willowser

[willowser]

there's so much i want to say and explain—bc i want to and not bc i feel like i have to—but i think most of it will have to come in the future, when i'm feeling better. but i am going to really work on my communication, and in doing that—i'm starting over with a lot of things. ao3 comments and my inbox here.

i've got close to 200 unanswered asks and i have gone through and read them all and even have a server on my personal discord called "nice things" that most, if not all, of my asks end up, for me to keep and hold and appreciate. so i'm sorry to say that i'm clearing out my inbox—minus the stuff i got yesterday from some lovely pals, who i will get to—but going forward i hope to do better at responding in a timely manner 🩷

[willowser]

nonsense—

bakugou x f!reader wc: 2.8k+ tags: bakugou pov, early relationship nervous feelies, bakugou thinks too much, lovergirl!reader (...as usual for me), reader works with mitsuki in case that wasn't communicated well for @seiwas 'subtle intimacies' collab ✨

Katsuki is shit with small talk.

Doesn't like it one bit. Everything about it feels insincere and performative to a painful degree, and he ain't ever been either of those things. If he cared how someone's weekend was, he'd ask; if he wanted to know what the weather was for the upcoming week, he'd check the forecast himself.

Texting is worthless. If there's shit to say, then it needs to happen face-to-face or over a call at the very least, because he's got no patience to be waiting around on answers every damn night and day. Doesn't stop the idiot squad from blowing up his phone, of course, but at least they know better than to expect a response to their bullshit.

You, however—

A message comes across his watch as the end of patrol is nearing, when the sun is stretching out over the city, waking it up.

6:23 AM mom office (important) : good morning ! miss you ! 002_jgln9.img attached.

It's different, with you.

Katsuki stretches his fingers, straining with the too-indulgent desire to pull out his phone and see the photo you've sent him this time. It's not exactly routine, but every now and then you'll send him a picture of your early morning—you, with a colorful mug of coffee; you, in the mirror, showing off the light skirt that falls to the smooth curve of your calf; you, bright, like goddamn sunshine.

You're distracting, and he's still got another half-hour before the shift is over. If he looks at it—you—now, he'll be counting down the minutes with a restlessness a Pro Hero of his ranking shouldn't have. It's better if he just keeps you in his pocket, burning up against his thigh.

Morning, he swipes across his watch face. Kirishima is still with a civilian off the sidewalk, petting some big fluffy dog that looks too much like him, but Katsuki still brings his wrist closer to the high collar he hides behind. Miss you too.

He hits send before he can think himself out of it—he does that a lot, for you—and tells himself he's still focused, that he's not thinking of the smile you'll wear when you read it; a shitty, slow-growing thing that will have the apples of your damned face fattening.

It makes him sick. Has his stomach tightening in a way that can't not be fucking perverted.

If anyone else were to spam him with seven pink heart emojis in a row, he'd probably block them—he's done it to Denki several times for much less—but they light up his watch, almost immediately, and it makes him feel like—

Katsuki doesn't know. Doesn't have any frame of reference to compare, because he's never had something like this with another person.

Good, is all he can come up with. It feels good.

It's been two weeks since Katsuki's seen you in front of him and not through a screen.

It's fine, is what he tells himself, even though it's not really. Just like he doesn't have the patience for small talk, he doesn't have the patience for whatever the fuck this is; he's always grabbed what he wanted by the throat, despite anyone else, and learning how to navigate dating is like trying to use his quirk with his feet.

If he could trust his own instincts, with you, he wouldn't be clocking out of the agency and going home to nothing. Yeah, there was a time when he craved the silence of his apartment, when coming home after twelve long hours felt like relief, how everything had gone cold in his absence; his bed, the rooms, the air, even.

But now, knowing that you're awake out there across the city, probably grabbing his mother's coffee order on your way into the office—impatience prickles under his skin.

He could see you, if he wanted. See your smile in real time, hear the sing-song surprise of your voice when you call out, "Hey, handsome," like you always do, because you fucking eat up how hot it makes him. The very memory of it is so sharp at the forefront of his brain, and just the thought of having it makes him itch all over.

You text again See you soon? with that little face with the huge, sad fucking eyes, but Kirishima is already stepping back up to him, all too curious and pushy, trying his damnedest to catch a glimpse at whatever got his attention.

"Leave it," Katsuki grunts, narrowing his eyes at the fucker before he can even say anything, and it's fine, he thinks, as he swipes you away for later.

It's fine, is what he tells himself, even though it's not really.

You look nice.

Very business casual, in the photo you've sent him, must have meetings all day with his witch of a mother, though you look happy as a damn clam about it. Katsuki doesn't know how you manage it, but somehow you've put up with Mitsuki for the past couple of years, and, yeah, he's seen your hair frazzled a time or two, but you’re there on the long, endless nights and too-early mornings.

Constant—loyal—to someone as unpredictable as his mother.

Katsuki finally opens up your message after his shift, when he's on the train, and—you look nice. Your clothes fit you nicely. Your pants hug your hips nicely and your blouse creases under your chest nicely.

Katsuki thinks you have a nice shape, and his ears fucking burn all the way down to his skull about it.

The train stops and passengers filter out and new ones filter back in and he's only got two more stops until he gets off, and that's when he texts you back: On the way. It feels—embarrassing to say, as if you could feel his desperation through the screen. Maybe he should be giving you a better heads-up or maybe it'd be smarter to go home, get some rest, plan something for later in the week.

But—a lot of things Katsuki does for you feel this way, some amalgamation of hope and fear and shame and excitement, and so he just presses it down, files it away to assess later. It's fine, is what he tells himself, even as he watches his screen like a fucking addict for his message to be marked Read.

It is, and your call comes within the minute.

Katsuki hesitates for a moment before clearing his throat, swallowing down anything that may be obvious in his voice. "Bakugou."

"Hi!" You breathe out, a whirlwind, and Katsuki resists the urge to curl his hands into fists. "You're on your way here? Like, to the studio?"

Studio—he alters his course mentally, revisiting the time between now and when he'll see you. It shaves off the two stops he still had to collect his goddamn composure, and—Katsuki stills, suddenly underneath the weight of something so vulnerable that it makes him feel weak and stupid.

It takes grinding his teeth down into one another just to ask, "That okay?"

"Yeah, of course!" (Tension escapes him, slow and careful. The belated heat of his own embarrassment sears across his face; of course you're not going to tell him to fuck off, and yet his chest still tightens horribly in the in-between.) "I'll come down and wait for you!"

He could tell you not to, because he's known the place for years, long before you, but—it's there in your voice, too, an echo of hope and fear and shame and excitement. Wickedly, his gut churns, and Katsuki is still learning how to feel about that.

"Alright."

You pause, and he can nearly hear your smile, can picture it when he closes his eyes. "Okay. Be careful."

Instead of responding, Katsuki mm-hmm's a goodbye, but you just sit in the silence, grinning into the static like a dork—and he doesn't hang-up, either.

You're outside when he gets to his mother's studio, sitting on the terrace with your little paper cup, swinging your feet like a damn kid.

You, bright, like goddamn sunshine.

That sick feeling returns, and Katsuki can't tell if it's getting stronger or if it's just been so long since he's seen you that his tolerance is wearing off. Either way, your eyes rise up to take him in and—then he's all too aware of himself, in a way his Quirk has never called for:

Hopefully he doesn't look like complete goddamn ass.

Pride makes him shrivel internally; never thought he'd be that guy that cared whether his hair was fucked off or not, never in a swarm of people wondered if he stank enough to offend. Every sideway comment he's ever made about Shitty Hair's shitty hair comes back to haunt him. The memory of when he'd been in front of a camera last and some dolt with a makeup bag came to touch up all the raw edges of his face sinks like a stone in his gut.

But—you shoot up, all eager energy, the kind he recognizes all the way down to his muscle. It all comes so easy to you, like you don't have a second thought about jumping into him, throwing both of your arms around his neck, and even though his chest warms in response—he can hardly reciprocate with an arm around your waist. Something fucked in his brain tells him he's showing too much, as if you don't have him by the balls already, as if, right now, he wouldn't trust you with just about anything.

There's something missing inside of him—Katsuki's always known that—but, somehow, you never seem to mind.

"Hi!" You chirp, wiggling in place like an overeager puppy. "I'm so happy to see you!"

