard at the water like it’s suddenly the most interesting thing in the world and something weird settles in Bakugou’s gut. 

It’s not irritation. Not exactly. And it sure as hell isn’t amusement.

If he had to put a name to it — which he won’t, because it’s fucking stupid — it almost feels like…relief.

Relief that Izuku doesn’t like any of them. And that’s…

Yeah…what the fuck is that supposed to mean?

Chapter Text

Chapter 3: Sweet for Salt

“Seems like your heart is locked up and I still get the combination wrong

Or are you simply waiting to save your love for someone I am not?”

The Love You Want — Sleep Token

The thing about a smalltown is that you can’t outrun people. 

Doesn’t matter how much you want to, doesn’t matter how clear you make it.

You can tell someone to leave you the hell alone one day, and by the next, you’re grabbing cereal off the same damn grocery store shelf, forced to acknowledge their existence again. 

It’s inevitable. 

You’ll see them at the gas station. At the drug store. At the beach.

And it doesn’t matter that Bakugou actually took Izuku’s words to heart, that he hasn’t spoken to him since that day at the surf shop, that every time they run into each other, he acts like Izuku isn’t even there.

It should be a good thing. It should make Izuku feel vindicated. Relieved. But it doesn’t.

No.

If anything, it just makes him angrier.

Because how fucking dare he listen to him now, when he never did before? How dare he hear "leave me alone" and actually follow through, when back in school Bakugou never once did?

This sudden silence, this careful distance, like he’s suddenly figured out how to respect boundaries. It’s infuriating.

It makes Izuku feel unsteady, unmoored, like the world is tilting in the wrong direction.

And he doesn’t have the energy to deal with it.

Not when he’s already on edge. Not when he’s already stretched too thin.

Not when every visit to the hospital feels heavier than the last, when every time he walks into his mother’s room, her voice is just a little thinner, her smile just a little more tired.

Not when the helplessness sits in his stomach like a slow, sick ache, like a weight he can’t shake, no matter how much he tries to drown himself in work or running.

And yeah.

He’s a goddamn hurricane waiting to happen.

"Izuku? Sweetie?" His mother’s voice, soft, a little raspy, but still hers, paired with the lightest touch on his forearm, pulls him back.

Izuku blinks, looks up at her.

Big, round eyes, the same color as his, watching him closely. A little more awake today than yesterday — a small victory. 

But the untouched piece of cake sitting on her bedside table — her favorite from the old bakery around the corner, the one she used to beg him to pick up for her whenever he came home from school — it‘s still there. Untouched.

A visual reminder of what the chemo is doing to her.

Of how much strength, appetite and herself is slipping from her body.

He shakes his head, forces himself to push the swirling mess in his mind away. Flashes her a soft smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes.

"I’m sorry. What did you say?"

She gives his hand a gentle squeeze. Weak. Barely there. Another sign of everything she’s losing.

"I asked about your surfboard." Her voice is light, casual, like she’s just asking about the weather. Like it’s not a loaded question. "You repaired it already?"

And for some reason, that’s what nearly knocks the air from his lungs. Because honestly?

After that whole debacle at the surf shop — where fate, in its never-ending mission to ruin his life, decided to let him walk straight into Bakugou fucking Katsuki behind the counter.

Izuku hasn’t touched the board. Not once. Hasn’t used the supplies he bought to fix it.

First look though?

It looks exactly like he feels right now.

Irreparable.

"I don’t think I can get it fixed. Lost cause."

Sadness and regret creep into her features, her body sinking further into the mattress, sheets rustling underneath her as she leans back.

"I’m sorry, honey," she murmurs, voice softer now, fragile in a way Izuku still isn’t used to. "It’s my fault, I didn’t take good care of it."

Izuku’s chest tightens.

Because screw that.

He shakes his head, fast, frantic, desperate to shut down that thought before it can settle in her mind. "What?! No, Mom. That’s not your fault."

His voice catches, wavers, just slightly. He reaches for her hand, gently, so gently, because she feels smaller than before, like holding her too tight might break something. "If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine."

His throat works around the words, but he forces a smile nonetheless. She’s already dealing with enough. She doesn’t need guilt over some stupid surfboard stacked on top of it.

"Besides," he tries again, this time a little lighter, forcing himself to breathe through the ache in his chest. "I probably outgrew it anyway. I got a bit taller since then. In case you didn’t notice."

The joke isn’t great. It isn’t even funny. But it’s something. And somehow, miraculously, it works.

Her face softens, the corners of her eyes crinkling as a small, tired giggle escapes. "Oh, I noticed," she says, squeezing his fingers as tight as she can manage.

It’s not tight at all. But it’s there. And Izuku — he’ll take that. He’ll take every second of this, every laugh, every small, fleeting moment where it feels like she’s still her.

Because there’s a part of him — a deep, terrified part of him — that knows there might come a day when these moments run out.

And he’s not ready for that. Not even close.

"But you’ll always be my little boy." She says it softly, sweetly, like it’s supposed to be comforting.

But it’s not.

It’s a punch to the ribs, a slow, aching squeeze around his lungs, something sharp and unbearable that he refuses to let spill out of him. So instead, he bites down on the inside of his cheek, hard, until the taste of copper pools in his mouth.

Because if he doesn’t — he’s going to break right here, right now. And she doesn’t need to see that. Not when she’s the one fighting for her life.

"I know, Mom," he manages, voice steady, but only just.

She smiles at him, like she knows exactly what he’s doing, like she’s letting him pretend he’s strong enough to handle this. "So, how about you get yourself a new one?"

Izuku blinks, thrown for a second. "What?"

"A new surfboard, sweetie." She tilts her head, eyes warm with something too soft, too knowing. "You can’t come back home and not have one."

He swallows, shaking his head. "Mom, I—I don’t need one. It’s fine. I’ll fix the old one."

"But you just said it was a lost cause, honey."

Shit.

"I—"

She lifts a weak hand, waves off his stammering before he can dig himself deeper.

"I could call Mitsuki, you know," she says casually, but there’s a hint of something sly behind it.

Izuku stills. "Mom."

"Or you could ask Katsuki…he’d deliver a board to you in no time."

"Mom, no."

"Oh, don’t be dramatic." She smiles, but there’s a knowing glint in her eyes, one that makes Izuku’s stomach twist. "I’m sure Katsuki—"

Izuku pulls his hand back like she just electrocuted him. "Mom."

She blinks, feigning innocence. "What?"

"I’m not getting a fucking board from Bakugou."

Her brows shoot up, and there it is — the full Inko Midoriya mom stare. "Izuku. Language."

He groans, scrubbing a hand down his face, voice muffled against his palm. "I’m serious, Mom. Don’t — don’t do that, okay?"

Her gaze softens again, her fingers brushing weakly over his knuckles. "I just think you need a new one," she says gently.

Izuku exhales slowly, trying to push away the immediate frustration curling in his gut. "Mom—"

"And I want to help," she cuts him off, her voice still light, but firm in that way only mothers can be. "I still feel bad for not having your old one properly taken care of."

"Really, you don’t have to worry about that.” 

But she isn’t done.

"Izuku, I never asked about details why you and Katsuki stopped surfing together back then, but—"

"Please," he mutters, letting his forehead fall against her hand, still intertwined with his.

It’s too much and absolutely misplaced. This conversation, this trip down memory lane that leads nowhere good. Just unearthing things that should’ve stayed buried beneath the sand.

"We shouldn’t talk about this stuff," he says, voice lower now, worn at the edges. "I’ll get a new board, if that’s what makes you happy, alright?"

Because she doesn’t need this. She doesn’t need to know the shit he kept from her.

Doesn’t need to know about the years he spent swallowing down insults, forcing himself to believe they didn’t matter. Doesn’t need to know that Bakugou didn’t just stop surfing with him.

Didn’t just stop visiting. Didn’t just stop staying for dinner. Didn’t just stop acting like they were ever anything at all. But also — made sure Izuku would never have a normal day again.

That every time Izuku thought it couldn’t get worse, Bakugou proved him wrong. That every shove, every insult, every time his face met the ground, every slur that ripped through the air like brine in a fresh cut. It all started with him.

And when she asked, he smiled through it. Brushed it off. Made up excuses.

Because it was easier. Because she didn’t need to know. And she still doesn’t.

So if it takes buying a new board to get her to focus on herself, on her recovery, on something other than him. Then, hell, he’d buy a hundred of them.

“Just promise me you’ll get one?”

She looks at him like it’s so important.

Like she’s trying to tie him down to this town with it. Like owning something whole, something not broken here again might make him change his mind. Might make him want to stay.

He doesn’t have the heart to tell her it won’t. That it never could, God, he’s such a disgusting human being. Selfish in every way a person can be.

All the self-disgust weighs him down in that moment, so he pushes himself to his feet, leaning down to press a kiss to her forehead. And she feels cold. Not surprising, not unexpected, but still. It knocks something loose inside him, sends a chill through his body despite the heat outside. It’s not like the ocean. Not like warmth or sun or anything remotely comforting. It’s something else entirely — something that makes his blood feel thin, like ice water running through his veins.

He swallows around the feeling, forces himself to straighten, and motions toward the untouched slice of cake. "You know what? I’ll get one if you can at least eat half of this."

Her brows lift. "That’s called blackmailing, honey."

A laugh escapes him before he can stop it, unfiltered and real. It’s been a while. And it feels good. Like things are okay for just this second. "I think the term you’re looking for is ‘reciprocal favor’," he corrects, smirking.

She playfully rolls her eyes, shaking her head with a small, tired smile. "Well, in that case, stop looking at me and give it to me." She taps a weak finger against the bedside table, where the cake still sits untouched. "I want to see my boy riding the waves again."

And shit.

Izuku swallows past the sudden tightness in his throat, forcing himself to keep the grin on his face. Because he wants that too. Wants her to see him out there again. Wants her to be here long enough to watch.

So he picks up the fork, cuts off a small piece of cake, and holds it out to her.

"Guess I better keep my end of the deal, then."

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

So apparently, the competitive side of his mother is still deeply ingrained in her — not even cancer could take that away.

Because she didn’t just eat half of the cake. She ate the whole damn thing.

And Izuku had been more than happy to watch her do it, watching the way she hummed in contentment at the taste, like for just a second, everything was normal.

Like she wasn’t sick. Like this was just another lazy afternoon, another quiet moment where he didn’t have to brace himself for the worst.

But now comes the hard part.

Because fulfilling his part of the bargain is far more fatal than devouring a piece of cake. Because the only way to get the surfboard he promised his mother he’d get — he has to go back to the only damn surf shop around.

The one that fate decided to screw him over with.

Because as he so graciously learned from his mother — when she had suggested for the second time that he should just call Mitsuki and hope she’d send Bakugou to handle things. 

That surf shop?

It belongs to him now.

As in, Bakugou freaking Katsuki bought the damn thing.

Fantastic.

However, since his mother hadn’t specified when he had to fulfill his end of the deal, Izuku decided it didn’t have to be today. 

Instead, after leaving the hospital, he takes a detour. 

To the old café — one of the few places in this town that never felt like it was suffocating him. A place that wasn’t touched by bad memories, wasn’t haunted by ghosts. 

It’s still at the same place, sitting on the corner of Dock Square, tucked between other small businesses, like it’s been waiting for him. When he parks his car on the narrow roadside, near the street that leads straight to the cliffs, he steps out and crosses the street, rolling his shoulders as if it’ll shake off the weight sitting there.

The café has gotten a fresh coat of paint — a deep, muted green that looks more inviting than the washed-out shade he remembers. The hanging plants by the front windows are new, fuller, trailing down in thick vines. A couple of small tables sit outside, the black iron chairs slightly rusted at the edges, but still sturdy. 

The sign still reads Dock Square Coffee House, though it’s been touched up, the gold lettering now brighter against the dark wood. 

When he steps inside, he takes it all in, and — yeah, it’s different. Not just renovated or freshened up with a new coat of paint like the outside.

Completely refurbished.

The air is cooled, filled with the familiar scent of coffee, but there’s something else — citrus, salt, the faintest trace of fresh limes sitting in a bowl on the counter.

The place leans into the surf-town aesthetic hard, but it works.

The walls are a soft seafoam green, lined with wooden shelves stacked with bottles of liquor and coffee beans, a weird but fitting mix. The ceiling is covered in old surfboards, strung up like relics from another life, battered and sun-bleached, some covered in stickers or scrawled with signatures.

It’s got that laid-back, worn-in feel, like the kind of place where time moves slower.

The long wooden counter is smooth from years of use, the edge of it worn slightly from where hands have gripped it over and over. A couple of handwritten menus are scattered across the surface, along with receipts and an open tip jar already half full.

It’s not the quiet little café he remembers from before.

Not with the seats, a motley collection of mismatched furniture, taking the whole hipster aesthetic to a new level, already occupied by groups chatting over espresso shots and iced lattes. Not with the occasional laugh cutting through the air, the distant hum of a blender and the low thrum of music from an old speaker tucked into the corner.

But it’s still…familiar enough.

Izuku walks up to the counter, the soft, haunting notes of Creep by Radiohead drifting through the space, as he fishes his wallet from the back pocket of his worn blue jean shorts.

The place isn’t packed, but there’s a steady hum of conversation, the clinking of cups, the occasional burst of laughter.

When he sees nobody behind the counter, he runs a hand through his hair, which is longer than it should be, curls sticking to his forehead from the heat. He really needs to get it cut.

With a sigh, he leans forward and spots the silver bell, eyeing the sign taped next to it that reads:

“RING FOR SERVICE. RING TWICE IF YOU’RE IMPATIENT. RING THREE TIMES AND YOU BETTER BE READY TO FIGHT.”

Izuku feels a reluctant smile curl his lips upward and follows the very strict and clear instructions by ringing once.

A female voice calls, "Just a second!" from somewhere in the back, and a few moments later, a woman — probably around his age — stumbles out from the kitchen.

Purple hair comes into view, cut into a short bob, styled in loose waves. And the second Izuku gets a proper look at her, familiarity washes over him like a gust of fresh water.

"Jirou?"

She tilts her head, hands kneading a towel, brows furrowed as she tries to place his face. Pushing a stray strand of hair behind her pierced ear, she bites down on her also pierced bottom lip. He doesn’t remember her having that one back in school.

"Izuku?" Her tone is laced with genuine surprise, like she wasn’t expecting to see a ghost from high school standing in this café.

Not that they were ever really friends. They just had music class together, exchanged maybe a handful of words over the years.

Still.

"Wow," she crosses her arms over her chest as she studies him. "It’s been…"

"Seven years," he finishes for her, feeling the discomfort slowly creeping in, settling beneath his ribs like an unwanted guest.

Jirou’s lips twitch, her teeth flashing in a small but genuine grin. "Damn. Guess you still know how to count."

Her eyes crinkle at the corners, no trace of pity in them, no hesitant softness, no forced condolences. And for the first time since stepping foot back in this town, Izuku feels a little bit lighter.

Because it’s nice — really fucking nice — to have someone just…treat him like a person. Not a walking tragedy. Not ‘poor Izuku’ whose mom is sick. Not someone people give quiet pats on the shoulder, offering that look, that awful fucking look that screams ‘I’m so sorry.’

He’s had enough of that in the last seventy-two hours to last a goddamn lifetime.

That’s the thing about a town too small for secrets. News spreads like wildfire. Or like weeds — unwanted, creeping into every crack, impossible to pull out at the root. Resistant to all types of herbicide.

"So," she starts, and Izuku immediately locks up, bracing himself.

Hoping — praying — that the initial relief of this conversation isn’t about to be wrecked by the inevitable:

How’re you doing?

Because he can’t answer that. Not truthfully. Not without either breaking something inside himself or lying through his teeth.

But Jirou just walks over to the coffee machine, flicking it on, casting him a look over her shoulder. "Coffee?"

Izuku’s shoulders sag. Just a tiny fraction. And he nods. "Yeah. That’d be great."

