tbh this chapter's title is from my favorite line in this chapter lolol. i feel like the rest is pretty cringey but whattaya do? lmao

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Kirishima

Kirishima couldn't get the feeling of Bakugou's lips—his lips—out of his mind. That moment when the last of the Pocky broke between them and he felt that warmth against his mouth was in every single one of his waking thoughts, torturing him. Making him crave more of that. Making him want to kiss Bakugou more—a lot more, even if it was after chewing slowly through a stick of chocolate Pocky. Hell, Kirishima didn't even really like chocolate Pocky! He was more of a strawberry guy. But he swore if that was what it took to feel those damn soft lips press into his again, even just once, he'd go on an all-chocolate Pocky diet.

But man! He was still having serious trouble wrapping his head around the fact that he and Bakugou had kissed! If he was being honest, he'd pictured it more times than he'd care to admit, but having it actually happen was a whole different thing. He always imagined it happening further into the future, in a hypothetical situation after he'd found the courage to ask Bakugou out and he'd said yes... not on the floor of Kaminari's room because of what was basically some stupid dare.

He'd been avoiding Kaminari and Sero. He left their text messages unanswered and avoided the mess hall with Bakugou during breakfast and lunch, eating elsewhere. Bakugou stuck with him. It was unspoken between them what they were doing, but neither of them needed to say anything about it. In fact, they were purposely avoiding that particular subject, even if it was the elephant in the room.

Things changed between the two after the dumb Pocky game. There was a certain amount of uneasiness in the air between them whenever they were together, yet somehow it wasn't inherently bad. In fact, more often Kirishima found himself noticing when their arms would accidentally brush together; where before Bakugou would walk with a foot or more of distance between them, now there was hardly any, and rarely did he keep his hands pocketed anymore, resulting in their knuckles unintentionally bumping together. And Kirishima left his board in the closet, even though the snow never picked up enough to do anything but wet the sidewalk and there was no reason he shouldn't bring it. He was more than happy to walk along next to his roommate.

To no surprise, Bakugou planted himself in the seat right beside Kirishima when he strolled into their environmental science class the first day that semester—though, Kirishima totally had put his backpack in the seat to keep anyone from taking it before his roommate showed up. And despite there being a whole five feet of table, he sat so close that their knees rested together. After the third day in a row of this, it was evident to Kirishima that this wasn't an accident.

Kirishima didn't know how much more of all this he could take. Bakugou made him feel like... like his bones themselves were melting, like his heart was going to burst right out of his chest... like he himself was just going to freaking explode. And now that he was so much closer...

With a huff, he turned and twisted the knob to turn off the shower. He'd been in there so long, just thinking and thinking and thinking way too much that the water temperature was starting to run cold. After running a towel through his hair and then throwing it around his waist he picked up his phone and sent a text to Mina.

>I think i'm going crazy

Her response was instantaneous.

>Baku?

>Yeah

>Need to talk about it?

>Think so. You busy?

>I'm kinda with Kami and Jirou rn, but I can make an excuse to get away

>Nah, i'll come meet you guys. Should probably talk to him too. Where are you?

>Game room

>Be there in 15

>👍🏻

Quickly, Kirishima rubbed his towel through his hair, tossed it carelessly over the towel rack, and got dressed. Bakugou hadn't moved from the lazy position on his bed while he watched YouTube videos when Kirishima opened the door, and he didn't look up when Kirishima re-entered the room, either. A muted, barely-there smile had graced Bakugou's features as a result of whatever he was watching, and though he expected it, Kirishima would never get used to the weird jump his stomach did every time he saw that gorgeous smile, no matter how small.

Kirishima waited until Bakugou was between videos as he combed through his hair to speak up. "Hey, uh..." Automatically the other's eyes lifted to his. "Mina... asked me to help her with something, so I'm gonna go meet up with her, 'kay?"

Bakugou's responding grunt was one of affirmation as he flopped over onto his back and held his phone above his head, scrolling through his feed as he did so.

"Don't drop it on your face," Kirishima joked as he slipped on his shoes, pocketed his key, and opened the door.

"Fuck you," Bakugou called after him light-heartedly. Kirishima was still chuckling as he started down the hall.

Kirishima almost regretted not grabbing his hoodie on the way out, though it was still on Bakugou's bed and underneath him from the other day when he'd let him borrow it the after it had snowed because his was in the laundry. Though it'd been only a few days ago, it was considerably warmer now; still, the late evening air was cooling off from the sun going down, and Kirishima's wet hair definitely wasn't helping. He couldn't bring himself to regret letting Bakugou borrow it, though.