Katsuki blushes. Full on. Blood rushes all the way from his head down to his toes, sweat starts up behind his ears and pools in the crooks of his elbows, on his upper fucking lip, even. You can tell you've embarrassed him, because you thrive on that shit, and you pinch his chin until he swats at you. Times like this, he wants to—eat you alive, crush you down into a ball to shove in his pocket; something about you makes him so furious and if there's one thing Katsuki knows, it's fury, but this is different. With you.

You press an open-mouthed laugh into his shoulder, at whatever he's exposing on his face, but your voice quiets with sincerity when you say, "I hope I didn't guilt you into coming over here," and Katsuki wants to tell you that you couldn't guilt him into a fucking thing, but your eyes shine as you look up at him and all his bite softens.

Instead of answering, he just takes the cup you're offering to him—tea, thankfully, but he'd struggle down coffee if you wanted to share it with him—and you're so obviously pleased that his face tingles. There's a glossy smear at the lip that makes him aware of something so suddenly, right before your eyes: his mouth is where your mouth was, and he hasn't kissed you properly in a while.

Two weeks since he's seen you, and at the end of it all, then, you'd both been in a train car with hardly anyone else and he wanted to do it but you were smiling too much, laughing at whatever he'd said even though he's not funny. It was just his lips against your teeth and yet he's thought about it every night since then and thinks he will for the rest of his life.

Katsuki doesn't know why it's so hard to say or accept or acknowledge, but—that moment is buried in him. Deeply. Something he never wants to let go of.

And even now, standing outside of his mother's studio, a glass door away from the receptionist he's met several times, who is doing a piss-poor job of pretending not to be a fucking creep, you drop your arms to rest around his waist and—

You're—overwhelming. This public shit is really not his thing because his business isn't anyone elses, but you reach up to rub at something on his cheek that stings belatedly—a cut, maybe, he didn't realize he had—and Katsuki—

Katsuki doesn't like being touched. Doesn't like a hand on his back or in his hair or on his face.

But with you, like all things—it's just different.

Something's funny in the way he peers down at you, because your nose scrunches and you smile and you're so—fucking happy. Just because he's fucking here. Doing nothing, bringing nothing, can't hardly get a word out. Doesn't make a lick of goddamn sense, and yet his cheeks heat under your fingers and he thinks fuck the receptionist, whatever her name is, because he wants to feel your skin on his more than anything. Wants your hand up the back of his shirt, wants to feel your nails scratching over the curve of his spine. Wants you to learn every notch and ridge there is to know.

He thinks about the last time he'd kissed you and he thinks about the time before then and the time before then. The time he'd kissed you in the sanctity of your apartment—warm and lively and welcoming, as if it was just inviting him to stay—and he'd pushed you back against the door unintentionally. It was too much too fast, gasoline in his veins, because a little sound came from the back of your throat that lit him up instantly, from head to toe, and he felt a kind of hunger he didn't know had ever been satiated.

The memory rattles him so severely that he has to physically shake it away before he really fucking embarrasses himself. You seem to gauge the fact that he can't stand here any longer without imploding and give him one quick, final squeeze before leading him through the lobby. Katsuki tells himself to get it the fuck together, but a thought hits him as soon as he sees the elevator, tears through him so fast that he can't even brace for impact.

All he needs is one moment, in an empty elevator. Just one, with you.

But the doors draw back and—of-fucking-course it's nearly full.

Before he can stop himself, he reaches out to snatch the back of your blouse, twists until the material crumples in his hold—but you take the roughness as something else. Not his wicked desire to wait for privacy, but as a misguided attempt at offering his hand, for you to hold.

And you don't even question it, don't look back. You just—take it.

It always feels so wrong for you to do this. In some ways, his hands are the best thing about him—the most important thing—and in some ways they are the last thing he wants you to know. There’s only one thing he's ever used them for and it's not this.

Childish, is how he feels when you slip your fingers between his, but he lets you. Whatever it is you do quiets him in some way, has him thinking that he's thinking too hard and shuts up all his apprehensions.

All eyes go to Katsuki—which he hates. Skirts and suits acting like they haven't seen him in the studio a hundred times. They're crammed like sardines in the elevator, but one look at him and then suddenly everyone's got a step to spare.

You aim for a back corner, which is still tight, but you position him against the wall and instead of squishing in beside him, you tuck your feet between his and lean back into him, into his chest. All the tension melts from your body, he feels it, and that's something he understands intrinsically; Katsuki sucks with his words—but body language is one thing he can read.

He knows what comfort looks like, and now he knows the weight of it on his chest, breathing in time with him.

So Katsuki presses his mouth into your hair, even though his face is hot and everyone in the elevator can see it, and he lets you hold his hand, too. Pinches you just to feel you pinch him back. Hooks a finger into your pocket to jostle you around, just to feel the shake of your laugh.

In front of him, you pull out your phone and it opens up to your message log, the last thing you'd been looking at before putting it up. His name in your phone is Katsuki, with your pink heart and little yellow sun.

He has to turn his face away, nearly into his shoulder because he can feel the tension in his jaw, almost like when he's eaten something too sour, only now it's because he can't stop himself from smiling. Not for the first time with you, Katsuki thinks he could do this every day for the rest of his life. Could feel this, whatever it is you've done to him.

It's fine, he tells himself, and it's even better than that.

[willowser]

on indefinite hiatus. heavy construction. tags might not work. will close from time to time. love you see you soon 🩷

[willowser]

hello guys.

i've not been doing well. for a long time, actually, which is why i needed to leave the way i did. since the moment i locked everything down until as recent as yesterday, i was not planning on returning to willowser/willossom. i'm not comfortable here anymore for a lot of reasons. i still have the passion to write, which i am grateful for. if i had discovered during my time away that that had been lost, i would be much worse off than i am. but it's been helping me, emotionally, to get to do it on my own time and at my own pace.

i'm back unexpectedly because—i created a new blog, with a new alias, new everything, and i want to just start over. detach from this little home i have made completely, anonymously. but willowser has been really, really hard to let go of. when i think about the things a new space would offer me, lately i've been wondering if willowser could not also offer me those, in time. not right away, but if i could tear it down and build from the ground up. and so i guess i am here to communicate that, and to see what you think.

we could say our goodbyes here and maybe find ourselves in the future, when the time is right for us—or we could take some time and change our foundation, here. it would be different, for my own mental health and sanity, but it would be here and, hopefully, better for the both of us.

[willowser]

sweet as cherry wine—

bakugou katsuki x f!reader wc: 2.6k+ tags: katsuki pov, tough family conflicts including emotional and physical abuse (non-graphic), toxic relationship dynamics (not with reader), bakugou x f!oc, eventual office romance, canon-typical violence, light smut, slowburn emotional growth, mentioned death of a family member, happy ending, tags subject to change.

once again, very big thank you to @kodzu-ken for giving me the opportunity to pursue this idea !! our office romance is coming.....i promise......i just have to give bakugou several different layers of trauma first akhfkahfa

𝐎𝐏𝐄𝐍 𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐑 𝐂𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐅𝐈𝐒𝐓 𝐖𝐎𝐔𝐋𝐃 𝐁𝐄 𝐅𝐈��𝐄 ˎˊ˗

title | part two

When Katsuki is 8, his grandmother dies.

There's very little he knows about death then, but he feels it coming in the months before it happens, before any of the grown-ups sit him down. It startles in his brain at her arrival, sudden and instinctive, like the little animal of him has smelled that something is off.

One day Obaachan visits—and then just never leaves, instead installed into Katsuki's playroom: the "office", once a kingdom of color, overrun with swaths of fabric his father brought home in great bundles, spooled out across the floor.

It takes both his parents and his aunt and even his oldest cousin to complete Obaachan's hostile takeover, and once she's settled in, he's entirely barred from the room. Not even allowed to dig through the scraps of red and blue and yellow, to pull satin over his shoulders or to chase tulle down the hallway.

No, after that, Katsuki can only stand at the door with an eye pressed to the crack, breathing in time to the hiss of Obaachan's machines.

Sometimes she watches him in return, catches him in her cloudy, sunken stare from her final resting place on the futon. It scares him in a way he doesn't know how to translate yet, all her protruding bone and thin, transparent skin, the way her mouth folds in on itself when she sees him. It makes something cold coil in his tummy, something that feels far too big for his little body.

There isn't much she says and that makes it worse, somehow. Her voice is as frail as she is, but there's an echo after she speaks, the same sudden silence that follows glass shattering. Most of the time, he's already on his way out of the room, moving much too loud and much too fast to show his respect and to slow down and listen—

But the one time he does, her words splinter something, hard, inside of him.

"He's just like his mother."