"Any special requests?"

"No, just… normal black coffee."

She chuckles, shaking her head. "As you wish."

She grabs one of the porcelain cups, placing it under the machine, and just as the familiar whir and hiss of espresso brewing fills the air, the door swings open.

Izuku turns his head instinctively.

And there it is. His personal curse. The inevitable, inescapable consequence of coming back to this town.

Crimson eyes lock onto his, freezing for just a second. And Izuku damns whatever small-town fate has decided to put him through this bullshit over and over again.

Bakugou doesn’t step further inside. Doesn’t move. Just stands there, throat working around a swallow, hands clenching at his sides like he doesn’t know what to do with them.

And Izuku? He doesn’t give him a chance to figure it out.

"You know what?" he says, turning back to Jirou like this is nothing. Like the air hasn’t just shifted. "I’ll take it to go."

Jirou glances between them, brows lifting slightly, catching on quick. "Uh… sure."

She doesn’t ask. Just reaches for a to-go cup instead.

And Izuku keeps his eyes trained on her hands, on the coffee, on anything that isn’t standing at the entrance watching him like he’s something Bakugou never expected to see twice in one lifetime.

He pays for it real quick, before taking the cup and striding toward the exit.

Bakugou is still there.

Still watching.

Izuku tries to move past him, doesn’t spare him a glance, doesn’t let the weight of those red eyes pressing into him slow his step. But then his hand shoots out, catching his wrist.

And goddammit. It’s like his entire body gets lit up in electric shocks. Like someone set his skin on fire and isn’t going to douse it anytime soon.

His breath locks in his chest, pulse pounding behind his ribs, because there’s no reason — no goddamn  reason — that Bakugou touching him should feel like this.

Like something that’s been waiting to happen. Like something he’s been running from, something he’s been craving and dreading at the same time. 

He snaps his head up, glares at Bakugou, and his expression is a mix of annoyance, frustration, tension. But mostly?

Mostly it’s desperate.

As if he’s saying, "I did what you said, I left you alone, but now — now give me a chance. Listen to me."

And as if he can hear Izuku’s thoughts, his lips part.

"De—" He cuts himself off, clenches his jaw, shakes his head. Corrects himself. "Izuku." The way he says it grates against something raw inside him. "You don’t have to go—"

"Let go of me, Bakugou." It’s a warning. 

His fingers clench around the coffee cup, desperate for something solid, something real — anything to drown out the lingering heat seared into his wrist where Bakugou touches him. Maybe if he spilled the coffee, let it scald his skin, it would replace one burn with another. Maybe then it wouldn’t feel like Bakugou is still there.

He flicks his eyes around the café, scanning, checking.

Making sure no one is watching, making sure no one has caught onto the tension twisting thick between them, onto the fact that something is definitely wrong.

But no one pays attention.

No one sees how Bakugou’s fingers hesitate for a second, how his grip loosens just slightly — like he doesn’t want to let go.

But he does. 

Because this time, Izuku won’t say it twice. 

The last brush of his calloused fingertips against his skin makes Izuku sprint out of the café, makes his pulse hammer in his throat like a warning siren.

He moves — fast, determined steps through the door, toward his car, toward anywhere that isn’t here.

The dark warm liquid in his cup sloshes at the edges, a few drops splattering onto the asphalt as he crosses the street, head snapping around just in time to check for traffic.

But he’s too in his head.

Still feeling the ghost of Bakugou’s grip on his wrist, still hearing his voice, still tasting the frustration on his own goddamn tongue.

So he doesn’t see the person in front of him. Doesn’t realize what’s about to happen until it’s too late.

His shoulder collides hard against someone else’s, his grip on the cup faltering. The coffee spills instantly, splattering across a shirt that isn’t his.

“Shit,” Izuku curses at the same time as the other person.

“I’m so freaking sorry,” he rushes out, already reaching for napkins he doesn’t have, not even looking at who he just crashed into until red hair comes into view — pulled back by a bandana. Broad shoulders, a familiar frame.

“Midoriya!” The voice is warm, surprised, so goddamn familiar that it nearly knocks the breath out of him.

Kirishima Eijiro grins wide, despite the fact that his shirt is currently soaked with hot coffee. It’s the same grin he always had, the one that somehow, even back then, used to put Izuku at ease.

God.

What in the ever-flying, unwanted school reunion is this day?

“Kirishima.” Izuku blinks, still eyeing the stain on the white shirt — except, looking closer, it’s not as white as it should be.

There are other stains, darker, smudged in streaks, oil or grease maybe, blending into the fresh spill of Izuku’s coffee. And paired with the boiler suit, the upper half knotted around his waist, it’s clear that Kirishima has probably given up on ever wearing a clean shirt again.

“I’d offer to pay for dry cleaning,” Izuku says, deadpan, gesturing vaguely at the mess he just made. “But I think the coffee stain is the least of your shirt’s problems.”

Kirishima looks down at himself, blinks once, then lets out a full-bodied laugh, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Y-yeah, guess you got me there,” he grins, completely unbothered. “Working at the garage kinda means sacrificing any hope of having a stain-free wardrobe. You should see my laundry pile. It’s a crime scene.”

“I can imagine.”

Seconds of silence stretch between them like a rubber band until Kirishima causes it to snap. 

“Man, it’s been such a long time.” He shakes his head in disbelief, eyeing Izuku like he’s double-checking that he’s real. “Rumors say you’re the successful construction boy now, living a glamorous life in the city.”

“And by ‘rumors‘, you probably mean ‘my mom,’ right?” He attempts to joke, but the second the words leave his mouth, Izuku regrets them. Because there it is.

That quick, flickering flash of sadness in Kirishima’s eyes. That too-familiar look, the one Izuku has been trying to dodge ever since he got back.

And just like that, he’s handed Kirishima the opening.

“How’s she doing?”

The lump in his throat returns instantly, heavy and unmovable. So does the nausea, churning deep in his stomach, making his coffee — or what’s left of it — suddenly feel like a bad idea.

“She’s holding her own.” It’s all he can manage.

Kirishima nods, lips pressing together for a second. “That’s… good to hear, man.”

And Izuku hates it. Hates the weight in Kirishima’s voice, the hesitation, the careful way he says it. Just like all the others. Like they’re all already grieving a person who is still here. Like they’ve already decided how this ends.

And Izuku refuses to do the same.

"So, you’re back here for the time being?" Kirishima is completely unfazed by the fact that Izuku just spilled half his coffee on him, instead he’s diving into what should be a normal conversation. 

One that makes sense, considering how long it’s been. But Izuku? He’s not particularly interested. Not because he doesn’t want to talk to Kirishima. But because, actually? He’s still very much on the run.

"Oi, shitty hair, what’re you do—"

Yeah. Exactly from that.

And just like that, Izuku’s moving.

Not even waiting for Kirishima to answer, not giving Bakugou a single goddamn second to pull that stunt on him again. 

"Was good to see you, Kirishima. Sorry about the shirt." It’s rushed, clipped, barely even a goodbye, as he heads straight for his car, gripping the door handle before his brain can catch up.

That deal with getting himself a surfboard?

Yeah, no.

He’d probably try to carve one out of driftwood with his bare hands before setting foot in that damn surf shop again. 

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

Parties have never been Izuku’s thing.

He knows it’s all part of the high school experience, that these are the nights people look back on, the ones they claim are life-changing or whatever crap people say about senior year.

But he’s never really cared for any of it.

Too much noise. Too many people. Too many ways for things to go wrong.

Still, his mom thought it would be good for him to go out for a change, and when Tenya from science mentioned he’d be there too, Izuku had been stupid enough to agree. It’s just a shame that his so-called companion got lost in the crowd twenty minutes after they arrived.

Because, as it turns out, the whole damn school is here.

And now, Izuku stands alone, watching the flames lick into the sky, glowing bright against the dark stretch of sand beneath his bare feet.

The fire crackles, loud and alive, filling the air with the thick scent of burning driftwood, beer, and salt.

The ocean isn’t far.

The waves crash somewhere just beyond the light of the bonfire, steady and rhythmic, almost like a distant reminder that there’s a way out of this. That he could just slip away into the night, head straight for his car, leave this whole thing behind.

And honestly? He’s considering it.

Because he doesn’t fit into this. Never has. Never will. 

He’s the outsider, the freak, the one people don’t really notice unless Bakugou decides to make him the center of attention for sport.

And when he isn’t — he’s invisible.

And that? That’s probably his favorite role to play.

No eyes on him. No expectations. No waiting for the next shove, the next insult, the next goddamn reminder that he’s never been one of them. 

So while the party swirls around him, he stands at the edges, watching.

People are drinking, laughing, tangled up in their own world. A world that feels completely different from his own. And yet, so familiar.

From here, it almost looks normal. Like the high school experience he was supposed to have. But it’s not his.

And the lukewarm beer in his hand — the one Tenya handed him at the start of the night — is proof of that. Because it’s been sitting in his grip for way too long, untouched except for a few halfhearted sips he shouldn’t have taken in the first place since he’s driving. 

It’s just another reminder of how long he’s been standing here, pretending.

And god, he’s probably just making himself stand out more. Probably looks more like a creep, scanning the party like he’s taking inventory, than an actual participant.

Great.

This whole thing is pointless.

But he keeps watching anyway. 

Watches the scattered groups of teenagers, the way the firelight casts flickering shadows over their figures, stretching them long and distorted. 

The orange glow makes the beach look creepier than he wants to admit, the contrast between light and dark almost unnerving.

Izuku likes the beach when it’s silent.

When it’s just him and the blanket of stars overhead, the comforting brush of saltwater around his ankles, the distant lull of waves instead of laughter.

But even with all that knowledge, he can’t seem to make himself leave. And it makes him hate himself more. 

Because he’s like the stupid earth gravitating around the sun, drawn into its pull even though he knows better. Even though he knows he’ll scorch himself if he gets too close.

And not even the ocean could douse this kind of fire.

"Bakugou!"

A high-pitched yelp cuts through the air, shattering Izuku’s train of thought. He blinks, realizing he’d been staring at the sand like it had answers. When he looks up, he sees them.

Ochako, the cheer captain, laughs as Bakugou lifts her off the ground.

"I’m warning you," she says, but the big, bright smile on her face makes it clear she’s only half serious. She’s enjoying this. This little game Bakugou plays with her, the effortless way he lifts her petite frame over his shoulder like it’s nothing, running straight for the waves.

Izuku watches, unmoving, as Bakugou doesn’t stop until they’re hip-deep in the water.

Only then does he set her down, letting go just in time for the next wave to crash against her, drenching her completely.

Ochako yelps again, snickering, swatting at his arm as she stumbles in the surf.

And Bakugou — he laughs too.

Not the sharp, cruel laugh Izuku remembers from years of being on the other end of it. Not the one that made his stomach knot in dread, made his face burn, made his chest feel too tight with something ugly and awful.

But also something warm. Something hopeful.

No.

This one is deep, warm, unguarded in a way Bakugou rarely ever lets himself be.

And Izuku’s stomach twists as he watches them get out of the water together.

They’re on the other side of the fire now, still dripping wet, still laughing, when Bakugou suddenly catches sight of him.

And then the fire isn’t the thing heating Izuku’s skin anymore.

Not when those red eyes could rival the hottest fire known to mankind. Not when the intensity of them pins him in place, locking him down like a force of gravity too strong to fight.

Izuku knows he should look away. Knows he shouldn’t get caught in this.

Shouldn’t let himself get lost in the crimson color that has burned him in so many ways before. Shouldn’t let himself stand there like a goddamn idiot, heart hammering against his ribs, completely forgetting how to breathe.

Because everything about him — every glance, every presence, every moment of simply existing — has been provocative to Bakugou for years now. Has been an excuse for war.

But still, he can’t. Still, he stares.

And Bakugou — he stares right back.

Even when Ochako wraps her arms around his neck, drawing him back into the moment, into the game they’ve been playing, he only gives her a millisecond of his attention. Just enough for her to think a kiss would be the best way to end whatever they’re doing. 

And when she leans in, Bakugou kisses her back.

But the second his lips meet hers — his eyes are back on Izuku.

Slowly opening, never looking away.

Even when Ochako’s hands tangle in his wet blond hair, fingers threading through the strands like she’s claiming him. Even when the whole scene should be something intense, something Bakugou should be lost in.

He looks completely indifferent. Like it means nothing.

And suddenly — the moment feels intimate.

Not between Bakugou and Ochako.

No.

Between Bakugou and Izuku.

A stifling atmosphere settles in the air, thick and so damn unbearable, suffocating in a way that has nothing to do with the smoke from the bonfire. It has everything to do with the fact that Bakugou is putting on a show now.

For him. Only him.

Because he doesn’t stop looking.

Even as his hands roam Ochako’s body. Even as he cups her ass, pulling her flush against him, as his tongue visibly plunges into her mouth — he keeps looking at Izuku.

And no one else around them sees it. No one notices the way Bakugou’s stare never wavers. No one feels the unbearable prickle of heat licking at Izuku’s skin, growing, twisting, tightening around his ribs like a vice.

It’s too much.

Too fucking much.

Another second ticks by, stretching out like an eternity, until Izuku finally rips his gaze away, heart hammering, skin burning, mind racing. He tosses his solo cup into the sand, barely caring where it lands, and moves.

Doesn’t think — just moves.

Straight down the wooden walkway, past the rocks, toward his car where the air is lighter, where Bakugou isn’t. Where he can breathe again.

His fingers are already digging into his pocket, fishing out the keys, unlocking the car, grabbing the handle of the driver’s door when a strong hand grabs his shoulder.

A forceful yank spins him around, his back slamming against the door with a dull thud. His mother’s Jeep shakes slightly from the impact.

Bakugou’s red eyes stare him down — sharp, burning, and just inches from his face. Heat. Alcohol. The smell of smoke clinging to his clothes.

"Let go of me," Izuku manages through the shock. 

But Bakugou ignores it.

Completely.

"What the fuck, Deku?!"

Izuku’s breath catches, pulse kicking into overdrive. He’s pinned, back pressed against cool metal, but his body feels like it’s on fire. And he’s absolutely out of words, something that always manages to make Bakugou even more furious. 

“Stop looking at me like that and tell me what the fuck that was back there?” His voice is low, rough, demanding. 

Like he has any right to ask. 

Like Izuku is the one playing games here. 

Like he wasn’t the one who followed him out here, backed him against his car, and is now waiting for an answer Izuku doesn’t even have. 

Izuku’s breath is uneven, shaky, but not from fear — from sheer disbelief. Because what the hell is Bakugou even asking?

"What are you talking about?" Izuku forces out, eyes narrowing while he doesn’t move. Doesn’t even try to get out of the situation he’s in.

But Bakugou doesn’t budge.

"Don’t play dumb, Deku." His hands tighten where they’re braced against the car, boxing Izuku in. "You know exactly what the fuck I mean." 

Izuku’s pulse pounds against his ribs. His mind is scrambling for logic, for anything that makes sense, but none of this freaking does. 

"I don’t," he snaps, glaring now, frustration bubbling up, matching the heat pressing against him. "I don’t know what you're talking about because I didn’t do anything. And now, let. Me. Go."

That — that makes Bakugou laugh.

A short, humorless, breathy sound that doesn’t belong here. That makes Izuku’s stomach churn in a way that tells him that maybe the few sips of beer will find their way out of his system in another way than through his liver doing its thing.

"Didn’t do anything?" Bakugou repeats, mockingly, and suddenly he’s even closer, forehead nearly knocking against Izuku’s. "Then why the fuck couldn’t you look away, freak?"

Izuku freezes. That’s what this is about? 

"What—"

"You stood there, just stood there, watching me like—like—" he cuts himself off, exhaling sharply, eyes flashing dangerously, completely unhinged.

Izuku’s fingers curl into fists at his sides. "You were the one staring at me, Katsuki! You were the one who—who—"

The words die on his tongue, because the rest is too much. Too humiliating to say aloud.