His trip halfway across campus to the game room was fairly quick, and save for a few other people occupying the pool table, the only ones inside were Mina, Kaminari, and Jirou over at the air hockey table. From the looks of things, Jirou was kicking Kaminari's ass—again, to no one's surprise.

As soon as she saw him, Mina sprang up and bounded in his direction. "Hey, loverboy," she teased with a wink.

"What?" he mumbled. Already he could feel the heat creeping to his face and with everything he had he willed it away.

"Nothin'," she giggled, elbowing him playfully in the ribs. "C'mon. Let's go watch Kami get his butt kicked for the thousandth time this year." Easily, she tugged him in the direction of clack, clack, clacking near the corner of the room and they plopped down onto the nearby couch to wait out the game.

For once, Jirou's victory came only by a few points, proving that Kaminari was finally starting to catch up to her. Still, he clearly had quite a ways to go before he had the hope of besting, or even tying her.

"It's my goal to beat you before the school year ends," he told her with a confident—almost cocky—smirk.

"We'll see about that," she challenged.

It was only then when they seemed to notice Kirishima's presence. "Oh hey, man. When'd you show up?"

"Long enough ago to see you get your butt kicked. Again," Kirishima told him.

Usually Kirishima knew Kaminari would throw a defensive remark right back at him, but this time he did nothing more than scratch his head and mumble a "right..."

"Kiri said he needs to talk. About Bakugou," Mina said.

"Um, yeah... can I, uh, say somethin' first, though?" Kaminari asked.

"Sure, man," Kirishima said.

Kaminari's shoulders were hunched as he spoke; already his gaze was apologetic—even guilty, almost. "Look, dude, I'm really sorry for the other day... with the whole dumb Pocky thing. I shouldn't have pressured you like that, I guess I just thought it'd be kinda funny, but it was seriously uncool of me."

A small pang of guilt hit Kirishima in the chest. In the back of his mind he'd been afraid Kaminari would tell him something along the lines of "you should be thanking me" or "you're welcome" for what went down between him and Bakugou, but he seriously should've known his friend better than that.

"Also," Kaminari continued before Kirishima could come up with something to say, "I wanna apologize to Bakugou too, if you can talk him into letting me talk to him."

"It's alright, dude. Sorry for avoiding you so much. I've just had a lot on my mind since it happened. And yeah, I'll tell him," Kirishima said with a smile.

"Thanks, bro." Kaminari held out his fist, which Kirishima promptly bumped his own into. "We good?"

"Yup."

"Soooo," Mina said, bouncing a bit in her seat as she'd turned her entire body to face Kirishima, that telltale sparkle in her eyes. "Since it did happen, you wanna talk about it, huh?" she asked, eyebrows waggling. Kaminari and Jirou planted themselves on the floor in front of them, Kami leaning against the air hockey table with Jirou in his lap, an arm hooked around his neck.

"Well, erm... sort of, but not exactly," Kirishima said, beginning to spin his phone between his fingers in a nervous fidget.

"Whattaya mean?"

"Since the whole... thing happened, Baku's been acting different. But not bad different," he began, really wishing he'd been thinking of what to say on the way there. But of course he hadn't—his thoughts had been filled with that tiny grin Bakugou'd had when he stepped out of the bathroom until the second he walked into the game room.

"Then different how?" Jirou was the one to question.

With a deep breath, Kirishima laid out Bakugou's actions, between the walking closer to sitting super close to him in their science class. It wasn't much, he realized as he told them, but it was pretty damn profound—that he could tell just by the looks on his friends faces, particularly the bright sparkles in Mina's eyes.

"Shit," Kaminari said. "And I kinda thought my stupid idea would've had the opposite effect..."

"I guess not..." Kirishima said. "I sorta did, too... at least at first," he admitted. "But after we talked it out after it happened, everything kinda... escalated."

"Um... what do you think it means?" Mina asked; clearly she was trying not to be too pushy or overly excited, but judging by the fists held in her lap it was evident she was having trouble containing herself. Still, he appreciated it.

"Hell, man, I don't even know myself," Kirishima said. "It's pretty hard to ignore, and I have been taking all the stuff you guys have said over the past several months into consideration, y'know? And I think maybe I was just being blind 'cause I'm afraid of rejection."

"So do you believe us?" An excited kind of hope filled Mina's voice. "That he likes you? Finally?"