It hits him hotter than his mom's palm, shuts his mouth before another word can form. He's yelling about something, because he's eight and still throws ugly tantrums and because the witch matches him beat for beat, feeds his unruly little fire. It's not the first time he's ever heard it, even that young, how much like her he is, but the way Obaachan says it. Like she's peeling something rotten off the sole of her shoe.

When she looks at him, really looks at Katsuki, it's like she's seen something. Caught him, somehow, doing something he should be ashamed of, even though he's only eight and doesn't know any other way to be.

That night, he lies in bed and tells himself he doesn't care. That she's old and mean and wrong. That his mother is a hag and his grandmother's even worse and he doesn't care, he just doesn't give a crap.

And he remembers it all anyway.

Obaachan's machines go quiet in the spring.

The office becomes an office again, all her things are packed and put away; his mother scrubs it all down herself, and his old man sews late, late into the night for a couple of weeks. Katsuki avoids that room for a while, walks past the door too fast, hears phantom hissing where he knows there is none.

He doesn't cry through the incense and sutras, and he never says that he misses her, doesn't even think it, and yet still—sometimes her voice rises up right behind his mother's, just as sharp.

Time drifts forward in slow, heavy pulses, with days folding into months and months folding into years. By sixteen, Katsuki's more of a weapon than a young man and he fights like violence is the only language he knows. Anger lives in him full-time, pressed tight behind his ribs, radiating out through every word, every action. There are moments it's so strong and he doesn't know how or why, almost like it's not even his but something that was passed down, written in his blood. Like a birthright, or a curse.

He sparks off his mother like dry wood under a match.

It doesn't take much, just a glance, a shift in tone, a scrape of chopsticks a little too hard against her bowl. At this point in his life, they don't even try to talk very much, because when they do, it never ends very well.

And tonight is a perfect example.

Katsuki's halfway through with dinner, voice sharp with frustration and a mouth full of rice, "—busted my ass on the field and still lost points just 'cause I didn't kiss the ground Eraser walks on." He doesn't stop to breathe, doesn't notice how his mother's stopped chewing across the table, only continues when Masaru nods sympathetically. "And class rankings are a joke, anyway. What's the point of top scores if they're just gonna kiss up to who they like better? If they're gonna act like I'm the problem for pointin' it out?"

There's a pause as he stops to swallow, as he glances up at his dad for—something, validation or anything. Since he was a kid, his old man has let him talk himself in circles, cry over the same damn things over and over again, and sometimes Katsuki needs that space and sometimes he just wants—

"You know," Mitsuki suddenly murmurs, as casually as a blade slipped between ribs. "For someone that's supposed to be so smart, you sure run your mouth like an idiot."

The air stiffens, between all of them. Katsuki goes still, jaw tight around the bite he hasn't swallowed, because he wasn't expecting it when he should have been. From her, he always should be expecting it.

"The hell's that supposed to mean?"

The old witch hates when he swears, but she doesn't jump on him for it, doesn't yell, only shrugs like she isn't tearing him right open at the dinner table. "You come home whining about how everyone's out to get you, how the system's broken when it's really just your big mouth that's getting in your way, Katsuki."

"I'm top three in my year," he grinds out. "Ain't nothin' in my way."

"Top three," she repeats, "not top."

Katsuki flushes, immediately. It stings because it's true, because it's the same thing he's been telling himself over and over again every night. Only now is he realizing just how familiar that voice inside his head is.

"All your talk, all your pride," she shrugs again, lazy and offhand. "Not worth a damn if you have nothing to show for it."

The scar on his shoulder is still pink, under his clothes, just like the one near his hip; they're the softest parts of him, a tenderness that had to be torn out and stitched back together.

Some nights he wakes up choking, breath caught sideways in his throat, gagging like he's trying to spit up sludge that isn't there. Some nights he closes his eyes and all he can see is what's left of All Might, brittle and burned out—and it's his fault. Katsuki is the shadow. Katsuki is the reason the light doesn't reach.

"I do have something to show—"

"Then show it." Finally, she looks up at him, lip curled in—annoyance, like this is the stupidest conversation she's ever had, like this is all shit he should know by now. "Quit walking around with your head up your ass, acting like being the loudest in the room makes you the winner." She snorts, one cruel sound. "That's not being the best, that's just your big, fat ego."

Katsuki scoffs, to scratch the itch in his throat. "Yeah, you'd know, huh?"

"Don't get smart with me, kid."

"I wouldn't have to if you knew a goddamn thing!"

"And there it is, Mr. Know-It-All!"

There are so many things he wants to say and doesn't know how to, none of them fit in his mouth. They feel small and tiny and weak, and he never learned how to be that way.

He settles on: "What the hell is your problem?"

That bites. Not deep, but enough to scar, and she blinks, like it's hit something she thought she fortified. Her mouth twitches like she's biting something back and just for a second, he sees it: the edge of guilt, or fear, or some soft thing she won't let live. And then it's gone just as fast, buried like everything else.

"You're my son," Mitsuki says, final and flat, "and I'm not gonna let you turn into some loser just because you don't know when to shut your mouth and listen."

And that—that's what guts him.

Some loser.

It's not the first time he’s heard it, even that young, but the way she says it. Like she means it, like it's already true. Katsuki stares at her and he doesn't know what his face is doing, but it burns—in his throat, behind his eyes, down to the fists he has in his lap.

When he shoves back from the table, the whole thing rattles, even the legs. Plates clink and cups slosh, chopsticks jump. Whatever, he growls—maybe, he doesn't know and doesn't care—and he stalks away with a fury so hot that it takes his breath away, and it's rooted in him, that fire.

Inherited. Thrumming inside his chest like a second heart. Less of something he feels and more of something he just is.

Her voice bites at his heels, trails him down the hallway and past the genkan and framed photos of their family, hung like ornaments, and Katsuki hits the garage door open so hard it splinters all the cracks in the wall even further.

Masaru finds him thirty minutes later.

Katsuki's hands are greasy, buried in the guts of an old Toyota Crown they've been picking at for months; some shitty thing Masaru bought half-rusted out of a field in Noto because he liked the bones.

The old man doesn't say anything, just walks around to the passenger side and leans onto the open hood. Katsuki doesn't look up, still breathing too hard from his nose, fucking hands shaking in small, infuriating ways.

Silence stretches between them, thick and oily, until the socket wrench slips for the third goddamn time.

"Fuck!" Katsuki spits, louder than he should. Masaru won't nag him about it, but that bothers him even more, to just have to sit in the quiet judgement and listen to his behavior echo back at him.

He flinches when his dad raises his hand, and so the old man makes a point to soothe the tension in his neck, to pinch at the muscle above his shoulder until it releases.

"Use the 13 mil," he murmurs, and—

It makes Katsuki's jaw tick, because he knows, he knows what the fuck to use. He just didn't want to.

Still, he swaps the wrench and gets the bolt loose with a hard, angry crack, and the sound satisfies something small and mean in his chest.

They work in that silence for a little while, the kind that feels like it's pressing up against his ears. Half-seething, Katsuki hunched over the hood like a dog waiting to be struck, scowl deep enough to scar; Masaru only hums under his breath, passing a rag and the right socket without being asked.

There's a little radio on the shelf, tuned low to some enka station neither of them have ever bothered to change.

"Did I ever tell you how we met?" Masaru gives Katsuki the chance to answer, but he doesn't, so he doesn't push. "We met at the fabric house. She came in red-hot over a shipment, some dyed silk that came out wrong. She lit into the floor manager like it was personal."

Katsuki snorts. A short, cruel sound. "Sounds about right."

"She was wrong about the dye, but she wasn't wrong about the way they were handling it." He smiles, like it's a fond memory and not an admission that the witch has always been psychotic. "Your mother saw through the nonsense faster than anyone else in the room."

Maybe at another time, he would have tried to picture it: his father younger, wide-eyed, caught in the orbit of a woman like Mitsuki, all fire and sharp elbows, raising hell like it was second nature, like it still is—but the thought tugs at some raw, unnamed thing inside of him, so instead he shoves it down as far as it will go and seals the lid.

"I don't know what caught me first," Masaru continues, soft. "That she was loud, or that she cared enough to be."

Katsuki's frown deepens. "You're both insane."

"Maybe," His father laughs, and when Katsuki glances at him, the apples of his cheeks are red, glowing. Still that young man, still enthralled. "But we know what matters, and we look out for each other."