You were the one who kissed her while looking at me.

You were the one who made it something else.

"Why do you always have to destroy everything?!" Bakugou’s voice cracks on it. His hand slaps against the car beside Izuku’s head, loud, sudden, making Izuku flinch. "Why, Deku?! Tell me the fuck why?"

Izuku doesn’t know the answer. He doesn’t even know what Bakugou’s asking.

Why everything between them spiraled so hard, so fast? Why it all fell apart?

Maybe — maybe it was Izuku’s fault.

For misreading the signs back then. Five years ago. At the cliffs. After they had surfed for hours, the sun dipping low, the salt drying on their skin. After Bakugou had looked at him like he wanted it too. Like he wanted it as much as Izuku had been craving it.

Izuku shakes his head. Trying to shake off the memory.

Because that was the moment. The moment everything shifted, cracked, split apart. Like an iceberg in the ocean. And they were the ship, speeding toward it, too fast to stop.

Destined to crash. Destined to sink.

Because some things don’t just wash away. They sink all the way down to the seabed.

Izuku’s silence breaks something in Bakugou. "Fucking say something!"

Bakugou’s voice is raw, almost desperate. He grabs him. Fists tight in Izuku’s shirt, breath heavy, hot, rapid.

Something flashes across his face. Something unreadable, completely unhinged, reckless. 

And before Izuku can even comprehend what’s happening — Bakugou kisses him.

It’s not gentle. Not hesitant, not careful.

It’s fast, messy, more force than control.

Like he’s fighting Izuku and himself at the same time.

Like he’s trying to prove something neither of them understand.

Izuku’s mind blanks.

His hands curl into fists against Bakugou’s chest, his breath hitching as heat crashes through him. 

Because this shouldn’t be happening. Not again. Not after the last time backfired so badly that Izuku is still facing the consequences years later.

Not after everything that came after it. Not after the taunts, the shoves, the bruises Bakugou left on more than just his skin.

This should be a mistake. This should be the moment he stops it.

But god help him — he doesn’t push him away.

Instead, he pulls him closer.

And that breaks something wide open. Like the floodgates of years of pushing and pulling at each other — they’re finally open. And the water is rushing in, pulling them under.

Bakugou makes a noise against his lips, something guttural, something that sounds like frustration and relief tangled together. Like he wasn’t expecting Izuku to give in. As if he was hoping he would and wouldn’t at the same time.

And then it’s a mess of heat and hands, of mouths meeting with too much force, too much desperation. Izuku gasps into it, and Bakugou takes full advantage, teeth scraping against his bottom lip before his tongue presses inside, demanding, claiming, reckless. 

It’s too much. It’s not enough. It’s everything Izuku told himself he wouldn’t want again.

But he’s a goddamn liar. 

His hands clutch at Bakugou’s shirt, dragging him closer, needing something solid, something real. 

Because he knows this is fleeting. Fleeting like the summer. Fleeting like a perfect wave, like the kind you wait for, the kind that builds and builds, only to crash down before you can catch it. Fleeting like a dive into the perfect aqua-blue water, because at some point you have to break the surface to breathe.

But right now — right now, Izuku isn’t coming up for air.

He isn’t thinking.

He isn’t questioning.

He’s just taking.

When he rolls his tongue against Bakugou’s, he’s not thinking about the fact that this tongue had just been in someone else’s mouth. He’s not thinking about where those hands were mere minutes ago. He’s just kissing him deeper, harder, drowning in it. 

In the taste of beer and dry salt from the ocean water that’s dried on Bakugou’s skin. In the way Bakugou presses against him, solid and burning, like he needs this just as much as Izuku does.

Like he’s starving for something he keeps fighting. Like he’s fighting himself more than he’s ever fought Izuku.

And God, it’s intoxicating.

The way Bakugou grips him, like he wants to bruise him into memory. The way his fingers dig into Izuku’s waist, his chest pressing hard against Izuku’s now, erasing all the space between them.

But when a soft "Kacchan" slips from Izuku’s throat into the tiny space between their lips when they take nothing more than a short moment to catch a breath, Bakugou shudders.

His grip falters, just slightly.

And suddenly, something shifts.

His hands loosen.

His breath stutters.

And he’s pulling back.

As if something in him just snapped back into place. Like his brain finally caught up to what his body was doing.

Izuku’s left gasping, chest rising and falling, back still pressed against the Jeep.

And Bakugou looks at him like he just made the worst fucking mistake of his life. 

Again.

Chapter Text

Chapter 4: Spare Me Those Parts

“There‘s a swelling storm, and I’m caught up in the middle of it all.“

Waves — Dean Lewis

Bakugou doesn’t realize he’s been zoning out until a voice rings out from the back door that leads toward the garage.

His head snaps up.

"Huh?"

"You wanna keep staring at those sandwiches, or you planning to put them in the cupboard eventually and help me with the rest?" His mother‘s grinning, teasing, but there’s an edge of expectation in her voice, like she already knows he’s off his game.

She stands in the doorway, arms loaded with grocery bags, one brow raised as she looks up at him. As if he’s the little kid again, caught doing something he shouldn’t.

And he is. Because his mind sure as hell isn’t in this kitchen.

It’s stuck somewhere else.

Back in Dock Square Café just hours ago, where a pair of green eyes locked onto him, filled with so much fucking aversion that it keeps haunting him — just like it did when he wasn’t even physically present in this town.

His grip tightens around the plastic container of packaged toast he’s apparently been holding for too long. Imagining the warm, smooth wrist that he had been holding earlier instead.

And fuck.

Touching Izuku was a bad idea. A really fucking bad idea.

Because he felt it.

The way he tensed.

The way his breath hitched just slightly. The way his pulse fluttered under Bakugou’s fingertips.

For a second — just a second — it was like Izuku was trapped there with him.

Like he wasn’t just disgusted. Like maybe, he still felt something too.

Something like back at the bonfire years ago, when the fire wasn’t the only thing burning between them. Or something like prom.

If Bakugou hadn’t been so fucking eager to destroy both of those moments. If he hadn’t ripped them apart before they had any chance to become something real. If he hadn’t killed them the second they started breathing, nipping it in the bud before it had a chance to grow into something else.

Something that now tastes like regret, like guilt, like fucking failure on his tongue. 

But that’s just Bakugou being a fucking idiot.

Because none of that matters now.

Because Izuku pulled away.

Tore himself out of Bakugou’s grip like it burned.

Like the mere thought of Bakugou touching him was unbearable.

And yeah — it should be.

It probably is for Izuku.

And Bakugou can’t even blame him.

Not one fucking bit.

That doesn’t make this whole thing any easier though. Doesn’t make the pull disappear. Doesn’t make the urge disappear to show him — to fucking prove to him — that he’s working through his shit, fighting through his own self-inflicted wreckage, tries to be someone better. Someone worthy of his acknowledgment.

Maybe even of his forgiveness.

"Katsuki?"

Shit. He really needs to get a grip.

Bakugou grunts, shaking himself out of it, finally moving to shove the toast into the cupboard where it belongs. "Yeah, yeah, got it."

His mom huffs out a laugh, watching him with that look — the one that says she’s already onto him, already picking up on the shit he doesn’t want her to. She sets the last of the bags down, stretching out her arms before placing her hands on her hips, assessing him.

"Okay, I’ll bite," she says.

Bakugou cocks a brow. "What?"

"You’re acting weird, son. And I mean weirder than usual."

Bakugou scoffs, the cool bite of the metal bar tapping against his teeth as he clicks his tongue. He feigns offense, rolling his shoulders like he’s shaking off the weight still pressing against him. "The apple doesn’t fall far from the trunk, old hag."

His mom snorts, unimpressed, because it’s the usual game they play. Some people would probably say Bakugou and his mother have a weird relationship — not overly affectionate, not soft, not filled with the kind of warmth people expect between a mother and son.

But both of them know better.

And especially Bakugou.

So yeah — she gets to call him out. Doesn’t mean he has to make it easy for her, though.

"Tch, don’t try to deflect. I know when you’re in your own head." She squints at him, arms crossed, already sizing him up like she’s about to call bullshit the second he opens his mouth. "Who pissed you off today, huh?"

Fucking hell.

He should’ve just left the damn toast on the counter and walked out of here.

Instead, she turns her attention toward the garage, cupping a hand around her mouth.

"Kirishima!"

Bakugou grits his teeth, glaring at her.

She ignores it.

From outside, the sound of metal clanking echoes back before Kirishima’s voice follows. "Yeah? What’s up?"

Bakugou keeps shooting daggers at his mother. "What the hell do you think you’re doing?"

He can already see where this is going. He starts shaking his head, ready to cut this off before it even starts, but then — she grins.

That grin. That knowing, smug, I’m-about-to-ruin-your-day grin. "If you’re not gonna tell me, I’m sure he will."

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

Bakugou groans, dragging a hand down his face. 

Kirishima pokes his head inside, wiping grease from his hands, glancing between them. "Tell you what?"

"Why my idiot son looks like he’s two seconds away from biting someone’s head off."

Bakugou levels her with a look. "You’re literally describing me every day."

Kirishima shrugs. “He’s not wrong, Mrs. Bakugou.”

"Not like this," she quips back, arms still crossed, clearly digging in for the long haul.

And that’s when Kirishima raises a brow, like something clicks in his head. "Maybe it’s because he ran into Izuku back in the café earlier."

Fucking traitor.

Bakugou’s death glare immediately redirects from his mother to his so-called best friend. Or maybe — ex-best friend, because he’s really questioning that title right now.

"Thanks, friend," Bakugou grits out, his voice sharp enough to cut through steel.

Kirishima grins, all too pleased with himself, before raising his grease-covered hands in surrender. "I’ll just — yeah, I’ll get back to it and leave you two… to whatever you were doing."

Bakugou is going to kill him.

Slowly. Painfully.

He’s already mentally planning it out, when he turns back to his mom—

And she’s smiling.

But there’s something else there too. A hint of heaviness, a look that she always saves for when they’re alone, for when there’s no one else around to buffer it.

That kind of look. The one she’s just waiting to direct at him as soon as Kirishima is out of earshot.

"Thanks again for taking a look at it," she calls after him, all genuine and polite, like she didn’t just throw her own son under the goddamn bus.

"Nah, it’s no big deal." Kirishima waves her off, casual as ever, because of course he is.

He could probably tell the worst person in the world to fuck off and still get called a good guy. Because he’s the absolute sweetheart and this town eats up that effortless charm like it’s their goddamn morning coffee.

"How are you feeling about it, Katsuki?"

His mom doesn’t even ease into it, just dives straight for the elephant in the room while she rummages through the grocery bags, sorting everything into its place like they’re having a casual conversation.

Like she’s just asking how his day was.

Bakugou grabs the carton of eggs, jaw clenching, because he knows full fucking well he can’t escape this right now.

Even though he would love nothing more than to grab the keys to his old GMC, throw his board in the back, and disappear into the ocean until his brain shuts the fuck up.

"I’m fine."

His mom snorts, unimpressed, and if there was ever any doubt that he’s her son, it would’ve been wiped out completely at this moment. Because it’s like looking into a mirror. "Try again, but be more convincing than the first time if you want me to believe you."

He huffs through his nose, rolls his shoulders, trying to shake off the weight pressing into them.

She knows. She always knows.

He had told his mother a lot of things over the years. She knows what he had done to Izuku. Not the details. But enough.

Enough to know he was a cruel little shit back then. Enough to understand that seeing Izuku again isn’t just an inconvenience for him — it’s a fucking reckoning.

He puts the eggs away, bracing his arms against the cold marble counter, head hanging low. The headache is already building behind his eyes, sharp and slow, crawling under his skull like it has all the fucking time in the world.

"He already showed up at the shop a few days ago." His voice comes out flat, exhausted. Like it’s taking too much effort to even talk about this. "You should’ve seen his face, Mom.“

It’s rare — calling her that. Feels too much like a lost kid searching for reassurance. But right now, that’s probably exactly what he is.

She stays silent for a few moments, and suddenly, the absence of her voice feels heavier than anything she could say.

The rustling of the grocery bags, the soft thud of items being placed into cupboards, the occasional clinking sounds from the garage where Kirishima is still poking around under the hood of her car — they’re the only sounds in the air.

And it makes Bakugou restless.

His fingers drum once against the counter before he clenches them into fists, forcing himself still.

His jaw tightens, waiting.

Because he knows his mom. Knows she’s choosing her words.

She pauses mid-movement, a container of milk in her hand, tapping her nails against the plastic before finally speaking. "What’re you gonna do about it?"

Bakugou snorts, shaking his head. "Well, taking into account that he basically told me to fuck off and not even fucking breathe in his direction… what do you think, huh?"

His voice comes out sharper than intended, frustration simmering just beneath the surface.

Because what the hell does she expect him to do? Izuku wants nothing to do with him. And Bakugou can’t blame him for that. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t fucking sting.

His mom doesn’t react right away. Just tilts her head slightly, watching him the way she does when she’s picking him apart. When she knows exactly what he needs to hear, but doesn’t want to hear.

Like she can see past the words, past the sharpness, past the deflection. Like she knows exactly what’s underneath it.

She sets the milk down on the counter with a soft thunk, then leans against it, arms crossing over her chest. 

Then — she loosens them again.

Just shrugs. Casual. Unbothered. Acting in that nonchalant way she knows will drive Bakugou insane. "Sounds like you already made up your mind." Calm. Even. Unshaken.

Which only pisses him off more.

"The fuck’s that supposed to mean?" he snaps, already bristling.

She just raises a brow. "It means exactly what it sounds like."

"Yeah? And what the hell do you think I decided, huh?"

His mom just tilts her head, looking unimpressed. "That it’s easier to let him hate you."

She lets the words settle, doesn’t push further, doesn’t need to. Just lets him stew in it while she resumes unpacking the groceries, going about her business like she didn’t just cut him open with a single sentence.

His palms flatten against the counter, pressing down like he can ground himself, like he can keep his thoughts from spiraling. He really fucking hates when she’s right.

Because there’s too much going on in his head.

Ever since Izuku stood in his shop. Ever since he first laid eyes on him after years of absolute silence. Years where they had both seemingly lived completely different lives. Where Izuku had been off somewhere else, thriving, growing, becoming someone new.

And Bakugou?

Bakugou never thought the worst part of losing Izuku would be watching him come back and realizing he had already learned how to live without him. That Izuku didn’t need him anymore. That he probably never did.

And maybe that was what hurt the most. Not the hate. Not the distance. But the fact that Izuku had survived him somehow. That he had gotten away, rebuilt himself, moved on.

While Bakugou is still out in the ocean, waiting. Still looking at the horizon, waiting to see green. Waiting for him to appear, riding his wave, coming back.

"Some things you just don’t come back from," he mutters once, more to himself than to her.

The bitter truth is — he doesn’t know how to fix what he broke. Doesn’t know if he even could. Some things aren’t meant to be forgiven. And maybe this is one of them.

His mother shakes her head, exhaling through her nose like she’s heard this before. Because she has. Because it’s the same thing Bakugou said about his father years ago.

And maybe that’s what makes this feel like déjà vu. Only this time, Bakugou is standing on the other side. The same side his father stood on back then. 

Still stands on, in a way. Judging by the unanswered calls his mom still begs him to take. Bakugou has forgiven her. But it still feels impossible to completely forgive his father. Why? Well, he doesn’t really know. 

"His mom is sick, Katsuki," she says after a beat, voice quieter now. She shakes her head, her pixie cut swinging softly, the blond strands catching the afternoon sunlight filtering through the windows. Bakugou knows his mom’s been visiting Inko Midoriya regularly. "That boy’s going through so much right now," she continues, watching him carefully. "You ever thought about giving him time?"

Bakugou’s hands curl into fists.