Kirishima didn't answer right away and took to chewing his lip in thought instead. He knew he had to be at least somewhat careful with his words or there would be an explosion (though, with Mina's excitable nature around, that was bound to happen no matter what he said—that was of course unless he lied and said no).

"Actually, I think I do," he said finally.

As expected, a squeal sounded from the girl and she threw her arms around his shoulders, her bouncing shaking the entire couch and her excitement catching the attention of the others across the room. In the same instant, a wide grin spread across Jirou's face and Kaminari fist-pumped the air.

"It's about time!" Mina laughed in his ear; all he could do was laugh a bit himself and pat her back, trying to ease her excitement more than anything else.

"Okay, okay," he told her, his grin only widening when she pulled back enough for him to see her face again. His whole body felt alive with nervous but excited butterflies.

"Next step: ask him out!" she declared, a finger in the air.

"W-wait? So soon?"

"Soon?!" Jirou asked, backhanding his knee. "It's been months, Kirishima!"

"And with everything you just told us, it's almost like he's waiting for you to ask him!" Mina said.

"You think so?"

"Jesus Christ, dude! Why are you so dense? Not even I'm that bad!" Kaminari huffed, his head thunking back against the side of the air hockey table.

"He's kinda right," Jirou admitted, if a bit sheepishly.

"Oh man..." Kirishima scratched at his head. "You really think I should do it right away?"

"Yes!" the three of them said together.

"Like, right now? And how? I've never done it before. And shouldn't I have some sort of plan first, like to go on an actual date? And what if he says no? What am I supposed to do after that? And—"

"He's not gonna say no, Kirishima," Mina said, matter of fact. "Maybe not right now. But soon. Like, by the end of the week soon, so that you can plan whatever you wanna do for this weekend when he says yes."

This weekend. Holy shit, it seemed so close. It was only Wednesday, but that still only gave him two—maybe three—days to figure all this out. Kirishima was already having a hard time wrapping his head around all this; he was seriously thinking about doing this, about finally asking Bakugou out—the guy he's had a serious damn crush on since practically the second he met him. He'd pictured himself with the guy about a million times, but now that it was about to probably, maybe, hopefully become a reality, it felt absolutely insane!

"Okay then... I-I guess I should come up with date ideas first?" he mumbled. "But I don't really want it to be something typical. I don't think Bakugou would be down for that."

"Oh, what about that music festival thing you told me about, babe?" Kaminari asked.

"Right! There's a live music festival happening at that outdoor mall a couple miles from here on Saturday. It's mostly a bunch of local bands, but admission is free," Jirou said. "Think he'd like something like that?"

Kirishima could just feel himself perk up. "Yeah, actually. He's told me about a bunch of concerts he's been to. What kind of music is it s'posed to be?"

"All sorts of stuff, but I think it'll mostly be alternative and rock stuff."

Kirishima nodded thoughtfully. Bakugou liked rock—and more so since Kirishima had been sharing a bunch of his own music with the guy. His go-to was more on the metal side, but he tended to keep an open mind about it. Besides, a music festival was pretty harmless for a first date, he thought; he knew he would definitely agree to something like that.

"That sounds good," he said. "Now I just gotta figure out how to ask him..."

"Why not just be straight up?" Kaminari suggested.

"Aw, but I think Kiri should be more creative about it," Mina said.

"Then what are your ideas, Miss Pinky?"

Their banter faded to the back of Kirishima's attention as he pondered himself, wracking his brain. He agreed that the way he asked should be more creative than something simple and straightforward; even if that was more Bakugou's style, it wasn't necessarily Kirishima's, and he wanted to take his roommate off guard when he did it.

And yet, as usual, all he could seem to think of were memes. Why his brain always reverted back to silly internet pictures was a mystery to him, but—

"Holy shit," he said.

Instantly, the others' conversation came to a halt and three sets of eyes landed right on him. "What?" they chorused together.

"I know how I'mma do it."

"How?"

"A meme."

⚜️

Come Friday, Kirishima was on edge all day and had trouble concentrating in class, especially seventh period science. He couldn't find it within himself to stop anxiously bouncing his leg, knowing just what he had planned for the end of eighth period.

He had it all ready. The photo was the latest one in his camera roll, and he planned on sending it about half an hour after the final bell without going straight to his room. Fortunately he had an excuse not to, seeing as he'd volunteered to help his eighth period teacher with making homework packets while he went to a meeting. It gave him the time and distance he needed; as much as he might've liked to see the initial reaction on Bakugou's face when he saw the image, he knew he was too chicken shit to actually be there, to send it to him when they were in the same room.