It burns something deep in Katsuki, hearing that, and he doesn't know why. It feels like disgust, but—that's not quite it. More like disbelief. Furious, bone-deep disbelief, to think that someone as gentle and quiet as his father could ever understand the wildfire that is his mother. To think there is some unseen side of her that he's never met, hidden and whole and that knows how to be gentle back.

"How?" Katsuki stands so fast that bolts clatter, that Masaru looks up at him in surprise. "How the hell do you deal with her? She never shuts up, she never backs off, she gets in everyone's face, always has to win—"

"She's not trying to win," Masaru disagrees, quietly.

"The hell she ain't!" Katsuki scoffs, throwing his hands out, because it's right there in front of his father's face and all he does is frown. "You always take her side! Even though she starts everything, and she's always pushin'—pushin' like 'm some little brat that doesn't know squat, that can't do anything right!"

Masaru doesn't flinch, or argue. Only watches him, silent and steady.

It makes his voice rise, crack with all the heat. "You act like she's perfect or somethin', but I'm not you! I can't—jus'—sit there while she tears into me!"

He’s nearly as tall as his father, but the old man kneels anyway, settling down to meet him, gripping both of Katsuki’s forearms; firm, unguarded, showing no hint of threat.

"She's not perfect, son," Masaru murmurs, voice low, "none of us are. She pushes you harder than she should, sometimes, because she sees the strength in you, even when you don't, because she doesn't want you to ever be unprepared—but that doesn't mean it's always right. That doesn't mean you have to be okay with it."

His face pinches tight, and he squeezes his eyes shut and when his father tries to hug him, Katsuki yanks away. Because he doesn't know any other way to be. The wrench in his hand doesn't shake anymore, but on the inside, something is splitting wide open, a slow kind of panic. Creeping, like rust spreading under paint.

His old man talks about love like it's so simple; patience is just something you give, forgiveness is just something that comes—but Katsuki isn't built that way. His mother isn't, either. They burn too hot, too fast, and leave ash in their wake without meaning to. Masaru will never get it, because he's not wired the same way and doesn't carry the same pressure in his chest, the same sharpness in his teeth.

But his father is right about one thing: just because he is stupid enough to endure the shit, doesn't mean Katsuki has to.

[willowser]

sweet as cherry wine—

bakugou katsuki x f!reader tags: katsuki pov, tough family conflicts including emotional and physical abuse (non-graphic), toxic relationship dynamics (not with reader), bakugou x f!oc, eventual office romance, canon-typical violence, light smut, slowburn emotional growth, mentioned death of a family member, happy ending, tags subject to change.

katsuki’s relationship with his mother is a central thread in this story. it’s explored with a critical lens, nothing overtly graphic, but their turbulent dynamic is referenced throughout. please mind the tags.

a gentle reminder that this is just one interpretation of what love might look like for bakugou. we all imagine our readers a little differently, just as we shape our favorite characters in our own ways. every version has its place in the fandom, and this is simply one of them.

lastly and most importantly, a huge huge thank you to my sunshine sen 🩷 you are so kind to put up with the mess that i am LOL your patience and understanding are more appreciated than you know 🥹🥹 i hope you enjoy it !!

𝟏. 𝐎𝐏𝐄𝐍 𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐑 𝐂𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐅𝐈𝐒𝐓 𝐖𝐎𝐔𝐋𝐃 𝐁𝐄 𝐅𝐈𝐍𝐄

[willowser]

willow!!!!! you wrote suguru so perfectly to me 🥹 did his character justice and with so much care, from his gentleness to his breaking point when he’s forced to question his world. how he cares for reader, a survivor in an unkind world, feels so him… i’m gonna be thinking about this for days.

WAAAAHHH admittedly i was SO nervous, SHAKING in my little boots to write him.....the amount of times i read the hidden inventory arc......i really appreciate you saying so 🥹 taking the time out to ease my worries 🥹🥹 you're so sweet smooch 🩷🩷🩷🥹

[willowser]

decode—

geto suguru x f!reader wc: 6.4k+ tags: sci-fi au—tbh i leaned into the cyberpunk futurism thing again i can't help myself 💀, suguru's job is never explicitly mentioned but hopefully you get the gist, he's also a bit scary but i think that's normal ?? idk hehe thank you thank you thank you to dear @rabbbitseason for allowing me to write this ! it's my first time with him 🥹 i hope it's okay ! very grateful for all your support 🥹

ONE

On the night you meet Suguru, an outage swallows the bar in one gulp.

No flicker, just a snap and everything cuts. The holosign outside dies in a whine of static, fans grind to a halt, light collapses, and you're left standing in the dark, holding a tray of warm glasses in hands that suddenly feel too small.

It's disappointing, but nothing new. You’re used to this. Your part of town doesn’t scream when the power goes out—it just sighs.

There’s a rustle near the door. Not the scrambling kind, not like the usual patrons stumbling out to smoke and curse the grid; it’s measured, heavy boots on concrete, too slow to be familiar.

This part of town isn't kind, even to someone it's grown. You step behind the counter in preparation for something—anything.

The figure comes into view in pieces—at first, just a tall silhouette framed by the dim spill of emergency glow leaking in from the street, but then he steps closer, and you see him: all in black, lean and broad-shouldered, his coat trailing like a shadow that's grown too long. The emergency light catches in his eyes, plum; dark and sharp and sweet.

You try not to stare. He probably notices anyway.

"Power out everywhere, or just here?" His voice is low, silk wrapped around steel. Calm in the way that makes you wary.

You shrug, but aren't sure he sees it. "Whole block, I think."

He hums, like that tells him something, and you reach below the counter to fumble for the old lantern. It flickers to life, casting amber light across the counter and his face. He’s handsome—suddenly so—but there’s something else. Something in the way he stands, relaxed but alert, like a man used to being watched.

You clear your throat. "Can still serve you something, if you're not picky. Got a few bottles that don't need cooling."

He smiles, slow and deliberate. One strand of his long black hair has come loose from the tight bun at the back of his head, and it swings slightly as he leans closer.

"Something warm, then," he says, not looking at the bottles. He’s looking at you.

You nod and turn, shoulders rising as you reach for the chipped ceramic pot. The movement’s an excuse to hide, give you a moment to settle the uneven flutter in your chest. You’re not used to being looked at like that. Not with focus. Not with intention.

The power’s out, but the pot’s still warm from before the lights went. You kept it wrapped in a thermal sleeve—old habit from long nights, colder ones. You pour the tea slow, steady, hoping your hands don’t shake as much as they feel they might. The silence thickens around you, too many shadows in too little space.

When he speaks again, his voice is low and steady, curling around edges in the dark. “City’s quieter with the lights out.”

You don’t answer right away, letting the sound of tea against ceramic fill the gap. Letting the heat of the cup chase back the chill climbing your fingers. “It’s always loud,” you say finally. “Just changes the kind.”

He makes a soft sound—agreement, maybe. Or understanding. Or neither. “No neon, no noise,” he says, more to the air than to you. “Funny how much the city depends on its own distractions.”

You slide the cup across the bar. He doesn’t reach for it right away, just watches the steam coil upward, like he’s waiting for something to reveal itself.

“I like it better this way, feels…cleaner, I guess.” You say, and it's true; this part of town isn't kind, no, but without the automated glitz and glamour, there's no need to pretend.

You hear the soft shift of fabric as he leans in—not close enough to touch, but closer than before. His presence hums against the edges of your awareness.

“You’re not scared of the dark?” he asks, voice smooth, teasing. His smile is wide, charming, disarms you in a way that it shouldn't.

You hesitate, trying to bite back your growing timidness. “Only when it’s creepy,” you say, "when it creaks or breathes back at me.”

That makes him huff, amused. Not quite a laugh, but close enough. “So, no ghosts in here?”

“Well, yeah, we have those,” you shrug, “They just mind their business.”

That pulls something out of him, something real and small that feels like a reward. “Interesting bar,” he continues, finally reaching for the tea. “Do you see much traffic here?”

You keep your face still. “Some.”

“Travelers?”

You nod, wary of where this is going, though nothing in his tone gives anything away. Not pushy, not prying. Just drifting. “People passing through,” you say. “They come. They leave. Same as anywhere.”

He sips. There’s something practiced in the way he does it. Measured, like he’s used to watching, used to waiting. “This part of the district,” he says after a beat, “doesn’t get much patrol. No official presence. Doesn’t that bother you?”

You shrug. “They never helped much anyway.”

Another pause. Another small pull of his attention. You realize too late how much you're giving away, when you see the thought behind his eyes, whatever he's cataloging for whatever reason, but he doesn't press it.

