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46. We are terrible for each other, and, yes, we are a disaster. But tell me your heart doesn’t race for a hurricane or a burning building. I’d rather die terrified than live forever. (mistakes aren’t always regrets)
Their respective hero offices had decided to join forces for an indefinite amount of time, which meant that Ochako was stuck working in the same office as Bakugou Katsuki for the unforeseeable future. She had fretted about her new working situation throughout the weeks leading up to it and had often sought the advice of her former Class 1-A friends on how she could possibly manage seeing her ex-boyfriend everyday at work.
They’d given her their two cents with varying degrees of helpfulness (she’d have to remind Mina later that “just kissing him” wasn’t really a game plan) but the reality was that Bakugou was surprisingly professional about the whole thing. Sure, when their teams had met up for the first time he was still his characteristically rude and obnoxious self but after the introductions had finished, each person had proceeded to work on their own office tasks in relative peace until duty called.
And it was in the heat of battle that she had to remind herself not to fall in love with him again.
Bakugou was an artisan of the battlefield, an unmatched maestro in the art of war. His raw power alone was enough to shake the earth and split the heavens and make his enemies fall to their knees in fear but it was his quick-wittedness and the level of tact behind his every move that always stole her breath away.
There was something captivating about watching him fight, something about the fire and smoke that made her heart race and made the blood scream in her veins. There was something envying and infectious about seeing the way he commanded a fight with fire and brimstone, something that made her want to rip into the battlefield as well and bring meteors and asteroids crashing down all around them.
Fighting with him, she’d come to learn that the adrenaline was addicting and the recklessness was contagious.
And it was that very recklessness that had led her to sitting in his office with a sprained ankle.
“Sorry about this,” Ochako apologizes sheepishly from her perch on top of his desk as Bakugou wordlessly riffled around his office searching for an ice pack. She holds up her foot and examines the bruised patches of violet and yellow blooming around her swollen ankle.
“Hmph,” he grunts in a way that roughly translated to ‘it’s fine’. Ochako can’t help but grin at the contrast between his standoffish response and his tireless efforts to make sure she was ok.
“That was some crazy-ass shit you pulled back there, roundface,” he finally speaks up when he finds the ice pack and tosses it to her. She catches it.
“I learned from the best,” she grins at him, eyes crinkling and apple-cheeks glowing red with her rose-tinted blush.
“Heh,” he smirks in agreement, “damn right you did!”
He plops into the chair in front of her and gingerly takes her swollen foot in one hand and holds out the other for the ice pack. She hands it to him and watches as he presses it against the swollen area.
“Thanks,” she chokes out as her growing blush burns across her cheeks. She’d forgotten how his touch, although rough and callused, would always send electricity crackling through her nerves.
He remains silent and refuses to look up, eyes hidden behind the stubborn tufts of his ash-blonde hair.
“How’ve you been?” She ventures to break the awkward silence.
“Fine,” he murmurs and she thinks that’s the end of it before he continues, “you?”
“Good,” she blinks, surprised that he was willing to go along with her small talk, “I’m…good…”
He hums in acknowledgement before his next question cracks down like a thunderbolt, “and that fucking nerd?”
Her heart leaps into her throat and she grows silent, unsure of where this question was coming from and how to respond. “He’s fine,” she finally answers with a fake laugh but stops, briefly contemplating her next words before saying, “but we’re not together anymore if…that’s what you’re asking…”
She can feel an involuntary twitch in his hand in response. “That’s not what I was asking.”
“Oh,” her gaze flits downward in horrified embarrassment and she can feel the angry blush creeping back across her cheeks, “right.”
The awkward silence returns and Ochako squeezes her eyes shut, both in an effort not to look at him and also to calm her frantic heart. All of the words that she wanted to say, that she had never said before, burned like coal in her throat: I’m sorry. I should have never said those things to you that night. I should have never hurt you like that. I—.
“I missed you.”
Her eyes pop wide open. Wait. Who’s voice was that? It sounded like her own but…it couldn’t be. There’s no way that she would say that out loud. But one glance at Bakugou’s wide-eyed expression was enough to convince her that yes, she had just gone and told her ex that she missed him.
“I-I mean!” She was in full crisis mode now, with her face beet-red, hands flailing and mind buzzing with panicked thoughts, none of which were discernible, “t-talking with you? Yea! Talking with you! I missed talking with you!”
He doesn’t say anything, just stares at her with eyes as wide as saucers and mouth slightly agape as Ochako struggles to pull herself together.
“I-I shouldn’t have said anything.” She can feel hot, embarrassed tears burn in the back of her eyes and a horrible lump rising in her throat. She had to go, go far away from this, from him. “I’m sorry, I should g—.”
The words die in her throat as Bakugou flies to his feet and wraps her in a tight embrace. She can feel his muscled chest, heaving with heavy, desperate breaths as it pressed against hers.
She blinks in surprise. “Bakugou-kun—?”
“Katsuki.”
“W-what?”
His arms around her tighten and his breathes, thin and shallow, are hot against her collar as he buries his face into the crook of her neck.
“I’d told you to call me Katsuki, roundface.”
Realization dawns on her. “That…that was ages ago,” she whispers against the base of his neck, her eyelids fluttering shut as she measures the seconds with the erratic staccato of the blood pounding in his veins, “Katsuki…I…”
“Don’t!” He pulls away from her and his crimson eyes quickly scan hers, searching for something, yearning for something, before his face crumples into something more desperate, more pained, “don’t…” His mouth hangs open as he physically struggles to dislodge the words stuck in his throat, “don’t…go.”
Ochako blinks in surprise. Bakugou had never been this forthright with his emotions and had never been one to beg for anything from anyone. And yet here he was, melting like liquid fire in her arms, all heavy limbs and heavy breaths and heavy-hearted. He was offering himself at her altar, practically buckling to his knees in a desperate prayer: break me, burn me, destroy me, like pestle and mortar, grind my bones to ashes to ashes to ashes. Anything. Just don’t leave.
Oh, how terrible they were for each other, she thinks, as she lifts her hand to caress the slope of his cheek, and yet there was nothing more wonderful than when they were together, skin burning like flames against skin.
She takes in a deep breath, her chest rising as her lungs swell with the familiar scent of him, and the foolishness of her next words rattle in her bones like a curse.
“I won’t,” she answers his prayer in a breathless whisper. Her words taste like an apology, a belated “I’m sorry” for the mistakes of the past and she knew that this too was a mistake but they were the most beautiful mistake she’d ever made and one she would willingly make over and over again.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Fighting with him, being with him, she’d come to learn that the adrenaline was addicting and the recklessness was contagious.
And it was that very recklessness that had her lean forward and press her lips against his in a kiss that promised that if they were going to burn, it was going to be in a brilliant and terrible blaze of starlight and glory.