"I gave him fucking time," he bites back, jaw tight. It’s ridiculous to think that four days would be enough, and Katsuki knows it. But he also knows — deep down, in the pit of his gut — that it doesn’t matter how much time he gives him. Izuku will never come around. And it’s not like Bakugou has the right to force him to. "But you just don’t get it, old hag.” His voice breaks through the air like thunder. The kind that warns of an oncoming storm, splitting through a warm summer day — a crack in the sky before everything crashes down. “He fucking hates me. Won’t even look at me without wanting to claw my goddamn eyes out."

His voice rises despite the restraint he tries to keep. "You think I can just walk up to him, say some bullshit apology, and it’ll all be good? No amount of time will ever be enough."

His mom meets his eyes. Steady. Unshaken. “If you can’t change the wind, adjust the sails.”

Bakugou clicks his tongue, rolling the metal bar in his tongue against his teeth. “You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?”

It’s a deflection, and they both know it. The ball of his piercing clicks softly against his teeth, a habit he’s picked up over time, something to ground himself when shit gets too heavy. Another change. Another piece he’s added to himself, visible proof of the person he’s tried to become. 

Probably a desperate attempt to make Izuku realize he’s put in the effort. Too bad Izuku doesn’t want to see it. Doesn’t want to see any of it. Not the internal shift. Not the external proof of it.

Not him.

His mom sighs, shaking her head, voice softer now. “I don’t, son.”

She places a can of coffee on the counter with a deliberate thud, like she’s emphasizing her point. “I’m just trying to tell you that sometimes it needs more than a few well-meant words and a little bit of persistence to make amends. Nobody says it’s going to be easy.”

Bakugou snorts. “Funny, you didn’t say that with Dad.”

And yeah — now, he’s just being an asshole.

His mom’s expression hardens instantly, and her palm slaps against the counter. “That’s different, Katsuki.”

Her voice is sharp, frustration cutting through the air like a blade. “And you know that.”

She’s tired of this conversation. Tired of revisiting the same argument, the same old wounds.

And yeah, maybe he is too.

But before she can continue, before the moment can spiral any further—

“Mrs. Bakugou? I think your serpentine belt is loose,” Kirishima calls, tone casual. “I could take the car with me to the garage and get it fixed today if you don’t need it anymore.” 

Both of them turn toward the doorway, and Bakugou already knows Kirishima can feel the weight in the room. 

Because he pauses and takes a second to glance between them, assessing the tightness in Bakugou’s shoulders, the way his mom still has her hand pressed against the counter. 

“Am I interrupting something?” he asks, already gesturing back toward the garage. “I could—”

“No.” Bakugou cuts in, sharp, quick, before Kirishima can weasel his way out and leave him alone with this conversation. “We’re done here anyway. Right?”

Bakugou doesn’t wait for a response. Because he can’t take more of this conversation. It would only lead to more arguments and he really doesn’t want to fight with her — even if that might not look like him.

He grabs the keys from the counter, turns toward the garage where Kirishima has already disappeared.

But his mom throws one last grenade over her shoulder. A perfectly aimed hit. “Inko said his board’s broken.”

Nothing else.

Like she’s throwing a lifebuoy into the water that is his mind, For him to make the choice.

To take it.

Or to drown.

Bakugou’s fingers tighten around the doorframe. He glances over his shoulder, just for a second.

She’s already back to putting away groceries. Like she didn’t just hand him an opportunity he didn’t ask for — one he doesn’t even know if he wants. 

“Don’t forget to call back Mr. Aizawa about the surf contest,” she reminds him, shifting topics as smoothly as she wrecks his entire train of thought.

Bakugou groans internally, already dreading the stupid annual summer festival bullshit. 

But as much as that bothers him—

The fact that Izuku’s board is broken bothers him more.

Just like the fact that fixing this mess will never be as easy as fixing a board.

Because this isn’t fiberglass and resin.

This is years of damage.

Years of words he can’t take back, actions that cut deeper than any snapped fin or cracked deck ever could.

And no amount of repair kits or epoxy will fix that.

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

Izuku tightens his grip on the sandpaper, dragging it across the fractured surface of his board, the uneven scrape filling the too-quiet space.

"Goddamn it," he mutters under his breath, tossing the sandpaper aside, raking a frustrated hand through his disheveled curls.

His board looks worse than before, a jagged crack running straight down the fiberglass, refusing to be smoothed out no matter how much he works on it.

No matter how hard he tries to patch it up. No matter how much he wants it to be like it was before.

A lost cause.

Just like he told his mom.

Or at least, Izuku has no fucking idea how to fix it.

His fingers curl into his palms, tension winding tight beneath his ribs.

Is he still talking about the board?

Because damn it. It’s the perfect, cruel representation of his own interior.

He should probably leave it be.

Just give up, go back inside, get some work done, answer some emails, work on those digital construction drawings for the next project.

Be productive. Be functional. Be anything other than this.

But honestly?

Being in the house is so much worse than spending time in the garage.

Too quiet. Too familiar. So familiar it actually hurts.

His mom hasn’t changed a damn thing. Not the framed posters on his bedroom wall, not the old books still stacked on his nightstand, not the trophies he once thought meant something. It’s like stepping into a past version of himself he thought he buried. Safe to say, he’s been avoiding it.

Avoiding the room, the walls, the memories. Avoiding the fact that the house is too fucking big without his mom in it. His hands curl around the edge of the table. 

Izuku has never felt fear like this before.

Not like this. Not this deep, this insidious.

It’s like a parasite, burrowing into him, laying eggs in his body, multiplying until it spreads through every nerve, every muscle. Until it seeps into his bloodstream, running through his veins like the chemo his mom has to endure.

Slow, poisonous, inescapable.

Something that changes you from the inside out. Something that won’t let go.

So this is what it feels like — to fear for the life of someone you love.

To exist in a constant state of unknown. To wake up every day not knowing what’s going to happen next. To always, be afraid that the next call will be from the hospital, that someone will be on the other end saying, "We’re sorry to have to tell you this, but…"

Izuku squeezes his eyes shut, willing the thought away. It’s making him miserable.

And it shows.

The lack of sleep, the weight pressing into his bones, the way his reflection in the bathroom mirror looks more hollowed out each morning. Pair this fear with the guilt of not being the son his mother deserved — because he was selfish.

Because he fled.

Because he ran away from her, from this town, from everything.

And then — pair that with the anger. The anger toward Bakugou.

For driving him to the point of waving goodbye and never looking back. For making it easier to leave than to stay. For being one of the biggest reasons he had to go.

His mind is a fucking disaster zone, a tangled mess of too much. And it’s getting worse. Like he’s sinking, deeper and deeper, with every passing day. And every time, it gets a little harder to breathe — oxygen draining steadily from his lungs, like a ship with a leak so small, so invisible, that it only slowly fills with water.

At first, you don’t notice it. At first, you think you’re fine. Until one day, you look around and realize you’re already halfway underwater.

His head falls forward, chin nearly touching his chest as he rubs his temples — a weak attempt to massage the tension out of his skull.

The desk lamp feels too bright all of a sudden, like tiny knives stabbing into his eyeballs. So he shuts them, squeezes them tight, and tries to push the overwhelming feeling out of his chest before it breaks him apart from the inside.

Breathe in, breathe out.

He tries. Tries to slow it down, to steady it, to make it stop fucking hurting. He can’t lose her. He just can’t.

Breathe in, breathe out.

He can’t keep seeing Bakugou. Because every time he does, it makes him painfully aware of how much he is not over it.

Not over the things that happened. Not over the things Bakugou said. And worst of all — not over how much he still fucking feels for him.

Not just the anger. Not just the resentment that sits heavy in his stomach like swallowed glass. But the one emotion that makes Izuku furious at himself.

The one that makes him want to punch a hole in the nearest wall. The one that makes him feel like a goddamn fool.

Breathe in, breathe out.

He needs it all to go away.

This feeling of helplessness, of standing in the eye of a storm and being unable to do anything but watch everything get ripped apart. Medicine talks about what cancer does to the people who have it. But nobody warns you about what it does to the ones who have to watch. Nobody tells you what it’s like to see someone you love become smaller, weaker, swallowed by something you can’t fight for them. Nobody warns you that it turns you into something else too — something desperate. Something that makes you want to curl up, disappear, bargain with any higher power that might be out there.

To make it stop. To take their place instead.

Because anything — anything — is better than having to sit there and do absolutely fucking nothing.

Breathe in, breathe out.

At this point, it’s already useless.

The ache in his chest won’t settle. It sits there, heavy and relentless, pressing against his ribs like something waiting to rip him open. 

Izuku doesn’t hear the footsteps at first. Doesn’t register the presence behind him. Not until a voice — low, raspy, softer than it has any right to be — cuts through the static in his head.

His breath catches. His muscles go tight.

And for a split second, he thinks he imagined it. Thinks his mind is playing tricks on him, shoving the past into the present just to mess with him one more time today.

But when he turns around, the garage door is cracked open and in the space between light and shadow is Bakugou. Hands shoved into his pockets, shoulders tense, brows drawn together just slightly.

Like he isn’t sure what the hell he’s doing here either. 

Izuku’s body goes rigid. Because he doesn’t know how long Bakugou’s been there. But judging by the way Bakugou is looking at him — it’s been long enough.

"Called you like five times," Bakugou mutters, shifting on his feet before he has the nerve to take a few steps toward him. "You good?"

Izuku lets himself take him in — something he definitely shouldn’t, but also can’t help but do. Like some addict, knowing exactly that the high will only last so long before the crash comes after.

Because Bakugou’s always been attractive. More than just appealing.

Izuku got it, back then. Got why the girls went crazy over the swim captain, why every party, every bonfire, every dumb school event had at least three people trying to get his attention.

And even now — Izuku admits, through gritted teeth and sheer willpower — he looks freaking good. The loose shorts, the boxy button-up hanging open just enough to show the toned line of his chest, the shell necklace dipping against his collarbone. 

But that was never why Izuku looked.

That was never what kept pulling him back in. He was always more drawn to Bakugou’s energy. His aura, his presence. The way he made everything feel sharper, more electric, like riding the perfect wave. 

Yeah, in some way, Bakugou felt like the ocean to Izuku.

Unpredictable. Powerful. Something that could hold you up or pull you under, depending on how it decided to move. And just like the ocean, Izuku had spent years trying to navigate him.

Until it started to shift. Until it became pure aversion — directed straight at Izuku.

"Izuku?" 

Izuku stares. At the way Bakugou’s right hand leaves his pocket, like he’s reaching out — but isn’t. Like he caught himself at the last second, remembering the way Izuku tore himself free at the café. Remembering how he had flinched. Knowing it’d be a mistake.

But he keeps approaching anyway. Tentatively. As if he’s approaching a scared animal, afraid Izuku might bolt.

"You alright? You’re kinda scaring the shit outta me right now."

Is he alright? What kind of stupid question is that? And what makes Bakugou think he has any goddamn right to ask?

Bakugou’s brows pull together slightly, like he’s really waiting for an answer. Like he actually fucking means it. And that’s what does it. The last drop in an already overflowing glass.

Because yeah, it was only a matter of time before Izuku snapped. He’s been a brooding volcano, simmering, waiting to erupt ever since he passed that stupid “Welcome to Seabright Bay” sign.

Ever since he dragged himself back here, knowing damn well it was the last place in the world he wanted to be and at the same time the only place he could be. Because his mother needed him. 

But the one person — the absolute last person — he wanted to have this breakdown in front of?

Bakugou fucking Katsuki.

And yet — here they are. And Izuku can’t stop it now.

Can’t pull himself back, can’t swallow it down, can’t do anything but let all the bitterness and exhaustion finally boil over. His vision tunnels, breath sharp, body moving before his brain can catch up.

One second, he’s standing there, fists clenched at his sides, chest heaving — and the next, his hands are in Bakugou’s shirt, gripping the fabric tight, shoving him back, slamming him up against the nearest metal shelf.

The entire thing rattles violently, tools and old cans of motor oil shifting, fertilizer bags rustling at the impact.

Bakugou grunts, but doesn’t fight back, doesn’t push him off.

Just stares at him, unreadable, breath coming in sharp exhales.

Izuku isn’t thinking.

His body is running on something primal, something fueled by years of resentment and grief and unresolved bullshit that never got the closure it deserved.

"You—" Izuku’s breath is ragged, his vision edged with red, his grip tightening around the collar of Bakugou’s open button-up. It’s a miracle the fabric hasn’t ripped, that a few buttons haven’t already popped off, given how tightly his fingers are curled into it. "You don’t fucking get to ask me that."

His knuckles turn white, his whole body trembling.

Bakugou just stares, his breath sharp, uneven, but he still doesn’t fight. Doesn’t push him off. Doesn’t even flinch.

And that only pisses Izuku off more. Because this isn’t how it’s supposed to go. He’s supposed to fight back, to shove him off, sneer, throw some scathing insult, dig his nails into the wound just like he always did. Not this silent, unreadable, unshaken version of him. Not this stillness that feels more like surrender than resistance.

"You don’t get to show up after all these years and pretend like you give a shit."

Izuku shakes him, just once, enough to rattle the shelf again, to hear the scrape of metal on metal, the dull clunk of something rolling to the floor.

"You don’t get to look at me like that."

There’s so much animosity rotting away in Izuku’s heart, curling together with fear, with the feeling he refuses to name. The one that makes him want to pull Bakugou in rather than push him away.

But he doesn’t. Instead, he stills.

Takes deep, uneven breaths, hands still gripping Bakugou’s shirt. He watches the rise and fall of Bakugou’s chest, the sharp inhale, the way his breathing stutters just slightly before evening out.

And it’s infuriating.

Why? Why do they need to have more chemistry than a goddamn oxygen and hydrogen molecule? Why does it feel like every time they’re close, the whole room gets charged, like something waiting to combust? And why won’t Bakugou take his eyes off him?

Those red-rimmed halos of color around a dark center, pupils still stretched wide in shock from Izuku’s outburst, while the rest of him remains so still. So infuriatingly calm.

"You don’t—"

The rest gets lost in the air, or stuck in Izuku’s throat — he’s not sure which. His head falls forward, his grip loosening just slightly.

Seconds tick by.

Or minutes.

Who the hell knows.

The only thing that pulls him back is the soft, feather-light brush of fingertips against his wrists. A touch so careful, so measured, so impossibly gentle, it makes his breath hitch.

His eyes snap back up.

Bakugou’s still staring at him. But this time, his expression is different.

Less detached. Less defensive.

And in its place is something that looks far too close to what Izuku feels. A reflection of the same pain, the same exhaustion.

Bakugou’s fingers curl around Izuku’s, not forceful, not demanding — just enough to pry them loose from where they’re still fisted in his shirt.

Like he’s saying, let go. Like he’s offering Izuku a way out of this moment before it takes them both under.

And then, softly — so softly it makes Izuku’s heart lurch.

"I know." A breath, a pause. "Fuck…I know."

Izuku feels it before it happens. The way his body suddenly feels too heavy, like the weight of everything is finally catching up to him. The way his breath comes in rapid, uneven bursts, like he’s been running for miles.

The way his fingers twitch where they’re still curled in Bakugou’s shirt — but this time, it’s not to push him away. 

It’s to hold on.

"I—" His voice catches, breaks, falls apart. And when he tries again, it shatters completely. His knees give out. Just like that. The tension that’s been holding him together for days — snaps. 

His body folds, crumbling under the weight of everything. And Bakugou moves before Izuku even hits the ground.

Catches him. Goes down with him.

His knee knocks against the concrete, his arm comes around Izuku’s back before he can crumple completely. And Izuku doesn’t have the energy to fight him. Doesn’t have the strength to shove him away, to put distance between them, to keep pretending that he can hold all of this on his own. So he clings instead. Hands fisting into the back of Bakugou’s shirt, gripping tight like he might disappear if he lets go.

His face presses into the warmth of Bakugou’s chest, into the scent of salt and sunscreen and something too familiar. He’s shaking so badly now, his muscles taut and frayed.