“Sometimes the places with the least oversight are the ones that know best how to take care of their own,” he says, almost like a proverb.

You nod. You’ve learned to let silences hold the things you don’t want to voice.

He drinks again, not watching you now, not exactly, but still aware of you. His presence wraps around the room like heat—delicate, thick, hard to ignore. You wonder if he’s just a traveler; surely not, with how handsome he is, how subtly elegant, the way he speaks. You wonder what he’s really looking for.

The thought doesn't go farther than that before a stool screeches from the back of the bar. Not the clean scrape of someone careful, but the lazy sprawl of someone who thinks the world owes him the space and time.

Jogo has been here since before the outage, hunched in the far corner like he’s part of the decor—one of the peeling posters or half-lit neon strips that doesn’t work right anymore. You should’ve made him leave with the others. You didn’t. You never do.

“Still no power?” His voice lurches into the dim, louder than necessary, too smug. “Place like this, surprised it had any to begin with.”

You press your palm flat to the bar. Not in fear—just to keep still. Shame flickers inside of you at the insult, a small flame, ever-burning; no pretending in the dark, no pretending you and your handsome stranger could be from the same world.

Jogo gets up, boots thudding against the composite floor. “Surprised you’re still running this place at all. Must get real lonely in here, huh?”

The sound of his approach stretches the silence thin. You don’t answer. Words feed men like him; it's always best to let them starve.

He stops at the bar, leans in with that breath like rot and synth-spice. “What’s wrong? Cat got your—”

He sees Suguru—who you don't know is Suguru, not yet—still half-sitting, one elbow resting on the counter like he’s got all the time in the world. Jogo must not have noticed him in the shadows before, but now he has, after the air has changed around him, gone colder, thinner. Like the room is holding its breath, too.

Suguru lifts his gaze to Jogo, calm as still water. "She’s busy," he says, voice smooth enough to be polite, but not a bit friendly. "Maybe try saying what you need without spitting."

The smile he wears is soft. Mannered, almost pleasant, though it doesn’t reach his eyes.

Jogo blinks, tries to laugh. It dies somewhere in his throat. “Didn’t mean anything by it,” he mutters, suddenly smaller. “Gonna smoke.”

He turns on his heel and stumbles out, too fast to be casual, too slow to be brave, and the door hisses shut behind him. The silence returns, heavier than before—but gentle, too. You breathe, slow, and let your hand drift from the counter. Suguru hasn’t moved.

When you risk a glance, he's watching you, eyes like dusk, plum-dark and unreadable, but not cruel, not smug; observant. Like he's measuring the weight of the moment and choosing not to tip it.

“Didn’t mean to bring any problems with me,” he says, voice low, dry with something like an apology.

You shake your head, smiling reflexively. “No problems, just finicky ghosts.”

He smiles, enough to show his teeth, and something sour in you eases, recedes. “That so?”

You nod once. It feels like the right answer.

He leans back again, and the moment should pass, but it doesn’t. Not really. The bar settles around you both like the world has exhaled, but there’s still something coiled in the space between you, waiting. Watching. Becoming.

TWO

Suguru comes and goes like a rumor—whispers first, then footsteps, then silence.

You don’t know what Suguru does, or what he has to do to come back. He doesn’t tell you, and you don’t ask—not because you don’t care, but because some part of you already knows it’s nothing soft. Whatever world he disappears into when he’s not here, it stains his silence, lingers in the way his eyes avoid yours when he’s too tired to pretend he’s fine. It sits between you like something alive and untouchable, a quiet, clawed thing neither of you dare disturb.

Sometimes he brings strange gifts—tokens you don’t understand, bought in currencies you’re sure you never want to learn. Once or twice, he shows up with that white-haired menace in tow, loud and too tall for your doorway, trying too hard to be funny and laughing like he owns the air.

But most of the time, it’s just Suguru, and the rain.

He comes when he wants to, leaves without warning, watches you too long sometimes, like he’s memorizing the shape of your silence. Like there’s something he wants from you but doesn’t know how to hold without breaking. And still, he never says why he comes, and, still, you never ask him to stay.

But the space between those two things—what you don’t say and what he won’t admit—is shrinking.

In the morning, you stir—bones stiff, muscles whispering their usual complaints—and the city mutters back outside your window, indifferent. Your apartment is still, small, the kind of place that remembers everything you’ve ever done in it, that won't let you forget.

You don’t want to wake up, but your body doesn’t care what you want. You shift, stretch, dreams still clinging to your lashes like cobwebs—and then you hear it: soft, wrong, from the kitchen.

And that easily, you’re no longer alone.

It only takes a breath for your nerves to remember themselves. You already know who it is. No need to ask.

The air has changed. Sweet, smoky, with something metallic curling at the edge; sharp, familiar, a memory you didn't have to invite back in. He’s here, Suguru, and of course he’s made himself at home again, like this place was carved to fit him and not the other way around.

The clock says six. Early, but time doesn’t mean anything to Suguru; he isn’t ruled by it, doesn’t bend to it. He arrives when he wants, leaves when he’s done, and you—you just let him.

The floor is cold beneath your feet. Not just icy—artificial, indifferent, the kind of chill that comes from old synth-tiling, worn thin by time and use. In the corner, your heater clicks to life with a tired hum, flickers once, then settles into its usual half-hearted wheeze. It’s trying, and failing, just like every other morning.

Suguru’s already steeped in the hush of the kitchen, the shadows wrapped around him like old friends. He doesn’t turn, just moves, slow and precise and controlled, the way he always does—tea, window, silence—and your exhaustion finds you again, soft and sudden. You should be used to this—used to him—but surprise has a way of wearing new faces; even the expected can weigh heavy.

His voice cuts through the morning, low and smooth. “Good morning.”

You rub at your eyes, suddenly too aware of yourself. Of the old pajamas clinging to your skin, the sleep still dragging at your limbs, the way your hair’s decided it has a mind of its own. Bare, vulnerable things.

Your words are dry, meant to sound casual. “Back so soon?”

He glances back, just enough. Eyes finding you like they were made to—slow, deliberate, full of something unreadable that still manages to see too much. You catch the shape of his smile in them before it ever touches his mouth.

“Don’t sound so disappointed.”

His ease scratches at something inside you. Not longing, not quite, something worse, maybe, that doesn’t have a clean name. The kind that slips into your throat and settles there. Every time he comes like this, unannounced, unbothered, it’s like he leaves part of his shadow stitched into your space when he's gone.

You sigh, slow and shallow, trying to collect your thoughts before they show on your face. “No Gojo this time?”

His name lands heavy in the room: Gojo—noisy, untouchable, always dragging storms in behind him. You already know the answer; if he’d come, it would have been obvious, because the walls would still be vibrating. He’s never hidden the disgust in his mouth when he talks about this place, your dirty little corner of the star-system, as if it's a smudge on Suguru’s reputation. Shame and relief crawl into your chest together and sit there, when Suguru shakes his head.

“He can handle things on his own every now and then.” A pause. A glance. “Don’t tell me you miss him.”

Your laugh breaks out too fast, too sharp. It’s loud and uglier than you want it to be, but real, the way everything Suguru drags out of you is.

He turns fully at the sound and steam curls from the mug in his hand, held like an offering. He doesn’t speak, just smiles—that Suguru smile. The kind that knows too much. The kind that doesn’t need words to press against you. His presence settles like warmth between you—just enough heat to stay. Just enough to forget it will burn when it leaves. You take the mug, fingers brushing his, barely, and he steps aside.

And then you see it.

A package on the counter no larger than your hand, plain brown paper folded with precision, sharp corners and clean edges and neatly tied with a band of thin copper wire.

You eye it warily. It looks expensive. More than that—it looks deliberate. That kind of care—small, quiet, meticulous—is more him than any signature. You feel it in your chest before your brain can catch up. No one else wraps things like that. Not in this city. Not for you.

“What's this?” you ask, already knowing he won’t answer the question directly.

Suguru just slides it toward you quietly.

You pick it up slowly, running your fingers along the cool surface. The band slips off with a soft click, revealing beneath the paper a slim e-journal—compact, beautifully made. The kind sold by back-alley specialists who don’t advertise but somehow always have a waiting list. The kind you’ve lingered near before, just to stare. A soft hum rises from it as the display lights up with a warm, golden pulse. Your name flickers in the top corner, small and elegant.

You blink. “These aren’t easy to get.”

Suguru doesn’t respond right away. His eyes flick to yours, unreadable. “You said your old one was glitching.”