Fortunately, Bakugou didn't seem to notice anything off about him during science. Somehow, though, it was easier to stay calm when he was there, while his knee was resting right up against Kirishima's as normal. It was the only thing keeping him from doing the leg bouncing thing, and after their usual parting fist bump when they went their separate ways before eighth period, he felt more confident in himself (especially because Bakugou was starting to return his smiles with the fist bump whether he realized it or not, and it'd given him insane butterflies every time).

Stapling the packets together turned out to be completely mundane and was nothing more than repetition, leaving his mind to wander, to fly through as many different scenarios he could come up with once he hit the send button. While somehow he could picture what felt like a thousand different ways Bakugou would turn him down, ranging from an easy letdown to complete, angry rejection that would end their friendship, too, the scenarios in which he agreed left Kirishima with a phantom happiness that wouldn't allow him to chicken out.

Once he was finished with the packets, he planned to head to the art room and grab a few supplies to continue work on concept sketches for the bottom of his new board. If there was anything that could calm his nerves, it was art.

The last thing Kirishima did before leaving the room was hold his breath, pull up the image, and hope for the best as he tapped send.

Bakugou

The heel of Bakugou's hand was smashed into his cheek out of sheer boredom of stupid Deku and the weird half-and-half bastard along with Pink Cheeks and the frog girl, and he was beginning to wonder why he'd decided to hang out with these losers again in the first place. For once it was finally a nice fucking day, and because all of the other, better losers were off doing shit—Sero making up some test, Pikachu and Jirou off together... somewhere (gross), Pinky with some of her girl friends, and Dumb Hair helping some teacher after eighth period—and he didn't wanna be the idiot sitting at a table alone, he'd opted to stick himself with these morons. Half-and-half—er, Todoroki, or whatever, was busy drawing some weird shit on Deku's hand while the girls watched, and Bakugou himself was going back and forth between YouTube videos on his phone and being bored with them.

It wasn't until his phone buzzed with a notification from redriot did things finally start to get interesting.

At first he didn't really get what he was looking at. It was there, in front if him, and he knew what it was, but what the actual fuck did it mean? He squinted at it for a good, long minute, trying to figure out if it meant what he thought it did.

It was a picture of himself—one taken right from his Instagram, and one that he'd posted over winter break when he'd been bored at three in the morning. Below it was this:

"Are you alright, Kacchan?"

Deku's voice broke Bakugou out of his racing thoughts and brought him to the realization that his forehead was starting to ache from frowning so damn hard. Without a thought, he twisted the phone to face the others.

"The fuck does this mean?"

Even Todoroki paused in his drawing and leaned in to see the screen.

"Is that from Kirishima?" Deku asked.

"Yeah."

In the next second, fucking Pink Cheeks started giggling, and Frog Girl wasn't far behind her. Even Deku grinned while Todoroki gave him a hopeless look.

"What?!" he spat.

"Do you... really not get it?" Deku asked; clearly the little fucker was holding back his own laughter, and Bakugou was two damn seconds away from punching those shitty freckles right off of his damn face!

"Obviously fucking not, you dweeb!" he said.

"Uhm... it looks like Kirishima's trying to ask you out, Kacchan... uh, using a meme, I guess?" He reached up with his free hand to scratch his head.

Are you fucking kidding me?

He wasn't fucking stupid. That's what he'd thought. He just... didn't know if he could believe it. He wanted to say it felt sudden and that it hardly made sense but fuck, that would be a lie. After the past several days since that shitty Pocky game stupid Pikachu pressured them into playing, he found himself getting closer, and not just when it came to their relationship. Physically. At first it'd been completely subconscious and unintentional but shit, he couldn't shake the feeling of liking being so close to dumb hair, so he hadn't stopped himself.

And neither had Kirishima. Add that on top of all the stupid (but kind of cute, if he was being honest) memes (a fuckton of which were flirty, but that he'd just brushed off and chalked up to a number of other things) and the fact that Dumb Hair did supposedly have some sort of crush on someone ('you-know-who', as Bakugou recalled from Sero) and the fact that Pikachu probably knew it and pulled out the Pocky with a plot in mind...

Holyshit holyshit holyshit!!

Bakugou was pretty sure he was about to explode, and the combustion would start in his racing heart.