And then, in a voice so small, so wrecked, it barely exists between them. "I can’t lose her."

The words barely make it out, breathless and fragile, slipping through the cracks of everything breaking inside him. 

Bakugou goes completely still.

But only for a second.

Then, without hesitation, without thought, he guides them both down to the cold concrete floor, pulling Izuku in tighter, arms wrapping around him in a way that feels more like holding than restraining.

Fingers brush softly over Izuku’s back, tracing calming patterns, slow, steady.

Like he’s saying, I hear you.

Like he’s saying, I’ve got you.

Like he’s saying, I won’t let you fall alone.

And for once — Izuku doesn’t feel the urge to tell him to spare him those words because they're nothing but hollow. Doesn’t feel the need to push, to bite, to shove him away before he gets too close.

No. He lets him. Lets him comfort him, lets him hold him, lets himself sink into the warmth of it.

Until the salty taste coats his lips. Until the shaking slows. Until he lets himself be pulled under.

Chapter Text

Chapter 5: Wrong Answer

“And I hear your ship is coming in

Your tears a sea for me to swim

And I hear a storm is coming in

My dear, is it all we’ve ever been?”

Anchor — Novo Amor

This isn’t how he wanted it.

But fuck if it isn’t everything he’s ever wanted. Izuku in his arms.

Pressed close, holding onto him, letting him be the thing keeping him together.

Letting Bakugou soothe him, rock him, run steady fingers over the sharp line of his spine, like maybe if he keeps doing it, he can smooth out the parts of Izuku that are fraying. 

Like maybe if he just holds tight enough, Izuku won’t break apart.

But this isn’t his. This moment — this fucking heartbreaking, gut-wrenching moment — doesn’t belong to him.

Because it’s not about them. Not about Izuku looking at him like he used to, not about touching him because he wants to.

It’s about fear. About the prospect of losing someone you love and being powerless to stop it. About Izuku falling apart, and Bakugou just being the only thing in the goddamn garage to catch him. And that — that’s what fucking kills him.

Because he’ll take it. Of course, he’ll take it. He’d let Izuku rip him to pieces if it meant getting to be close again. If it meant even a fraction of what he used to have.

But not like this.

Not because Izuku has nowhere else to put his pain. Not because it’s the only option left. Not because his mother’s sick and he has no one else here to talk to, to lean on, to fucking cry his eyeballs out to. Bakugou doesn’t want to be the last resort. Doesn’t want to be just the body that happened to be in the way when Izuku finally collapsed.

He wants to be something real. Wants to be the sun that chases away the clouds of Izuku’s internal storm. Wants to be more than this.

His jaw clenches, his grip instinctively tightening, just for a second. Izuku’s breath stutters against his collarbone, the heat of it damp against Bakugou’s skin. He’s shaking, fists curled into the fabric of Bakugou’s shirt, and fuck — his shoulder is soaked, damp from the tears that won’t stop falling. Bakugou feels every goddamn one of them.

A choked, shaky inhale.

And Bakugou softens again, loosens his grip, keeps rubbing his back in slow, steady motions. Because that’s all he can fucking do.

If he can’t fix this, if he can’t make it better — then at the very least, he can hold him through it. Let Izuku use him as much as he wants, no matter how, no matter what.

Bakugou would never exploit the moment — but he wouldn’t blink at letting Izuku use him. 

In any way. 

In any fucking way he needs.

In a heartbeat.

Knowing that afterward, Izuku will push him away again. Knowing that this isn’t the start of something. It’s just a moment. And Bakugou — he’ll take it anyway.

He swallows hard at that realization, staring up at the dim light of the garage, at the ceiling he used to see as a kid, back when things were different.

Back when he’d come over for dinner, when they’d end up in this very garage waxing their boards together, laughing, talking shit, throwing punches that didn’t hurt. Back when they’d hit the waves afterward, racing each other into the surf, pushing, pulling, crashing into each other with nothing but salt and sunlight between them.

Now?

Now, he’s holding the strongest person he’s ever known while he shakes in his arms, crying like the world is slipping through his fingers, and there’s not a goddamn thing Bakugou can do to stop it.

He just keeps holding him. Keeps tracing those soft, steady patterns along his back, slow and deliberate, like he’s trying to ground him.

At some point, his hand drifts, fingers grazing the curve of Izuku’s neck.

And fuck — his skin is surprisingly soft. Soft in a way that makes Bakugou’s breath hitch, makes something in his chest go tight, go unbearably fucking fragile. Before he can think better of it, his fingers thread into Izuku’s curls, working through the tangles, massaging gently against his scalp.

And it’s so instinctual, so natural, that Bakugou doesn’t even realize he’s doing it at first. Doesn’t even realize he’s humming, a low, quiet sound, something close to a lullaby that doesn’t have words. 

Just something to fill the silence, something to keep Izuku from drowning in it.

And it goes on like that.

For seconds, minutes — he doesn’t know. Doesn’t care.

Time feels irrelevant when Izuku is still pressed against him, breath shaky, body curled into him like he belongs there.

The only reason he even notices the time passing is when the cold of the concrete floor really starts seeping into his skin, biting at his bare legs, making goosebumps rise along his calves. But he shakes it off.

There’s no space for it. Not when Izuku’s fingers are still curled into Bakugou’s shirt, holding tight like he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it. Not when the weight of him feels like something familiar, something Bakugou knows he’s never going to have again after this moment slips through his fingers.

And then — just like Izuku can read his mind, like he can feel the way Bakugou doesn’t want this to end — Izuku’s fingers start to loosen.

Slowly. Painfully. Like Bakugou is getting ripped apart, piece by piece, losing parts of himself he didn’t even realize he needed to feel whole.

Izuku’s breath evens out, still unsteady, but no longer ragged. His hands uncurl, sliding away from Bakugou’s back, from his grip on his shirt, like he’s suddenly remembered where they are, what they’re doing, who they are. And then, with a sharp inhale, Izuku pulls away.

Not all at once.

Not like before, when he tore himself free like the touch of Bakugou’s hands burned him. This time, it’s slower. More careful.  Like he’s shaking off a dream, waking up to reality again.

Bakugou lets him go.

Lets him pull back, lets the space between them settle like something inevitable. Like a wave that’s finally receding, dragging warmth and weight and something dangerously close to comfort back into the tide.

Izuku’s hands drop to his sides, empty, twitching slightly like his mind hasn’t caught up to what his body just did. 

They’re still sitting close. Knees touching, barely, like breaking contact without really losing it entirely.

Bakugou swallows past the dryness in his throat, past the tension curling in his chest, when Izuku finally looks up at him.

Strands of messy curls fall into his face, wild and damp from sweat, from tears, and Bakugou has the stupidest, most reckless urge to reach out and push them away.

To feel the softness between his fingers. To see him clearly. But he doesn’t.

Just clenches his hands into fists, shoving them against his knees, grounding himself in the cold concrete beneath them.

Izuku’s eyes are still red-rimmed, still glassy, still holding too much. The thick lashes are wet, darkened by the tears that had spilled freely moments ago.

But the sharpness — the blade he’s been wielding against Bakugou since the second they saw each other again — isn’t as lethal now.

Not gone. Just…duller.

Izuku swallows, sniffs hard, drags a hand across his face like he can scrub away the evidence of all of it. As if he can erase what just happened if he doesn’t acknowledge it.

"What did I—" His voice is hoarse, raw from everything, and he has to clear his throat. "I didn’t mean to…"

Yeah.

Bakugou neither.

His original plan? Just drop off the goddamn surfboard and leave.

That’s it. That’s all.

Just deliver the board sitting in the back of his truck, the one he’s had stocked in his shop for way too fucking long. The one he should have sold, should have let go of, should have forgotten about.

But he didn’t.

Because it wasn’t just some board. Never was. It was white, with forest green elements — just like Izuku’s old one.

But not quite the same. 

Different. New. Made from scratch.

Made by Bakugou’s own hands.

A process that took a whole fucking year to finish. A board that was never going to see the light of day in his shop.

That was never meant for anyone else. That was never just some board.

Because it was always going to be his board. 

Izuku’s.

Because some part of Bakugou — some stupid, reckless, fucking pathetic part of him — still held on to something called hope. Through all these years. 

And now, that same hope flares again. Because Izuku’s eyes flicker — just barely — toward his lips. The shift is subtle, almost imperceptible, but Bakugou notices. Of course, he does. He’s always noticed the way Izuku moves, the way he looks, the way he feels. 

His pulse kicks, intense and insistent, dragging him straight back to every time they’ve kissed. Every time it ended in disaster. Every time it ended with Izuku slipping through his fingers like saltwater through cupped hands.

Bakugou rolls his tongue in his mouth, pressing the cool metal of his barbell piercing against the roof of it, biting down just enough to sting — to ground himself, to keep him from doing something fucking stupid. Like kissing him again.

Fortunately — or maybe unfortunately — Izuku doesn’t give him the chance. He pushes to his feet, too fast, too sudden, pacing the garage like a chained tiger. His hands lock behind his head, shoulders tense, movements restless as he tries to steer the conversation somewhere — anywhere — else.

“What the hell are you doing here, Bakugou?”

The bite in his voice is still there, but it’s different this time. Not as cutting. Not aimed to wound, just edged enough to remind Bakugou that whatever just happened between them doesn’t mean a goddamn thing.

Why the fuck does Bakugou’s mouth always lock up at moments like this?

He’s the most vocal person on the damn planet — loud, unfiltered, never at a loss for words. But with Izuku, his mind just spirals, tongue turning to lead in his mouth, every possible response slipping through his fingers before he can grab onto it.

Izuku stops pacing. Turns to face him. “What are you doing here?”

Bakugou forces himself to answer, jaw tight. “Your mom told mine your board needed a touch-up.”

Izuku exhales, something unreadable flickering across his face before he huffs out a quiet, resigned “Of course she did.“ 

Bakugou pushes himself up, hands bracing against his thighs, before dusting off his pants with slow, deliberate pats — like he’s giving himself a second to get his shit together.

"And then you thought coming here to fix my board might be a good idea?" Izuku says it as if it’s the dumbest, most self-destructive decision Bakugou could’ve possibly made. Like showing up here, in this garage, after everything, is practically suicide.

A tiny bit of Bakugou’s usual cocky self slips through the cracks as he answers, voice steady now. "Actually, I thought bringing you a new one was a good idea." He jerks his chin toward the garage door. "It’s in my truck."

Izuku’s jaw tightens. “I don’t need your help.”

"It’s not help, it’s just a board." Bakugou shrugs, brushing it off like it’s nothing, like this isn’t some grand fucking gesture. Because if Izuku knows that Bakugou built that board for him, shaped it with his own hands, made it his in every way that mattered, he’d never take it. 

"It was just lying around in my stock anyway." He says it easy, casual, like it’s no big deal. 

Izuku cocks a brow, and Bakugou already knows — whatever’s about to come out of his mouth is going to be fucking sassy. 

"So you're giving me your insufficient leftovers? That’s what you’re trying to tell me, Bakugou?"

It’s the first time Bakugou sees the slightest trace of a reluctant smirk tug at Izuku’s mouth. Or at least, one directed at him. He’d seen him smiling at Kirishima earlier — not that he’s going to mention that shit.

Instead of arguing, Bakugou turns, already walking toward the door, ready to hand Izuku the board and pretend the last minutes never happened. Because clearly, that’s what Izuku wants — to shove this whole breakdown into a box, bury it, never speak of it again.

"I don’t freaking need it," Izuku emphasizes as he follows him outside. 

Bakugou pops open the truck bed, reaching for the board before tossing a glance over his shoulder. "Too bad I’m giving it to you anyway."

"I’m not taking it." Izuku says it firm, but his voice falters for just a second when he actually looks at the board Bakugou’s heaving out of his truck. His breath stutters, caught between realization and something dangerously close to recognition.

Because it’s his. Not literally, but — fuck, it may as well be. The familiar curve of it, the colors, the balance between structure and movement — it’s too similar to be a coincidence.

Bakugou doesn’t comment on it.

“Well, I’m not driving it all the fucking way back.”

"I’m not going to use it."

"Suit yourself." Bakugou strides past him, places it inside the garage, leaning it against one of the empty walls like it belongs there. 

"I’m selling it, Bakugou. I mean it."

God, it fucking stings. Sharp and immediate, like an open palm to the face. But he doesn’t let it show.

"Do what you want with it," he mutters, already walking back to his truck, movements deliberate, steady, like he doesn’t feel the rejection sitting like a fist in his chest. He slams the truck bed shut, his own orange board still resting inside, gleaming in the fading light. 

Why the hell did he even load it in?

Okay — he knows why. But it wasn’t like he planned anything. It was instinct, a stupid reflex, some buried hope that had no fucking place here. 

Like Izuku would take one look at the damn board and magically forget everything. Like he’d suddenly decide, yeah, let’s ride some waves together — as if they haven’t spent years tearing each other apart, like the past didn’t still sit between them like a shipwreck rusting on the ocean floor. 

God. He’s so fucking pathetic for even letting that thought cross his mind. Even deeper in the back of his head, where he refuses to acknowledge it.

"Sell it, let it collect dust — you can even burn it if you really want," he tells him while climbing into the driver's seat. The words leave him flat, indifferent. But they’re a lie.

Because if Izuku does burn it — if he torches every piece of it just to watch the flames eat it whole — Bakugou isn’t sure if the fire would burn worse in Izuku’s hands or inside his own fucking chest.

The door doesn’t shut.

A quick hand stops it, palm pressed firm against the metal.

Izuku stands there, gaze heavy, expression unreadable. Those damn eyes always manage to make his breath get caught for a second, and his heart does a stupid stutter, like it’s reviving itself just through the intensity of Izuku’s green depths. 

His fingers curl against the door frame, knuckles taut, shoulders tense like he’s been holding something in for too long and he’s finally letting it crack.

"Why, Bakugou?" His voice is quiet but cuts through the air like a blade. "Just give me one reason."

Bakugou’s grip tightens on the steering wheel. Does he have one?

He could say a lot of things. He could tell Izuku it’s guilt, that it’s regret, that it’s years of looking at himself and hating what he sees. He could tell him that every time he closed his eyes, all he saw was the way Izuku looked at him before — before he ruined him, before he turned that admiration, that trust, into something unrecognizable.

But that wouldn’t be enough.

And it’s fucking pathetic that he can think of so many right now.

"Because you left, and you took the whole fucking sky with you."

"Because I can live without you. I already did. And it was the worst fucking thing I’ve ever done."

"Because every time I hear the tide pull back, I still expect you to be there. And you never fucking are."

"Because I should’ve seen you sooner."

But he doesn’t say any of that. Instead, he exhales sharply, jaw locking as he stares out at nothing. "I can’t give you one."

Izuku’s silence is a wound splitting open.

For a second, Bakugou thinks that’s it — that Izuku will just walk away, that this will be another thing left unsaid, another fucking mess neither of them will ever clean up.

But then—

"Wrong answer, Bakugou." The words hit harder than the door when Izuku slams it shut, the force rattling through the whole damn car, through Bakugou’s ribs, through every stupid fucking part of him that still wants. "Wrong. Fucking. Answer." 

And then he turns, walking back toward the house without looking back.

Leaving Bakugou sitting in his truck, gripping the wheel like if he holds on tight enough, maybe he won’t feel like he’s losing him all over again without ever actually having him. 

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

Bakugou’s toes grip the rough surface of the starting block, heels slightly lifted, every muscle coiled and ready to explode the second Monoma makes contact with the wall. His goggles are snug against his face, cap pulled low, the sharp scent of chlorine thick in his nose as he narrows his eyes down the lane.

Monoma is already halfway back, arms slicing through the water in powerful strokes, legs flutter-kicking beneath the surface in a steady rhythm.

Come on, fucking hurry up.