You can’t even remember when you said that. Weeks ago, maybe, in passing. You doubt you even meant for him to hear it.

Your chest tightens, that odd pull of gratitude and disbelief tangling behind your ribs. You press your thumb against the screen, watching it open to a clean interface—blank pages, empty folders, but one tab already labeled: Home.

"Suguru…" you start, voice shaky, barely pushing past your throat.

He just tilts his head slightly, smile twitching at the corner of his mouth. “Don’t mention it.”

The journal hums gently in your hands, in response. It’s light, sleek, and somehow heavier than it should be. A gift like that isn’t about what it is, not with him, it’s about the way he remembers. The way he’s been gone for weeks, and yet, when he returns, he still knows exactly what you need.

You keep your eyes on the journal even after the screen fades to black, the glow slowly dimming beneath your fingertips. It feels like the only thing anchoring you, like if you let go too quickly, the quiet swell of feeling might show on your face.

He’s here. He brought you something. He thought of you.

And you like the way that feels. You don’t hate it—not at all. You’re just shy about the way it wants to spill over. You’re not sure what he’d do if it showed too obviously, but from the way he’s watching you, eyes half-lidded and amused, maybe he already knows.

You squish your lips together, trying to tide back your smile. “You know, I was managing just fine with my ancient, barely-functioning piece of junk.”

Suguru hums, warm and buttery. “Mm. I noticed.”

“I was!”

“You say that, but I watched you slap the screen four times just to open the calendar.”

“It still worked.”

He lifts a shoulder in a slow shrug, like the act of teasing you is something luxurious, a taste he wants to savor. “Barely.”

The air feels lighter already. You’re still holding the journal—still feeling the warmth of its casing, still tracing its smooth edge with your thumb like it might disappear if you let go.

You move to the kettle to keep yourself from lingering too long in your thoughts. The tea’s already ready, still warm in its ceramic pot. You pour him a cup without asking—it’s second nature by now—and the motion steadies you.

When you pass it to him, your fingers brush again. This time, the contact lingers just a little longer than it should, and you pretend not to notice how your breath catches in your throat. You don't dare meet his eyes.

“Thank you,” Suguru says, voice softer now. How many times will you have to say it back before you're even?

You nod once, keeping your arms folded loosely across your chest. “You didn’t have to bring anything, you know that, right?”

“I know.” He blows gently across the rim of the cup before adding, “but I wanted to.”

You glance at him out of the corner of your eye. The steam from his tea curls upward, catching the low light spilling through the window behind him. His expression is unreadable—somewhere between patient and quietly pleased. And it settles deeper than you expect it to.

“Well,” you say, small this time, “it’s nice. You’ve officially outdone yourself.”

Suguru leans beside you, shoulder brushing yours as he shifts. His presence is always heavy, but now it feels warm, grounding. “I’ll try not to make a habit of it.”

You let out a breathy scoff. “Liar.”

His mouth curves, a small, knowing smile. “Maybe.”

The silence that follows stretches—not tense this time, but gentle. Lived-in. The kind that doesn’t demand anything from either of you. Just... a moment shared. A stillness made from something softer than what this world usually offers.

When you finally look over again, he’s already watching you—eyes dark, but not distant.

This time, you don’t look away so quickly.

And for a second, everything feels suspended: his hand cradling the tea, the warmth of his shoulder against yours, the soft click of the journal as it powers down completely. The hush of the kitchen wraps around you like a secret, and you let yourself stay there just a little longer than you should.

THREE

Something eats away at him.

You don’t notice it at first—he’s always been distant, unreadable in ways that feel deliberate—but something shifts. Subtle at first, then sharp as a crack beneath ice.

Whenever the mask slips, Suguru speaks in riddles. About rot. About weakness. About the way curses cling to people like smoke in their lungs. Suguru never says what he means outright, but you start to understand that what he hunts is no longer just out there: it's in him now, settling deep. You’ve always been afraid to ask where he goes, what he does in the stretch between his visits—but one day, something starts ticking inside you, soft and slow, like a countdown. And you know you have to ask, soon, before the poison spreads.

He comes in just after midnight; a whisper of the stairwell, the slow press of the door, the scent of cold air and blood and rain. The room bends with his presence, drawn to him like gravity to a star, but tonight he is no source of light. Now he swallows it whole.

For a long, terrible moment, he simply stands there, tall, broad-shouldered, soaked through the folds of his coat. Hair down, black and heavy, falling like a curtain, hiding more than it shows. You don't speak. You don't want to fill up any more of the space than you have to.

Suguru crosses the room like a man half-remembering the shape of it, as though he’s not really here, not yet. His eyes skim the walls, the ceiling, the half-empty cup on the counter like it’s all unfamiliar, like he’s unsure whether he’s still dreaming.

He finds the edge of your bed—an altar he has never bowed to—and sits slow, deliberate. The same way someone eases into the bath after a long battle.

The silence feels brittle, glass under pressure. His hands are braced on his knees, fingers twitching, opening and closing like he’s trying to hold something he can’t quite name.

“Did you eat?” you ask, because you don’t know what else to say.

His gaze flicks to you. Something unreadable in the dark plum of his eyes, bruised purple, shadowed and strange.

“No,” he says. Then adds, almost like an afterthought: “I'm not hungry.”

You don't care if that's true or not. You have to do something with your hands, offer comfort made just for him, even if it's instant and simple and comes from a packet—but before you can leave the room, he asks:

"Do you think people are born evil?"

He’s not looking at you. Just at the floor, at the space between his boots, like the question fell out of him without permission.

“I don’t know,” you say softly, and it's true—you don't.

You never had time to wonder about things like good and evil, never had the luxury. Your choices were simpler, narrower. How to keep the lights on. How to make enough for the next meal. How to stay whole in a place that’s always trying to carve pieces from you.

But this—this is a crack in his armor, and through it you see the shape of his world. A world built on consequences, on lines drawn and crossed again. You wonder who you’d be if your life asked those kinds of questions, if every choice you made had to hold up under the weight of whether it was right or simply necessary.

Suguru looks up—and in that moment, he’s someone else. A snake in the grass, coiled so tight you hadn’t noticed his presence until too late. He remains seated on the edge of the bed, and you’re still standing, but the distance between you feels like a black hole, sucking you in; it doesn’t give you control, doesn’t make you feel safe.

“What if I told you they were evil? Would you believe me?”

The question hangs in the air, sharp and unsettling. You don’t like the way he asks—don’t like any part of it, truthfully, but this, especially, settles under your skin like a stain that won’t wash out. It makes you wonder if he’s lied to you. If he’s been playing you all along, smiling just long enough to hide the knife in his hand, to keep you from seeing the truth.

Suguru has always unnerved you, in ways you never quite could face. From when he stepped into your bar, drifting in from the dark street outside, bathed in the emergency lighting. Like a warning you were blind to.

Since he walked into your apartment tonight, his attention has been scattered, drifting through the room like smoke, but now it’s all on you. You thought you wanted it, thought you could handle it, but now, under the weight of his gaze, you feel like prey. His focus presses on you, slow and deliberate, until every breath feels too shallow. When he rises from the edge of your bed, you step back, head bumping into the wall of your cramped room. The space between you disappears with one swift motion, and suddenly, he’s right there—close, too close.

"Would you kill them if I told you to?"

The question hits you before you’ve even had a chance to form an answer. You shake your head, words bubbling out in a rush, helpless. "I don't know."

"If I told you they were born wrong, would you kill them?"

You don’t know. The answer drips out, thick and slow, but it's the truth. "I don't know."

"If I told you they were little demons, twisted and demented, brought nothing but death and ruin—would you kill them? Even if they were young?"

You can’t answer anymore. The question feels unceasing, endless, like it’s reaching beyond you. His eyes, once dark and intense, have gone empty—hollow like a well. You don’t know if he’s even still looking at you, if he sees you at all.

Then, you notice it—blood. Slowly seeping through the chest of his white shirt, dark and damp, spreading like ink across the fabric. The realization hits you harder than anything he’s said, because there’s truth in it: something has collapsed inside him, something broken that you couldn’t stop.

“Y—you’re bleeding.” The words sound too small, too stupid, leaving your mouth like an afterthought, but he's still so close, close enough that you could count the long, dark lashes of his closed eyes when he blinks—and something flickers across his face. A snap, and then everything cuts.