"Gotta go," he muttered, yanking the phone back and standing up to head back to the dorm without a backwards glance. From there he practically stormed across the damn campus, weaving his way around anyone who got in his way and ignoring any dirty looks send his way. He needed to confront Kirishima about this, and now.

And yet as soon as he made it to the entrance to the boys' dorm that was right near his room, he slowed down, even paused with his hand on the handle to yank the door open. It wasn't like Bakugou Katsuki to get nervous—about anything—and yet there he was, with a strange uneasiness surrounding him, butterflies filling his stomach and his heart racing at a million goddamn miles an hour. What the fuck was he eve supposed to say to Dumb Hair when he saw him? Was he just supposed to give him a straight answer? What the hell did that fucker expect?

Fuck, he needed to stop thinking so much. He needed to find Kirishima and ask him what the fuck he meant, and if the idiots Bakugou had just ditched were right in interpreting it.

When he finally mustered the balls to push the door to his room open, he found Kirishima just dropping his backpack in its usual place next to his bed. Clearly he'd just gotten back, too, and he didn't notice Bakugou's presence until he turned around and saw him standing in the doorway, gripping the knob with white knuckles.

Just seeing the little fucker's face caused Bakugou to forget how to speak. All the questions that'd been swarming through his mind vanished. He didn't even know where to begin.

"Uhm... hey, Bakugou," said Kirishima, a nervous edge to his tone that likewise made itself known in his slight, crooked smile.

"...hey," Bakugou managed after a thick swallow. And Jesus fuck, if Shitty Hair couldn't hear his racing heart from all the way across the room he'd be damned.

"Are... you alright, dude?"

Was this asshole planning on playing stupid?

Bakugou found his hands to be shaking, just slightly, when he yanked his phone back out. The message was still up on the screen when he unlocked it, and he thrust it in Kirishima's direction. "The fuck is this supposed to mean?" he blurted, hoping to high fucking hell that the heat filling his neck, his cheeks, his ears wasn't actually visible—that he wasn't beet fucking red like Pikachu had been the other day.

Somehow, Dumb Hair relaxed a bit, his smile widening. His ears were pinker than normal, that was for fucking sure, and his eyes dropped to the floor. "Um... well..." he started slowly, hand reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. After a second his eyes flicked back up to Bakugou's. "I was... kinda hopin' you'd be down to... maybe, uh..." He cleared his throat, clearly having trouble getting the question out. "...to go on a date with me?"

Bakugou couldn't tell if Kirishima's voice cracked a little on the word 'date' or if he'd just imagined it, but fuck, he couldn't get over how damn cute the idiot was, head inclined a bit as he peered up at him from underneath his eyelashes and that tiny scar on his right eyelid, one hand still on his neck while the other rested in his pocket and the subtlest, lightest dusting of a rosy pink across the apples of his cheeks.

Bakugou nearly dropped his phone when his arm fell back to his side. Blood was rushing in his ears so loudly he was questioning whether or not he'd even heard Kirishima right, or if he was even awake.

All the memes. All the stupid teasing from the other losers. All the subtle little compliments from him that Bakugou had brushed off and chalked up to his being the nice guy he was. The fact that Kirishima never pulled away when their shoulders or hands brushed, when their legs rested together underneath the table or when they sat probably a little closer than what was normal when studying together or were next to each other during meals or in the lounge. The fact that he'd agreed to do that god forsaken Pocky game with him, hadn't pulled away, and even said he didn't think it was bad. It'd all been so much fucking more than that.

Bakugou was an idiot. He was the you-know-who. On some level he'd known that—known that the weird, Voldemort looking fucker he'd been picturing in place next to Kirishima as the person he'd had some sort of middle school crush on or whatever—was him. And standing there now with Kirishima looking at him like that, with those big eyes he'd unknowingly been falling for over the past several months, he had no idea why he'd been denying it.

"Bakugou?" Kirishima mumbled, his hand falling back to his side and stuffing into his pocket like the other when Bakugou hadn't responded, and thus breaking him out of his shitty mind babble.

And then the answer was pouring out of Bakugou's mouth without a second thought. "Fuck yeah, I wanna go on a date with you."

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some of you have some theories about angst in this fic and guys, it's not gonna be angsty, lmao. there's one thing i have planned that's gonna be kinda "aw :(" but it's fairly small and not super impactful on the fic. i'm saving all my angst for I Will Never Find Another You TvT

and, again, thank you for all the love on this ♥