Perfect timing is everything in a freestyle relay. The second Monoma’s fingertips slap the tiles, Bakugou has to launch himself forward — too early, and they’ll get DQ’d, too late, and he’ll lose precious seconds.

Even if this is just PE, just some half-assed lesson that barely counts for anything, there is no fucking reason to treat it any differently than a real competition. There shouldn’t be a reason not to give a thousand percent.

But there’s one.

One reason that stops his focus from locking solely on the water in front of him. One reason that makes his gaze falter for just a split second — to catch sight of Deku, crouched on the starting block beside him, mirroring his stance.

Bakugou can feel him.

Before he even sees him. Before his brain even registers the messy curls half-tucked under his cap or the way his muscles coil in quiet anticipation, Bakugou knows he’s there.

Because he always fucking knows.

It’s like some built-in, goddamn sixth sense, some unavoidable pull that tells him exactly when the nerd is close, even before his eyes land on him — before the sound of his breath, before the way his fingers twitch in place, like he’s eager to hit the water.

And it pisses Bakugou off.

Has been pissing him off for years.

Because it doesn’t matter if he’s across the room, across the damn school — Bakugou always feels him first. Always gets this stupid, irritating, instinctual awareness before he even looks. 

And right now — right fucking now — it makes his pulse kick just a little harder.

Not because of the race. Not because of the water.

But because Deku’s beside him.

Bakugou doesn’t register it. Doesn’t hear the sharp exhale from Monoma as he surges forward against the wall.

Because his eyes are locked onto Deku.

Right beside him, at the very edge of his vision, he moves.

And for some fucking reason, Bakugou is watching him instead of focusing on his own start.

Shit.

The way his thighs tense, the way his fingers twitch before his hands leave the block, the split-second flick of his eyes toward the water just before he leaps.

It’s seamless.

The nerd’s not a swimmer. Not really. But surfing demands a certain mastery over the water — enough skill, enough instinct, enough something that makes him dangerous. Makes him a threat.

And right now, Bakugou is watching that threat unfold in real time.

Deku explodes forward, cutting through the air in a near-perfect streamline, the muscles in his back flexing as he curves into the dive with an ease that shouldn’t piss Bakugou off as much as it does.

Because it looks effortless. Because it is effortless.

Because Bakugou should be right there with him, should already be in motion, should be pushing off the second Monoma’s fingers smacked the tiles.

But he’s not.

He’s fucking staring.

And it costs him.

"BAKUGOU, GO! WHAT THE FUCK—"

Monoma’s yell rips through the natatorium, slicing through the slap of water, through the muffled roar of voices bouncing off the walls, through everything as Bakugou snaps back to reality.

His body reacts a half-second too late, legs pushing off the block in a powerful drive — but the damage is already fucking done.

Deku is ahead.

Not by much — but enough. Enough to put distance between them. Enough to make Bakugou’s stomach twist in frustration, rage, and fucking admiration. 

He hits the water hard, chest tight with the force of his own mistake, and fucking hell — he is going to make up for it.

He has to.

Because losing to Deku?

Not. An. Option.

Bakugou powers through the water, muscles burning as he drives forward, each stroke sharper, more calculated. He catches glimpses of Deku out of his periphery — just a flash of movement, the stretch of his arms, the churn of whitewater in his wake.

And he feels it.

The distance shrinking.

Stroke by stroke, kick by kick — he’s gaining.

He doesn’t give a single fuck about the other teams anymore. They don’t matter. Not to him.

Because this race isn’t about them.

It’s him and Deku.

Bakugou feels it — the water slicing around him, the powerful pull of his arms, his body screaming for more speed, more power, more fucking everything. Chlorine stings his lungs, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t feel the burn in his muscles, doesn’t register anything except the absolute fucking refusal to let Deku win.

But he’s already flipping.

By the time Bakugou reaches the wall, Deku’s body is already tucking tight, legs snapping against the tiles, pushing off with that natural fucking ease that makes him look like a goddamn pro.

Even though he isn’t.

He’s not even on the swim team.

He doesn’t train for this. Doesn’t spend hours perfecting his turns, his strokes, his form. He’s just — fast. Just good, like the water is as much a part of him as the fucking air he breathes.

He slams into his own flip turn a second later, kicks hard, streamlining into his breakout with everything he has — arms cutting, legs snapping, body burning with the need to close the gap.

But Deku is still ahead.

Not by much. One maybe two bodylengths.

It doesn’t sound like a lot.

But it feels like an entire fucking ocean between them.

He kicks harder, strokes stronger, fingers stretching for every possible inch. The tiled wall is coming up fast, and if he just — if he pushes a little more, if he digs in — he’ll take it.

He’ll win.

Almost there.

He’s almost there.

The final stretch.

Every muscle in his body is screaming, every ounce of power surging into his last few strokes, fingertips reaching — but then.

Slap.

Deku’s fingers hit the wall.

And less than a second later—

Bakugou’s hand smacks into the tiles.

So fucking close. Stupidly close. Close enough that if he hadn’t lost focus — if he hadn’t let himself slip, hadn’t let Deku get in his fucking head — he would’ve won without even trying.

His head breaks the surface, and he rips his goggles off immediately, chest heaving, frustration curling in his gut like wildfire.

His hand slams into the water, sending a sharp splash over the lane line, boiling over with the kind of rage that’s so familiar when it comes to him.

No fucking way.

He turns, glaring, waiting for the teacher’s signal — waiting for confirmation that this was some kind of mistake, that there’s no fucking way.

But then the call comes in.

For Deku’s team.

Bakugou curses, the words ripping out of him before he can stop them. “Fuck this shit!”

Groans rise from his teammates, a few of them throwing their hands up in frustration. Kirishima tosses his head back with an exaggerated sigh, while Monoma, the absolute asshole, takes the opportunity to dip his foot in the water, sending a splash directly at Bakugou with a smug, “How could you mess up the timing, you idiot?” 

Bakugou doesn’t even dignify him with a real response — just flips him off, brows pinching together in pure irritation. “Fuck you.”

Meanwhile, Deku is actually getting positive attention for once.

As he hauls himself out of the water, a handful of his teammates crowd around him — some patting his back, others mumbling words of praise, and even Ochako gives him a grin, nudging his shoulder. “That was so cool, Izuku.”

And the stupid nerd looks uncomfortable as fuck.

Like he doesn’t know what to do with the attention. Like he’d rather sink back into the water than stand there and take it.

Because normally? No one really acknowledges him unless they have to. Normally, he stays invisible.

Or at least, he tries to.

But Bakugou doesn’t let him.

Never has. Probably never will.

And this right here? This reaction — this awkward, fidgeting, hating every second of it reaction?

Yeah, that’s definitely Bakugou’s doing.

A direct fucking result of years spent making sure the nerd never had the option of blending into the background. Never had the chance to go unnoticed. Never got to exist quietly, without Bakugou breathing down his neck.

He probably should feel indifferent about it. Maybe even good.

He’s the one who made Deku’s life miserable, right? He’s the one who’s kept him under his thumb, the one who made sure no one ever forgot the pecking order, the one who should be proud of this exact moment.

But he’s not.

Not really.

Scowling, Bakugou hauls himself out of the pool, water dripping off him as he stomps toward the bench, yanking a towel from the pile. He scrubs himself down aggressively, dragging the fabric over his face and shoulders before throwing it around his neck.

He can’t stick around.

Can’t watch Deku stand there, stiff and awkward, taking praise like it’s something foreign — like it’s something he doesn’t deserve.

And that’s fucking ridiculous, isn’t it?

Because this is exactly what Bakugou wants.

This whole thing — Deku’s discomfort, the way people look at him now, the way he seems so out of place in his own fucking skin — it’s Bakugou’s fault.

It’s his doing.

And yet, standing here, watching it unfold? It makes something twist inside him. Something sharp. Something that pisses him off.

So he does something he rarely does. 

He flees. 

Flees into the locker room, yanking off his swim cap the second he’s through the door, the damp material snapping as he tosses it onto the bench by his stuff. His goggles follow, flung carelessly aside, and then his fingers hook into the waistband of his trunks, shoving them down his legs in one sharp motion.

He grabs a fresh towel, wraps it low around his waist, and heads straight for the showers.

The water scalds the second it hits his skin, but he doesn’t flinch.

Doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe — just plants his palms against the cool tile, head bowed, eyes squeezed shut as the droplets slide down his face, washing away the chlorine, the sweat, the tension coiling under his skin like a live wire.

But it doesn’t wash away this.

Doesn’t strip him clean of whatever the fuck is sitting heavy in his chest, tangled in knots too tight to unravel.

It lingers.

Because no amount of water will ever rinse away the shit he doesn’t want to face.

He feels weird today.

It happens sometimes — this slow, creeping thing that sinks its claws into his chest and refuses to let go. Usually, he’s more in control. Usually, he buries it before it can dig too deep.

But today is a bad day.

One where the phantom press of Deku’s lips is still burned into his skin. One where the thought of touching him doesn’t feel like something he should shove down, but something his body aches to do.

And yeah, this fucking urge, this loss of control — this is what cost him today.

This is why he fucked up. Why he lost focus. Why he let Deku get in his goddamn head.

Because the second he let his mind slip, the second he looked instead of acted, the second he let himself get pulled into that stupid gravitational chaos — Deku won.

And that? That’s the evidence he needs. Proof that Deku is just like his fuck-up of a father. Just another thing that exists to tear Bakugou’s world apart.

The thought twists inside him, coiling hot in his stomach. He hates that Deku reminds him of his father — not in the way he moves or speaks, not even in the way he is, but in what he represents.

Something Bakugou never learned how to be.

Or rather — something his father never showed him how to be.

Honest.

Be confident in your own skin.

Be who you are, no matter what.

Bakugou shouldn’t think about it. Not the memories, not the years of watching his mother wear a hardened mask, not the nights of overhearing the quiet, cut-off sobs through the walls. He doesn’t think about the cold, detached apologies, the reasons behind them, the way he learned too young that love could be a fucking lie.

That you could bury something so deep it rots inside you before you ever dig it up again.

He moves through the motions without thinking.

Doesn’t register lathering his body in soap, doesn’t register rinsing it all off. He just functions. Mechanically.

He doesn’t even clock the others filtering into the showers, occupying the rest of the spots. Doesn’t react when Kirishima asks if he’s good. Doesn’t glare when Monoma, the absolute dipshit, decides now is a great time to push his luck.

He just wraps his towel around his waist again and walks the fuck out.

The locker room looks empty at first glance when he steps in, beads of water still dripping down his back as he drops his towel and reaches for his boxer briefs.

But then — a sharp intake of breath, bouncing off the tiled walls like a basketball.

Bakugou hears it. But more than that — he feels it. Feels it run down his spine, prickling at his skin, just like the unmistakable weight of green fucking eyes trailing over him. Leaving heat in their wake. A heat he can’t fucking ignore. His fingers twitch as he yanks his briefs up over his hips, body coiled so tight it might snap.

Because he already knows. Knows exactly what he’s about to see when he turns around.

And he turns anyway.

And just as expected. Deku is standing there, staring.

His swim cap is off, damp curls clinging to his forehead, goggles hanging loosely from his fingers. His chest still glistens from the water, his skin flushed from exertion, his breaths just a little too sharp.

And his eyes? His fucking eyes — they drag over Bakugou, slow and unintentional, like he knows he shouldn’t be looking but can’t stop.

From his face — down his throat — along his chest, over his abs. And just before they settle lower, before they really cross the line, Deku jerks his gaze away, swallowing hard.

But it’s too fucking late. Bakugou felt it.

Felt the weight of that gaze like a scorching brand on his skin, making his entire body feel too hot, too dizzy, too fucking aware. He wants to dive back into the water to douse that heat, that fire spreading through his nerve system. Drown himself in it, or maybe drown Deku in it to make it go away. 

Because he hates Deku for making him feel this way. 

“What the fuck are you looking at, freak?!”

His voice comes out sharp, instinctual, biting — because what else is he supposed to do?

He takes a step forward. Then another. Doesn’t bother to think about how fucking weird this situation is. Doesn’t care if someone walks in.

Because right now, all he sees is Deku, blushing, mouth slightly parted, his whole body locked up like a cornered animal.

“I—” he stammers, voice cracking, a deep red creeping up his neck, dusting over his freckled cheeks.

Bakugou’s body moves before his mind catches up, closing the space between them in an instant. His hand shoots out, fingers wrapping tight around Deku’s throat, pushing him back — slamming him against the cold metal lockers with a hollow, ringing clang.

"Give me one fucking reason that made you think you can look at me like that, Deku?!"

The air punches out of Deku’s lungs, his lips parting in a sharp, breathless gasp.

His pupils blow wide, swallowing up the green of his irises, dark and stunned and caught —  his hands fly up on instinct, fingers wrapping around Bakugou’s wrist — but he doesn’t push him away.

Doesn’t fight.

Doesn’t run.

And they both don’t care — not about the fact that Bakugou is still fucking half-naked, not about how Deku’s bare chest heaves against him, not about the sheer insanity of this moment.

Because right now?

Right now, the only thing that exists is the heat between them, the sharp, unsteady breath spilling from Deku’s lips, the way his throat bobs under Bakugou’s grip.

"Are you deaf?!" Bakugou snarls, grip tightening.

"I—I don’t. I didn’t—"

"Wrong answer, Deku." He slams him back again, the lockers rattling, Deku’s breath shuddering. "Wrong fucking answer."

They’re both panting now.

Why he is, Bakugou has no fucking clue. Maybe the adrenaline. Maybe because the air between them is too thick, too heavy, pressing against his ribs like something alive.

Or maybe — maybe — it’s because he’s hyper aware of everything.

The warmth of Deku’s skin beneath his fingertips. The way his pulse flutters under Bakugou’s grip. The deep, shaky swallows that move through his throat, right against where Bakugou’s fingers are still wrapped around it.

Neither of them speaks.

They just stare.

And Bakugou’s eyes roam — over the flushed skin of the guy he pretends to hate, over the rapid rise and fall of his chest, over the parting of his lips as he exhales sharp and shallow.

His own breath shudders out of him, and he does the only thing he can think to do. He shuts his eyes. Squeezes them tight, like he can trick his own fucking body, like he can will himself into believing this is something else, something harmless.

I hate him. I hate him. I hate him.

But the thing rotting in his chest — the thing twisting inside him, coiling up tighter and tighter — he knows the truth.

Knows that “him” isn’t Deku.

It’s not even really his father.

Maybe partially. Maybe just enough to sink into his bones, to keep his fists clenched, to keep him fighting something he doesn’t even fucking understand.

But mostly? Mostly, it’s himself.

And then — Deku’s fingers move.

Not to shove him away. Not to push him off. But to circle his wrist, slow and deliberate. A soft, soothing motion.

Like he’s not scared of Bakugou. Like he’s not fucking angry, even though he should be. But like he wants to ease his inner conflict. 

And Bakugou feels it.

Feels the sensation rip through his body like a live wire, lighting up his insides like a fucking firework, heat exploding through every nerve — and his dick twitches in his fucking briefs.

Oh, fuck no.

That’s his motherfucking signal. Retreat. Right fucking now.

His hand drops like he’s been burned, fingers curling into a fist at his side as he gulps down something too thick in his throat.

Deku stares at him, still wide-eyed, still breathing too hard, and Bakugou can’t — can’t fucking do this.

So he moves.

Snatches up his clothes, shoves his shit into his bag, and stumbles out of the locker room like the entire goddamn building is on fire.

Chapter Text

Chapter 6: Home Is A Rip Current

“And are you trying to live, like everything is a lesson to learn? Can you ever forgive (yourself)? Do you wish that you loved me?”

DYWTYLM — Sleep Token

Izuku presses his phone between his shoulder and ear, rubbing a hand down his face as he stares at his laptop screen — untouched for the last two hours.

He should be working.

Should be sorting through emails, finalizing construction plans, responding to project updates. Should be busy. Productive. Doing literally anything other than sitting here, restless, his focus flickering between the screen and the garage door like some kind of magnet is pulling at him.