His expression barely changes from that haunted look, but his voice is steady when he says, “It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing.” The words leave you with more force than you expect, anger flickering beneath the surface of your worry. You latch onto it, grounding yourself with it, needing something to steady you against the unease crawling up your spine. “You’re hurt and you didn’t tell me.”

Suguru straightens, settling back onto his feet, back into his bones. It should be terrifying, how familiar he seems in that moment, how quickly he slips back into himself, but you're so desperate to get him away from that horror that you don't care.

His voice is sharper now, edged with something close to irritation. “Was I meant to?”

“You could’ve said you were bleeding.”

“It’s not new.”

“It’s new to me.”

That stops him. The space between now and the last time you saw him flickers behind his eyes—not like before, not like a wound he couldn’t name, but something else. A fact. A shared recognition: That was then. This is now. He is not whoever he was then. Not here. Not with you.

He closes his eyes, eventually. Breathes out a quiet sound, almost a hum. “It is,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

But he doesn’t step back. Doesn’t give you the space to go. There’s no hand on your wrist, no body blocking your path—but you know, with a kind of terrible clarity, that you couldn’t pull away from him right now, even if you tried.

It can’t be life-threatening, you realize, now that your heart isn’t pounding so loudly in your ears. Not a picked scab, but not a torn stitch either; the blood looks worse than it is, startling against the clean white of his shirt, thin and vibrant where it crosses in straight, resolute lines. In better lighting, you might have been able to see through the soaked fabric. You’re not sure that would do either of you any good.

The top two buttons of his shirt are undone, something so profoundly unlike him it feels like a slip in character, and the pale glimpse of his collarbones is distracting, delicate in a way you hadn't expected. You shouldn't be looking, but it's hard not to. Enticing in a way that pulls gently at your attention, makes your breath catch for reasons you don't want to examine, not with him so close. You almost can’t stop staring, can’t help but wonder what else you’re missing—until the corner of his mouth twitches. Barely, but enough.

You clear your throat and press your spine against the wall, like it might make more space between you. It doesn't. "How recent is ‘not new’?”

“Weeks,” Suguru says, casually—so easily it startles you. You’ve never talked about his work before, and you’re still not, not really, but you’re closer now than you’ve ever been, in too many ways. “I’m fine.”

“You’re fine now,” you say, not quite believing it. His smile tightens, enough that it reaches the corners of his eyes, though you wouldn't call it warm.

And then his hand moves. Slow, deliberate, like he’s afraid of startling you. His fingers rise until they hover beside your face, and when they finally make contact—just the backs of his knuckles brushing your cheek—it’s featherlight. Reverent. It’s not possessive, not even asking; it’s a question in the shape of a touch, and somehow you already know the answer is yes. The air between you grows impossibly still, as if the world stopped turning just to see what you'll do next.

Your heart stumbles. You’ve never seen him like this—not the version that walks in shadows, not the one who smiles like a blade—but something else. Something stripped down and aching. It terrifies you how badly you want him to stay.

His eyes don’t leave yours. They could lie, but they don’t. "Yes," he says, "I'm fine now."

FOUR

Not much time passes, surprisingly.

Days, maybe a week or two, though time stretches differently when you're waiting for something—or someone—you’re afraid won’t come back.

Outside, the neon gutters spit their color against the wet pavement. The air smells like ozone, like the sky’s about to split open again. Maybe it will. You wouldn’t mind. Rain makes everything seem farther away. The night is nearly over; you’ve wiped the counters twice, swept the floor even though no one spilled anything, stacked the chairs with a little more force than necessary. You move slower than you need to, hands lingering on small tasks just to stay busy, just to keep from looking at the door.

The place is quiet—finally—and you welcome it.

Suguru left as he always has: without reason. Something has changed, yes, but still, he left you in the same shape he always does—like the world has flipped itself inside out. He never leaves without unmaking something. Every return, every departure, carves a new gap into you. They don’t heal. You don’t even notice they’re there until you're trying to stand still and find you can't—until gravity presses in wrong, sideways, like it's trying to fold you in half.

You've never seen him that way, so unraveled. It's been replaying in your head on repeat, unending: what if I told you they were evil? Would you believe me? Sometimes you think you should’ve said yes. Not because you would believe it, but because maybe—just maybe—he would’ve stayed, but that thought brushes up against something inside of you that’s cold and rotten and not meant to be touched. It makes your stomach twist. You don't like who you are in that version of the story.

You tell yourself, maybe it's for the best that he's done, that he doesn't come back—but the thought feels distant, like it doesn't belong to you. Like it doesn't belong to him, either.

You don’t hear the door open, but you feel it, a shift in pressure, like the world exhaling. You turn just as he steps inside, though it's not quite the same as before; his hair is down again, though only half-way, not the wild ink-spill it was before, and his shoulders seem more relaxed, like he’s shed whatever that unseen weight was. He’s not walking with that same tight, controlled confidence; this is different, lighter, somehow, but there’s still something about him, something sharp behind the soft way he moves.

And he's not alone.

Two little girls are with him, though they haven't moved from the door, haven't commanded the space as he has. They're just watching. One of them has her arms crossed tight like a shield, the other clutches something—maybe a toy, maybe a scrap of cloth—pressed to her chest like it might anchor her. Both of their eyes seem too old for their small, round faces.

It's been playing in your head on repeat, unending: would you kill them? Even if they were young?

You stand there, unsure of what to say. The silence stretches, taut as a wire, until his voice cuts through it.

“It’s quiet tonight,” he says, lightly. Too lightly. Like he’s trying to smooth the air between you, pretend nothing’s changed. Maybe it’s for the girls’ sake. Maybe it’s for yours.

You open your mouth. Close it again. A question rises and flattens against your tongue. You don’t ask. He doesn’t offer. But that’s always been your dance, hasn’t it? The space between what’s said and what’s not.

He follows your gaze, then crosses the bar to stand in front of you. In front of them. “I’m tired,” he says, quiet and sharp. “Of that world, of the filth it feeds on. Of fools who think hurting someone small makes them strong.”

That word—small—lands like a dropped glass; the question you never asked answers itself, shattering quietly between you.

Suguru lifts his hand to your face, like he did the last time—but now the gesture is different. Looser. No tremble at the edges, no hesitation, as if he’s no longer afraid he might break whatever he touches.

His thumb grazes the arch of your brow, traces down to the soft skin beneath your eye. You think—maybe—he’s counting your lashes.

“I want them to live in a world that’s better than ours,” he murmurs, barely louder than a breath. “Safer.”

You've always thought Suguru was built from something other. Something finer, sharper, less breakable. A different species from whatever you are, clinging to the bottom rungs in your corner of the world, but now, up close, that divide feels thinner. Imagined.

You don’t know where he came from, not really, but you know where he is now. You’ve seen the edges of it, the pieces he hasn’t named and maybe never will, and they’re ugly. Embedded like grit beneath his fingernails, worn into the quiet lines of his face. Ghosts clinging to the hem of his voice.

You’re not the same. But there’s something unkind that lives in you both. Something heavy, and tired, and human. Something he wants to cut out—for their sake.

You glance back at the girls. They’re clinging to each other now, as if the world might fall out from under them at any moment, and the only thing they trust to hold is each other. Their small hands are tangled in fabric, sleeves bunched in fists, pressed so close they breathe as one. The sight turns something in your gut—sharp, instinctive, like a wire pulled too tight.

The thought that someone, anyone, had wanted to hurt them—had tried—makes your throat close. Your body moves before your mind does and you lean into Suguru’s touch. Maybe it’s deliberate, maybe it’s not, but his hand doesn’t hesitate. His fingers drift into your hair, curling there like a root finding soil, like he belongs.

For a moment, neither of you speak. You don’t have to. The quiet stretches, warm and fragile.

Then, softly—barely above a whisper—you say, “I don’t know where you’re going to find a place like that.”

Because you don’t. You’ve lived your whole life in the dirt of this city, in the cracks of what people like to pretend is order. You’ve never been offworld, never even dreamed of it, but you’ve heard enough to know there’s no such place waiting out there, not one untouched, not one that won’t eat girls like those alive the moment you look away.

Suguru hums, low in his chest. The sound rumbles through his fingers where they rest against your scalp.

“I’m not going to find it,” he says, quiet but certain. “I’m going to make it.”

And when he says it, you believe him. Maybe not in the way of miracles, but in the way storms believe in rain. His hand lingers in your hair a moment longer, then slides down, slow, catching at your jaw, your cheek. He doesn’t move away. You don’t either.

Behind you, one of the girls makes a soft noise on the tile, barely a scuff of her feet, but it tethers everything back to the moment. The realness of it. This isn’t a story. It’s a turning point.