Behind that door, untouched for two days, sits the board.

The one Bakugou gave him.

Izuku hasn’t touched it. Hasn’t looked at it. But somehow, he still feels it. Like it’s staring at him through the fucking door, like it’s waiting for something — like it knows.

And the worst part? It makes him uneasy as hell.

So when his mother called, pulling him out of the downward spiral of not thinking about it, it was almost a relief.

Almost.

At least until he realized this wasn’t just a check-in.

"Izuku?"

He blinks, shaking his head to clear it. "I’m sorry, I… drifted off. What were you saying?"

She still sounds weak, her voice carrying that fragile edge that makes something tighten in his chest — but he’s grateful to hear it, especially since he can’t visit her today.

He feels bad about that. But life doesn’t wait for you forever. The world keeps spinning. It doesn’t care if you’re not in the headspace to deal with it. 

"I asked if you could stand in for me for the annual festival preparations."

Actually, no.

No time. No motivation. No urge to see too many familiar faces. There are at least ten arguments for a negative answer — easy, logical, reasonable arguments.

But because his name is Izuku Midoriya, and he can’t deny his mother anything, he makes the stupid mistake of asking: "What exactly would you need me to do?"

There’s a pause — just a second, just long enough for Izuku to realize he’s already lost this battle. 

It’s not like he doesn’t know his mom helps organize the festival every year. She’s mentioned it before, in passing, during their phone calls — always excited, always a little too involved in the small-town politics of it all. But he never asked for details. Never wanted to. Because talking about it meant thinking about Seabright Bay. And he’s spent years avoiding that.

"It’s just handling registration for the surf contest," his mother says, light but purposeful, like she already knows he won’t say no. "Coordinating heats, making sure the contestants know when and where they need to be, helping with community outreach. It’s the same thing I do every year."

Izuku exhales sharply, leaning back in his chair. His bare foot taps restlessly against the barstool rung, his free hand drumming against the kitchen counter — nervous habits, ones he doesn’t bother trying to stop.

Because this conversation? It’s going nowhere good. Even though it’s not technically a hard job.

But still, it’s Seabright Bay’s annual festival. Which means nostalgia and small talk and too many people acting like they give a shit about catching up with him. It means seeing familiar faces, most of which he has no interest in dealing with.

And yet—

"I mean, Mitsuki will be there handling setup," his mom adds, like that’s supposed to help.

"Mrs. Bakugou?" Izuku echoes, stomach dropping in instant dread.

"Yes, you know she’s in charge of all the hands-on stuff — sponsorships, prizes, help setting up the equipment—"

Izuku already knows what’s coming next.

And he wants no fucking part of it.

"And Bakugou will be handling safety checks, the PA system, making sure the tents and heat boundaries are properly set up—" She mumbles that part, like speaking just a little softer, a little less clearly, might somehow make him miss the fact that she just — indirectly or directly — implied that he and Bakugou will have to work together.

Like he’s too stupid to catch onto what she’s doing. Like he’ll forget that this means standing in the same space as him again.

"No." He sits up straighter, grip tightening around his phone. "Why the fu—" He catches himself, forces the word back down before he earns another scolding. "Why is he involved in this?"

"Because he always is," she points out, like this is just obvious information. "He’s been helping for years, and he owns the surf shop, sweetie."

He’s straight up whining now. "Mom, please don’t come at me with logic when this is clearly an emotional matter."

That makes her giggle a little, and — damn it. Izuku wants to hear it again.

The sound fills him, makes his heart stretch bigger in his chest, warm and light and alive. But at the same time, it constricts, squeezing the life out of him. Because — how many times is he allowed to hear it? How many more calls will there be? How many more chances?

It’s said that the voice is the first thing people forget. And — shit. He doesn’t want to be put in that position. Never. But especially not so fucking soon.

And she sounds better today. Not as sick, not as exhausted. That’s a good sign. Right?

"So, are you saying ‘yes’?"

Izuku exhales, running a hand through his hair. "You know I can’t say ‘no’ to you."

And the second the words leave his mouth, he flinches internally — because it’s a straight-up lie. He has said no to her. For years.

Every time she asked him to visit. Every time she begged, even in that soft, patient way she does, never pressing too hard, but always hoping. He told her no so many times that it became second nature. Became the default answer.

"I—Mom, you know what I—"

"It’s alright, honey."

She cuts him off before he can start, before he can fumble through another half-assed apology that won’t fix a damn thing. And he can almost see her — softened features, tired but still warm, that gentle, knowing smile that always makes him feel like she’s holding more understanding in her heart than he fucking deserves.

Like she forgives him before he even asks for it. Like she doesn’t want him to feel the guilt that’s already settled too deep in his chest.

"I’ll do it," he says, as if the answer hasn’t already been given. As if he needs to hear himself say it to make it real.

He can hear her smile on the other end. "You’re gonna do great, sweetheart."

"Yeah… we’ll see about that."

They talk for a while after that — about what’s next in her treatment, about what Dr. Torino said concerning her last results, about how she’s responding well to chemo for now. It’s good news. It is. But it’s not a guarantee. Things can flip in an instant, can change from one day to the next. That’s the thing about cancer.

It’s as unpredictable as the sea.

So they steer toward lighter topics, or at least try to — his mom’s new favorite show, the characters she loves, the ones she hates and rants about in long-winded tangents that Izuku honestly enjoys more than the plot itself.

And then she asks about his projects.

"A high-class hotel in the city, huh?" she hums. "Fancy."

"More like a nightmare," Izuku mutters. "The client keeps changing their mind about every little thing — last week they wanted sleek, modern minimalism, and now they suddenly want something 'classic but with an edge' — whatever the hell that means."

She laughs, soft and warm, and for a few minutes, everything feels normal.

Like they’re just having a regular conversation, like she’s not sick, like he’s not drowning in shit he doesn’t want to deal with. 

And he clings to that feeling — lets himself settle into the rhythm of it, into the ease of just talking with her, of listening to her voice without that creeping fear clawing at the edges of his mind. 

But it doesn’t last.

Because even while he enjoys the shift in topic, that nagging feeling still lingers — sitting heavy in the back of his mind, just like the surfboard lying untouched in the garage. The ultimate reminder of the absolute, humiliating shitshow that took place there. 

The evidence of his weakness, his breakdown. Of collapsing in front of Bakugou Katsuki.

Izuku broke — let himself cry in his arms like some helpless, pathetic kid, clinging to him, soaking the fabric of his stupid button-up, letting him hold him.

And what fucks him up the most — what makes his skin burn, what makes his fingers curl tight against the counter — is the fact that it felt safe. Felt good. Like something he needed — something he didn’t want to need.

Bakugou’s touch. His hands.

The way he held him up instead of pushing him down.

Like safety. Like something solid and real.

And Bakugou had never represented that for a long time.

“Izuku…” His mother’s voice pulls him out of it, gentle but firm, and he realizes — this isn’t the first time she’s said his name. He probably spaced out again. “You’re very distant today.”

Izuku pushes all the pent up air out of his lungs in a long, heavy exhale, rubbing his fingers against the bridge of his nose. “I know. I’m sorry. I have a load of work piling up in front of my eyes — like, literally. My inbox is exploding…”

It’s not a lie. But it’s also not even half the truth.

Yeah, he has work to do. A shitload of it. But the reason those emails have piled up in the first place?

It’s because his most important person is slipping through his fingers.

And even though he tries to stay positive, tries to hold onto days like today — days where she doesn’t sound like leukemia, where she just sounds like his mom — he can’t stop the worst-case scenarios from eating him alive.

They creep in, shadowing every conversation, haunting his daily life. They bring nightmares that won’t let him sleep and drain his energy before he even gets out of bed in the morning.

And on top of that?

He has to deal with it alone.

No one to talk to. No one to unload it onto.

Sure, he has friends where he lives, but they’re more like work colleagues — people he shares a few laughs with, but not the kind he can spill his guts to.

He had Rody.

Had.

Someone who would’ve gladly been there for him. Someone who wanted to be. But Izuku was always too afraid of opening up completely.

Something always stopped him.

And that something—

Wasn’t a thing.

It was a someone.

A certain person who never really left his mind. The very person he let himself break down in front of. The last person he thought he would ever want — would ever need — to make him feel less alone.

And yet, Bakugou did exactly that.

God, his mind is a freaking disaster zone, to say the least. 

“It’s okay, honey. I know you have a lot on your plate right now.”

The way her tone dips — just slightly, just enough — makes it clear what she’s really saying.

Words like “And I’m sorry I’m the reason for it.”

But she doesn’t say them out loud. And Izuku doesn’t let her.

Doesn’t let her carry that guilt, doesn’t let her drown in it — because if anyone should be carrying it, it should be him. His pile is already so fucking high — what’s a little more? What’s a few more bricks pressing into his chest, making it harder to breathe?

“I promise I’ll come visit tomorrow. Make sure you eat,” he orders, gently but firm, because she never does when he doesn’t remind her.

Hospital food is horrible — probably some universal rule at this point — but she still has to eat.

“Stop worrying, that’s my job, baby. I’m your mom.”

“I’m your son,” he counters, playfully. “I’m pretty sure worrying about my mother is part of my job requirements too.” He hears her chuckle — light, warm, something he wants to bottle up and keep forever — and his fingers curl tighter around the edge of the kitchen counter. "I love you, Mom."

"I love you, Izuku.”

And he lets it sit between them, pressing into his ribs, wrapping around his heart like a safety net.

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

Not even an hour after his mom and he had ended the call, Mr. Aizawa — the coordinator of most of the festival activities — had already called him. 

She really wasted no time handing over the reins, huh?

Not that he’s surprised. Mr. Aizawa isn’t just the guy in charge of the water events during the festival — he also owns the local Dive Shop and works as a diving instructor. A man of many talents and even less patience.

So Izuku listens as Aizawa rattles off the details — what needs to be done, what’s required, who to coordinate with. The whole painfully efficient rundown.

And of course, because the universe loves to fuck with him, Aizawa makes a point of mentioning, "It’d be more efficient if you clarify the remaining details with Mrs. Bakugou, since she’s been doing this for years with your mother."

Izuku clenches his jaw and rubs his palm over his face, stuffing the resigned sigh behind it. Avoiding Bakugou is becoming more and more difficult. 

"I’ll send you the details, along with the documents the contestants need to fill out when they register for the contest," Aizawa continues, voice as dry as ever. "I’m sure Mrs. Bakugou will help with the scheduling since that part’s a bit trickier…"

Then, after a short pause.  "Any questions?"

Well, yeah. Is it too late to say no?

But that’s not what comes out of his mouth.

He swallows, throat dry. "No, I don’t think so."

And that’s how he seals his fate. 

"Great. Thank you for helping out, Midoriya." Aizawa’s voice carries a rare trace of something genuine — less grumpy, less I-haven’t-slept-in-a-week and more actually grateful. "We don’t have a lot of volunteers to help manage this, so we’re grateful for anyone who offers a helping hand."

And just like that, Izuku feels like even more of an asshole for wanting to say no. Because it’s not like he doesn’t care about this town.

It’s just…

He spent so long trying to cut himself away from it. And now, piece by piece, it’s dragging him back in. 

After what felt like an eternity, the call finally ends, and Izuku exhales, like he can breathe again. At least for now.

He still has time to prepare himself to talk to Mrs. Bakugou. Which shouldn’t be a big deal. She’s not him.

No, only his mother, you moron, the pessimistic part of him shoots back, annoyingly loud in his head, right as he tries to look at the bright side for once.

He tips his head back, groaning, fingers rubbing over his face before—

Ping.

His laptop screen lights up, a soft notification reminding him of the still half-full inbox he needs to manage before he can even think about calling it a day. So Izuku does his best to lose himself in emails for the rest of the early afternoon.

But by the time the clock strikes four, his eyes feel like lead.

He exhales, slipping his glasses off and placing them on the counter before clocking out — shutting the laptop for good this time.

No more work today. He just can’t.

Rolling his head and shoulders, he feels it — the tension coiling inside him, so thick, so suffocating it’s almost unbearable.

It’s not funny anymore.

It’s not even about work. It’s about everything.

His mom. Being back. The festival. Bakugou.

And that stupid board.

His eyes drift back to the garage door.

He hasn’t moved from the damn kitchen since six in the morning. Hasn’t stepped outside, hasn’t let himself breathe in the expanse of the ocean waiting just beyond the house. And even though he could have — even though he could’ve easily taken his laptop to the back porch, and let the sound of waves drown out his thoughts. He didn’t. 

It’s like his body wouldn’t let him.

Like he needed to sit here, needed to let the weight of it press down on him, needed to let that board sit at the edge of his vision, gnawing at him, poking at his side like a reminder he refused to acknowledge.

A reminder he can’t ignore any longer.

He inhales through his nose, chest rising with the oxygen and the soft ocean breeze slipping in through the sliding door.

Should he?

He asks himself, but his body already decides for him. His bare feet move across the wooden floor, basketball shorts swaying against his thighs as he steps toward the garage.

A part of him wants to turn back. But he doesn’t.

Instead, his fingers wrap around the handle, twisting it open.

The moment the door swings, there it is. Still in the exact same spot Bakugou left it.

Waiting.

It just sits there — taunting him, testing him, staring him down like it knows he won’t walk away this time.

Izuku steps closer, eyes flicking between the old board and the one Bakugou gave him.

A gift? A grand gesture? A materialized apology, maybe?

He doesn’t know.

Bakugou confuses him to the point where he doesn’t know what to do with himself anymore.

Izuku said he’d sell it. Said he wouldn’t use it.

And yet — his body moves on autopilot.

Before he even registers it, he’s back inside, rummaging through his things, slipping into his swim trunks. 

He’s an outside spectator — watching himself, detached, as his fingers grip the board, hauling it into the back of his roofless Jeep and hopping behind the wheel. 

He’s still in mechanical mode when he hums along to the song “Coastline”, sunglasses perched on the bridge of his nose, the sun warm against his skin. It isn’t until he shifts the gear into park that he realizes — he knows this place.

His hands tighten around the steering wheel as his eyes flick to the bay stretched before him. 

Nestled between two massive rock formations, tucked away like a secret.

One of his favorites. 

Back when he was younger, when he still felt like he belonged to this town.

It’s more private than the other beaches, less crowded. The rocks shield most of the shoreline, casting deep shadows over the sand too early in the day for the people who prefer basking in the heat.

But Izuku never cared about that. Never wanted to lie on the sand, roasting under the sun. He was always in the water.

Because out in the ocean, the sun never really set.

Out there, it felt endless.

Izuku doesn’t know how long he sits in his car, parked in a lot dusted with sand carried up by the wind.

It feels long. Probably longer than it actually is.

But eventually, his fingers wrap around the key, pulling it from the ignition. He exhales, opens the door, and steps out into the salty, sun-drenched air.

Everything had felt fast back home — packing the board, getting dressed, tossing it into the Jeep like it wasn’t a big deal. But now.

Now everything feels like slow motion.

Throwing his towel over his shoulder. Perching his sunglasses up into his already wind-messed curls. Gripping the board and hauling it out of the back.

Even the walk stretches long.

The wooden boardwalk creaks beneath his feet, leading him down toward the sand. And when he finally steps off it — when his feet finally sink into the warmth of the beach — he feels it again.

That same creeping sensation in his chest.

Like the past is reaching for him. Like the ocean has been waiting for him.

His slides sink into the sand instantly, and he toes them off, scooping them up and carrying them the rest of the way. Past the open shoreline, past the sunbathers, past the families scattered under colorful umbrellas. To the section between the rocks.

Where it’s quieter. 

Where the ocean doesn’t just call to him — it pulls.

The wind brushes over his skin as he sets the board down onto the sand, placing his things beside it.

He slips off his sunglasses, then grips the fabric of his shirt at the collar, pulling it over his head in one fluid motion before tossing both onto the towel next to his slides.