Suguru glances toward them, then back at you. You're not used to seeing him like this, less worn, less closed off. Like the jagged edge he’s always carried has been tucked away for a moment of stillness.

“It's not going to be easy, and I’ll need someone who knows how to build things that last. Someone steady.”

He’s not smiling, but his eyes hold the weight of something close to it. Hopeful, uncertain, wanting. A line cast into a dark sea.

You could laugh, if it didn’t feel like your whole chest was shaking. There’s no question what he means. Not really.

The silence sits between you again, but it’s different now—waiting, watching. Becoming.

And when you speak, your voice is quiet, but it doesn’t tremble. “Someone like me,” you say.

Suguru's thumb brushes your cheek again, soft as a promise. “Exactly like you.”

[willowser]

katsuki wakes up slow, adrift in calm waters.

everything's warm. not hot, but comfortable enough that tension and ache have melted from his muscles like butter. hard to say the last time he ever felt so relaxed, so softened and spread out—maybe aldera? before ua and the war, before there were phantom pains in his arm and torn tendons in his knees. before he could sleep without nightmares and a never-satiated guilt, when he only dreamt of a bright future.

this is like that. golden, ethereal. he shifts with a gentle tide, suspended in time, welcomed by the silence. water trickles across the contours of his stomach and leaves goosebumps in its wake; meets over the tops of his thighs, submerges his hips.

you splay your hands across the plane of his tattered chest slowly, feeling the flush he's sure has spread from his cheeks. he doesn't know when you got here or how and he doesn't question it, either, only peers up at you from heavy, lidded eyes, watches the way your tits squeeze together when you stretch forward.

it's exhilarating to look at your body, knocks the breath out of him in a way that churns his gut. he almost doesn't realize he's looking at you until he drags a wet hand over the curve of your waist and down the slope of your navel, up across your sternum, to thumb at the peak of your nipples.

some distant moral voice in the back of katsuki's mind wonders if he should be seeing you like this, naked and exposed, and—horribly—the idea that he shouldn't has his balls drawing in tight, his nerves going fuzzy under his skin. all the blood rushes to his lower half and he's harder than he's ever been in his life.

it's not uncomfortable, though, like it usually is; everything is still calm, trembling, new and tender. you spread your legs and settle further into his lap and it nudges him deeper into your body, envelops him to the root. his head falls back on a moan that rips through his chest before he can stop it, and he should be embarrassed for sounding so desperate beneath you, but the scorch of it through his lungs feels right, natural.

you haven't said anything and still don't, only let out a quiet, blissful sigh that he's thought about too often, before pulling yourself off of him to the tip, waiting until his cock twitches impatiently, and then sheathing him to the hilt. again and again and again.

you're fucking yourself on him. the idea makes him dizzy, has him grasping for something, anything under the water. if he doesn't anchor himself somehow, he'll dissolve, melt down until there's nothing left—and yet katsuki raises head, because he has to watch the way he disappears inside of you, the way your mouth drops open and your eyebrows furrow.

it draws another embarrassing sound out of his throat, an even worse one when you lean back, steady yourself with flat palms on his thighs. the change in angle has him rocking against things that make him shudder, that make you shudder, and his whole body jolts when you meet his heavy stare.

it hits him all at once, every untamed urge he's been suppressing: you want this. you want him, katsuki. there's a slick smear in the hair at the base of his cock because—you fucking want this. him. it makes you feel good—he does. the certainty of it is something he's wanted for so long, been desperate and scared to uncover.

god—and he's wanted this with you, too. longer than he's willing to admit, before he even knew it, maybe. it's debauched and greedy but he doesn't give a damn, and he wants to do this with you again and again, as many times as you'll let him.

every time you've smiled at him in the hallway and put a hand on his arm and laughed at something that wasn't funny—he's wanted this. you send a molten tidal wave of want crashing into him, and he's tried to hold it back, to prove he's not some brainless meathead, but—

you want this, too.

it all makes so much sense now, a fucking dream come true.

katsuki reaches up to grab you by the arms, too roughly, though you just laugh when he pulls you down to him. he's wanted to kiss you for so long and he finally does, open-mouthed and hot, against your teeth because of your smile, and he rolls you both over so he can press his face into your hair and rut his hips—

katsuki wakes up slowly, and doesn't open his eyes.

his heartbeat drums in his ears, deep and a little painful, enough to warn him of a future headache if he doesn't move. and that's wrong.

everything is wrong.

the a/c is cooling sweat on his back and his foot is hanging off the bad and he's on his stomach, cheek smushed into his sheets. he's distantly aware that he's crossed a threshold he can't return from, but he doesn't want to believe that. not yet.

if he squeezes his eyes tight enough, he can still feel the lingering warmth, your hungry touch. katsuki tries his best to hold onto it and—it's okay. not as good as it once was, but he forces every thought from his mind that isn't you. tries to burn the image of you on top of him into his eyelids.

it works him over the edge easily, insignificantly. his dick pulses as his climax fades as quickly as it came, but there's not a hint of relief. all his muscles are stiff, coiled, drawn taut at the rapidly dissolving images in his mind.

already, he can't remember what you sounded like. not that it was really you, because he's never heard you like that, but—there's nothing now.

when he opens his eyes, he's alone. in his bedroom at near 4 am, a gross patch of drool growing at his mouth. he doesn't have to be up for several hours, doesn't have to be at the agency for several more. he's on for a night patrol and he won't come into the office until after everyone's gone home and that usually bothers him. because it means he'll miss seeing you.

but it must be a blessing in disguise this time around, because katsuki has no idea how he'll ever look at you again after this.

hey gang. not gonna lie to you, i have been unable to think about anything other than bakugou having a wet dream about you for days.

[willowser]

hey gang. not gonna lie to you, i have been unable to think about anything other than bakugou having a wet dream about you for days.

[willowser]

like the delicious angst in there being another weekly attempt to slander his name, question his place in hero society, and his pr team insists he align himself with a non-profit organization for those that are quirkless. he does it all "quietly", because he doesn't want to be too obvious that he's making a show of his support, but he's spending time with quirkless kids and making them feel seen, donating to outreach events for abused family members, showing his support for policies that advocate for non-powered individuals.

and—you're just one of the community event coordinators. as a quirkless person yourself, you see enough about him in the media to be a little wary, but deep down you know how easily things get misconstrued. even if you don't particularly care that much for him, you appreciate the publicity it brings to your organization, so you are fine with your mutually beneficial relationship.

it's not until one too many pictures are snapped of the two of you out and about, and then someone is reaching out to his pr team for comments.

it was never really their intention to sell some dating scheme, but the response to bakugou's efforts are...a slow tide, not bringing as much positivity as they'd hoped; too many are still questioning whether his actions are sincere or if it's all for show—and so they make a decision to confirm that, yes, you two are seeing each other, as a matter of fact.

and you both find out at the same time, on opposite sides of the city, when the news goes viral.

i am thinking Hard about fake dating with pro hero bakugou

[willowser]

i am thinking Hard about fake dating with pro hero bakugou

[willowser]

Help Sahar and Her Family to Evacuate Gaza🇵🇸

I am in an urgent matter and I hope you watch the video. I hope you all stand by my side. Do not be stingy with me. You are my second family. I hope you help me so that I and my family are free Gaza🙏 . Donation link on my page in bio 🍉👇

@el-shab-hussein @self-hating-zionist @thenewgothictwice @raelyn-dreams @unfortunatelyuncreative @butterfly-pumpkin @licencetokrill @jezebelgoldstone @ramelcandy @petracourtjester @labutansa @sammywo @autistwizard @tortiefrancis @sparklinpixiedust @feluka @revcuse @golvio @leftismsideblog @star-and-space-ace @rainbowywitch @marscoded @oursapphirestars @dalekofchaos @annoyingloudmicrowavecultist @boyvandals @the-bastard-king @13ag21k @agentfascinateur @ammonitetheseaserpent

[willowser]

laios's badonkies

[willowser]

bkg most vanilla sex loving 2d man to ever walk this earth btw. you ask him fuck u in any position that doesn’t include eye contact and he’s like. why would we do that

[willowser]

i know i have said this before, but toyua at your first few kid drop offs after you break up is soooooo petty to hide how upset he is 🥺 wears sunglasses the entire time, doesn't speak to you any more than he has to, if he even sees you smile at another man he'll go absolutely nuclear djfbdjalql

[willowser]

errands for mom