The waves are high today — rideable.

That’s how he always used to put it. Back in the day, when the sight of the perfect swell would send a thrill down his spine, when he’d turn to Bakugou and say, Look at that. It’s rideable as hell.

Just for Bakugou to snort, arms crossed over his chest, before teasing, Your eyes get all big when you say that, like a kid on Christmas morning.

Izuku swallows, pushing the memory aside. Because he can’t think about that right now.

Not when he’s standing here, on the edge of something he hasn’t touched in years. Not when the ocean is right there, waiting.

Izuku’s chest expands with a deep inhale of salt air, letting it settle inside him, spreading deep, rushing through his veins until it feels like the ocean isn’t just before him — it’s inside him.

Like it never really left.

Like he never really left it.

He missed this.

He can’t deny that.

Can’t pretend that standing here, board in hand, doesn’t make something stir in his ribs — something he thought he buried. 

He clamps the board under his arm and strides toward the water.

And the second the first wave washes around his ankles, he gasps — not because it’s shockingly cold, though it is — but because it feels like…

Like coming home.

God, that sounds corny. But there’s no better way to describe it.

“I probably should’ve grabbed a wetsuit,” he mutters under his breath, wading deeper until the water reaches his hips. He knows he won’t be able to stay out long before his body cools down too much, but — fuck it.

He needs this.

Needs the waves to flood his mind, to wash everything clean — the exhaustion, the helplessness, the loneliness, the weight of everything pressing down on him.

Holy water takes on a whole new meaning now. Reverend Toshinori would probably disagree, but Izuku doesn’t care.

The ocean is his holy water.

And right now, he’s here to cleanse himself in it.

He moves with the water, muscles already remembering, instinct kicking in as he climbs onto the board.

And goddammit, it feels perfect. Smooth surface, freshly waxed, balanced under his fingers like it was made for him. And Izuku’s heart falters at the thought — at the fact — that Bakugou was the one who gave it to him.

Shaking that thought off instantly, he straps the board leash to his ankle, securing it with a firm tug before shifting into a prone position to paddle out.

Is it dangerous to just dive into it after years of not surfing?

Well, it’s definitely a bit unreasonable. 

His body remembers, but that doesn’t mean his stamina does. It doesn’t mean the ocean will go easy on him, just because he’s been gone.

Izuku paddles out, nonetheless, arms cutting through the water with steady strokes, feeling the resistance push back against him. It’s been years since he’s done this, but muscle memory is getting him forward, his body falling into rhythm with the ocean’s pulse.

He pushes further, past the inside break, keeping his chest light on the board, gaze flicking across the horizon. The waves are clean, the offshore wind sculpting the swell into smooth, well-formed peaks. He watches the lineup, tracking the sets rolling in — until one catches his eye.

A big one.

A Left.

It looms in the distance, building, darkening as it pulls from the deep.

Izuku shifts, turns his board toward shore, and starts paddling hard.

Something stupidly hopeful and nostalgic inside him expects — wants — to feel eyes on him.

Like before. 

Like Bakugou, watching him from the shore, arms crossed, eyes sharp, waiting to see if he’d pull it off.

But when he flicks a glance toward the beach. 

There’s nothing. Just the vacant stretch of sand, his abandoned stuff lying undisturbed where he left it.

No one watching. No one waiting.

Just him and the ocean.

He shoves it down, forces himself to focus.

Because he can feel it now.

The pull.

The water beneath him sucks back, draining away from the peak as the swell rises. The crest feathers, the offshore wind throwing mist into the sky.

It’s happening fast.

Now or never.

Izuku commits.

His heart races, adrenaline spiking as he matches the wave’s speed, feeling the powerful force of the ocean beneath him.

He times it perfectly, pushing up in one fluid motion, popping to his feet with the kind of instinct that feels ingrained in his body.

His stance locks in — feet steady, knees bent, weight centered.

The board catches.

And for a second — it’s perfect.

The drop is steep, but he carves into it, setting his rail, legs bending low to absorb the speed.

Then the wave starts to barrel.

The lip throws out, curling over him, forming the tube.

And that’s where he fucks up.

He hesitates. Just for a second.

His line isn’t deep enough. His weight shifts too far back.

And suddenly, he’s trapped.

The lip pitches over, and before he can adjust, the wave collapses on him.

He gets sucked over the falls.

For a moment, there’s nothing — just weightlessness, the world flipping as he gets tossed like a ragdoll. Then—

Impact.

The force slams into him, ripping him off his board, sending him deep.

Water churns around him, turbulent, relentless. He’s in the washing machine, tumbling, his body rag-dolling through the whitewater.

He holds his breath, waiting for the moment the wave releases him, but the turbulence won’t let up.

His leash tugs sharply, his board pulling in another direction, and fuck — the surface feels far.

His chest burns.

The pressure clamps down around him, the weight of the ocean pressing from all sides, flipping him end over end in the chaos of whitewater. He needs to relax, needs to wait it out — but shit, it’s been years since he’s had a wipeout like this, since he’s been caught in a wave’s hold with no easy way up.

He kicks out, tries to orient himself, but everything is moving — water dragging at him, pulling in every direction, his leash yanking him somewhere opposite of where he wants to go.

The current is holding him down. The surface still feels too far.

Panic flares in his ribs.

Don’t fight it. He knows this. He’s known it since he was a kid.

The ocean always wins.

So he forces his body to go limp, lets the turbulence thrash him without resistance, conserving what little oxygen he has left.

Seconds stretch too long.

His lungs scream, burning hotter, tighter. 

Something shifts. The weight of the water presses heavier, his limbs slow, the burn fades and he feels himself drifting.

Like resignation. Like surrender.

Too much water already in his lungs. Too little strength left in him.

The world around him narrows, edges blurring, darkness creeping in.

And then—

Fingers.

Wrapping around his arm. 

Firm. Solid. Real.

Or maybe it isn’t.

Maybe it’s just his mind, reaching for something, someone, before everything slips — before the last of the light above him fades into…black.

🫧⋆｡˚﹏﹏𓇼𓂃⋆.˚𓂃 𓈒𓏸‏𖦹.

Izuku’s certain there’s water coming out everywhere — his nose, his mouth, his ears.

His body is desperately trying to purge every last drop, each cough rattling his chest as he heaves for breath. His lungs burn, his throat raw from salt and panic, and Bakugou’s heavy-handed pats against his back don’t make it any easier.

"C’mon, dumbass," Bakugou mutters, smacking him again, a little harder this time, like that’s going to help. "Get it out." 

But even though Bakugou looks irritated, the deep-seated worry pinching his brows together is more prominent.

And that? That makes Izuku’s heart beat faster again.

God, he really needs to get his pulse down, not up.

Another cough wrecks through him, his ribs aching from the force of it. And when he finally sucks in a breath that doesn’t feel like he’s choking on the entire fucking ocean, Bakugou claps him on the back of the head.

"Were you looking to die today, dumbass?"

Izuku barely has the energy to glare at him, still gasping like he’s been starved of air.

"I—" He wheezes, voice scratchy, water still burning its way up his throat. "I wasn’t—" Another cough. "I didn’t mean to—"

Didn’t mean for the wave to take him like that. Didn’t mean to get dragged under.

But it was just so good — too good not to try.

Even though he knew it was big. Even though, deep down, he knew he wasn’t ready for it.

It just looked so…

Mesmerizing.

"You’re not a fucking fish, Deku." Bakugou flicks his forehead, sharp and quick, like that’ll knock some sense into him.

"Ow, Kacchan…," Izuku mutters, rubbing the sore spot, his fingers lingering there longer than necessary. He looks at Bakugou — just for a second — before looking away again. Because it’s been getting harder and harder recently. To look him in the eyes. To not blush like the stupidly crushing teenager he is. "It’s not like I planned to nearly drown."

"Tch." Bakugou scoffs, crossing his arms, his damp hair clinging to his forehead. "You’re lucky I was there to save you."

The coughs have mostly died down by now, leaving Izuku exhausted, but otherwise intact. His fingers absentmindedly toy with the sand beneath him — grabbing a handful, letting it run through his fingers, repeating the process again and again.

Like if he focuses just on that, maybe he won’t have to think about how close Bakugou still is.

"Oi!"

Before he can react, Bakugou’s fingers curl around his upper arm, firm, insistent, yanking him closer. Izuku sputters, his balance nearly thrown off, but then — Bakugou is looking at him. Really looking at him. Sharp crimson eyes scanning his face, his chest, like he’s searching for any signs of damage.

“What are you doing?” Izuku stammers awkwardly, but Bakugou ignores it. 

"You sure you’re feeling good? Should we get you to the hospital? Get you checked." His grip tightens, like he’s already decided Izuku looks too pale. "I’m not letting your mom blame me if you get home fucked up, idiot."

It shouldn’t make Izuku’s stomach flip. But it does.

Because Bakugou is so close, his proximity burning against Izuku’s skin — skin that should be cool from the water still dripping down his body. But somehow, despite the ocean breeze, despite the damp chill clinging to him — he feels hot. 

Too hot. 

Izuku swallows, throat dry, which is ironic considering he nearly drowned just minutes ago. 

"I-I'm fine, Kacchan," he manages, voice uneven, barely above a whisper.

But Bakugou doesn’t let go.

His fingers are still there, curled around Izuku’s arm, warm against the damp chill of his skin. His grip is firm, like he doesn’t believe him, like he’s waiting for Izuku to prove him wrong. 

Izuku has started to catch on that he’s different from other boys months ago. Maybe longer. But it wasn’t until he and Bakugou started hanging out more intensely, spending more time together — more time alone — that he was sure.

Sure that he’s definitely different. Like, a lot.

And moments like this just confirme his assumptions.

He doesn’t look at the girls the way the other boys do. He doesn’t get that same rush, that same quickened pulse when they smile at him, doesn’t care when they laugh at his jokes or playfully touch his arm.

But when Bakugou looks at him—

His chest tightens.

His stomach flips.

His mind spins.

And sometimes, sometimes — Izuku thinks Bakugou is looking at him like that, too. That same intensity, that same sharp, unwavering focus — like Izuku’s the only thing in the world worth paying attention to.

Maybe it’s just his mind conjuring up scenarios it wishes are real. Maybe he’s just hallucinating.

But right now. 

With Bakugou’s fingers still clutching his arm, his body too close, his breaths coming out a little too hard — Izuku isn’t so sure.

He hasn’t even realized he’s leaning in until Bakugou’s eyes go wide, until the sharp inhale between them pulls him out of his trance. But not enough to stop him. Not enough to keep him from getting closer and closer by the second.

Bakugou doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t let go.

His grip tightens, just slightly, like he wants to stop him but can’t bring himself to move. "Deku…," he breathes, his voice quieter than Izuku’s ever heard it, like it’s barely making it past his lips.

Still touching him. Still holding on.

"W-what are you—"

"I—I don’t know, Kacchan…"

And it’s not a lie.

He doesn’t know. 

Doesn’t know why his chest feels like it’s going to burst, why he can’t stop looking at Bakugou’s mouth, why his body is moving before his brain can catch up.

Doesn’t know what’s about to happen — only that he wants it to.

Maybe his brain was cut off from oxygen for too long before Bakugou saved him.

Maybe that’s why he feels this inevitable pull, this gravitational drag toward Bakugou, like he’s not even in control of himself anymore.

As if something bigger, stronger is guiding him forward.

Because before he can stop it, before he can think, before he can do anything he’s closing the last bit of distance. And Bakugou’s just staring at him. 

Expectantly. 

Izuku’s breath is shallow, his pulse hammering in his ears, and all he can see, all he can focus on, is the way Bakugou’s lips part slightly and then his mouth brushes against Bakugou’s.

His breath shudders against Bakugou’s lips, and for a moment — just one fleeting, fragile moment — it feels like the world has stopped.

Like the ocean has stilled, the waves paused, the sun itself holding its place in the sky just for them.

The touch is soft.

Barely there.

A hesitation. A question.

But Bakugou doesn’t pull away.

Doesn’t shove him off.

And that’s what makes Izuku’s entire body feel like it’s floating, like something inside him is expanding too fast to contain.

His lips tingle where they barely touch Bakugou’s, his heart hammering against his ribs, the warmth of Bakugou’s breath mixing with his own.

This is real.

Not a dream, not a late-night fantasy tucked away in the quiet corners of his mind.

This is happening.

And Bakugou is letting it happen.

Izuku feels like he could burn up from the inside out, from the way his chest aches, from the butterflies swarming in his stomach, from the way Bakugou is still right there.

It takes a few seconds before Bakugou’s hand moves.

Hesitant. Uncertain. But his fingers find the back of Izuku’s neck, pressing just slightly, like he’s figuring it out as he goes. Just following instinct. The warmth of it floods his entire body, spreading through his veins like wildfire, making his fingers tremble where they hover, unsure whether to grab onto something, hold something.

And god — it’s awkward, and clumsy, and their lips move a little too sloppy because Izuku’s never done this before.

But it’s everything.

Yet, needless to say, that “everything“ could turn into “nothing“ in a matter of seconds.

And that’s exactly what happens.

Because one moment, Bakugou’s fingers are there — warm at the nape of Izuku’s neck, holding onto him, like he wants to be there.

And the next?

He freezes.

Completely, utterly stiffens.

And as fast as it happened — it’s gone.

Bakugou jerks away so suddenly that Izuku barely has time to process it, the warmth of him ripped from his skin, leaving the ocean breeze biting against the ghost of it.

His eyes are wide, wild with something Izuku can’t quite place. Panic. Fear. Regret. Maybe…a tiny flicker of disgust?

“Kacchan—” Izuku starts, voice breathless, reaching out before he can stop himself. But Bakugou shoves him.

Hard.

A rough push against his chest, forcing distance between them as Bakugou scrambles back, his entire body coiled tight, breathing uneven, shaking his head like he’s trying to erase what just happened.

“Don’t you fucking touch me, you freak!”

Izuku feels like he’s been slapped. The words hit — like a gut punch, like a fist to the ribs, knocking the breath out of him faster than the ocean ever could.

His throat constricts, tears sting at the corners of his eyes, embarrassment flooding through his body like something toxic. “I—I’m sorry, I thought—”

“What did you think, huh?!” Bakugou snarls, his voice sharp and vicious in a way Izuku has never heard before. “That I’d want to kiss you?!”

Izuku flinches.

“You’re out of your fucking mind if you really thought that.” 

Bakugou’s voice is sharp, biting, but there’s something else buried underneath it — something wild and frantic, something Izuku can’t name, can’t understand, not when his ears are ringing and his chest feels like it’s caving in on itself.

Bakugou grabs his board, slings his backpack over one shoulder, movements stiff, jerky, like he just needs to get out of here.

Like he can’t stand to be near him anymore.

And then—

“That’s… disgusting.”

That’s when Izuku stops breathing.

The world around him blurs, the wind, the sound of the ocean — everything dulls beneath the sharp sting of those words, slicing through him effortlessly. His throat tightens, something thick pressing behind his ribs, behind his eyes, but he doesn’t let it out.

He can’t.

Because if he lets it out, then that means it’s real.

That means this — this moment, this horrible, gut-wrenching moment — is actually happening.

Bakugou is walking away.

Without looking back. Without a single ounce of hesitation.

Like Izuku never meant anything at all. Like whatever this was — whatever they were — wasn’t just ruined.

It was never even real to begin with.

Izuku sits there, hands curling into the sand, fingers shaking, watching Bakugou disappear down the beach — walking away like Izuku is nothing… this was nothing.

Warm tears spill down his cheeks before he even realizes he’s crying.

Silent. Hot. Unstoppable.

He drags in a breath, but it shudders out of him, broken, uneven — because fuck, it hurts.

It hurts. 

More than the wipeout. More than getting dragged under by the ocean. More than anything he’s ever felt in his entire life.

And for the first time in his life he wishes the ocean had just swallowed him whole.