Chapter Text
Fake Dating
Kyoka Jirou isn’t your usual barista. She works in a coffee shop by day, but sings in a rock band by night. She’s kickass and she knows it. Unfortunately, she isn’t the only one who knows this.
Being a good-looking, confident young woman means she has to deal with a fair amount of creeps in both of her workplaces. It’s always the same thing — people trying to get her name, her number, saying inappropriate innuendos or stupid jokes.
Usually she handles things herself just fine. As said before, she’s kickass and she knows it; so she kicks their asses to the curb without thinking twice.
But this new guy freaks her out.
He’s big as in big . At least two feet taller than her, biceps bigger than her thighs, tattoos of explosions and fire covering every exposed inch of skin. Even his face looks mean. He’s always scowling, a deep frown on his forehead, a snarl on his lips. She doesn’t even understand half the things he says, because he just growls words under his breath. It’s terrifying.
And he’s stalking her.
She first met him at one of her shows. He approached, tried to snarl at her, yelling a bunch of profanities. She ran away as quickly as she could, without answering anything to him, praying he got a hint and never showed up at her gigs again.
But now, two days later, he showed up at the coffee shop.
He’s by the counter, trying to get her attention. Jirou is doing her best to ignore him, pumping out lattes as if her life depended on it. She doesn’t allow herself even one second to breathe; once an order is done, she’s already starting the next. She thought that if she left him waiting long enough, he’d give up and leave, but it’s already been over an hour and he’s still there, looking at her with an increasingly angrier face.
So, yeah, she is scared. Very scared.
As the end of her shift comes near, Kyoka gets more agitated. She can’t keep working after her shift is done, it’ll create a huge commotion of her coworkers trying to understand what’s going on. She doesn’t want to make a big deal out of it, because the guy may try to demand explanations from her in one of her shows.
Feeling like she doesn’t have any choice, she goes for the one tried-and-true way of getting creeps off her — ask for a male friend to tell them she’s his girlfriend. It’s a solution that rubs her feminist side the wrong way, but she can’t deny that it usually works. Asshole guys just respect other guys; if she’s ‘taken’, they tend to back off.
Lucky for Kyoka, one of her best friends is also working there that day.
“Hey, Izuku,” she approaches, talking in a hushed voice. “Can I ask you for a favor?”
“Of course,” Izuku beams at her. She knew he would, Izuku is a sweetheart who never says no to a friend in need.
“There’s a guy here bothering me. Can you tell him you’re my boyfriend so he leaves me alone?”
Izuku frowns angrily, his chubby cheeks puffing up in indignation.
“Some guys really can’t take a hint,” he says, shaking his head. “Don’t worry, I’ve got this. I’ll make sure he leaves you in peace. Who is he?”
Kyoka points to the big, terrifying guy by the counter and to his credit, Izuku doesn’t seem to think twice. He marches towards the hulking figure with purpose, dead-set in sending him away.
During one glorious second, Kyoka breathes in relief. This should be the end of it. Izuku will tell the guy to not mess with his girl and she won’t ever have to see that barbarian ever again.
But as Izuku gets close to the man, Koyka realizes what she has done. She has sent the sweetest, most gentle and warm guy she ever met to face someone who looks like he’s running away from the police in 4 countries. It’s a ghastly sight.
Izuku is about two feet shorter than the monstrous man. And it’s not only the height difference — Izuku is a little chubby, has soft, pink cheeks speckled with freckles, wears a silly superhero hoodie, and looks like the most huggable person on Earth. The other guy is whatever happens when you mix up Hercules with death metal; all black clothes, chains, bulging muscles, and thirst for blood.
If anything goes wrong, the guy will smash Izuku like a plump fly.
Oh man,what has Koyka done?!
***
Izuku twists the hem of his apron in his pudgy hands. Sure, when Jirou asked for help, he was glad to go to her rescue, but now... Well, now he’s facing the biggest, strongest, and most handsome man he has ever seen and he doesn’t know how to act.
For a second, after she pointed to the blond behemoth, Izuku thought of running. There was no way he could face that man! But he couldn’t. He couldn’t leave Jirou to fend for herself. He’s not the type of guy that saves his skin and leaves a friend behind! He’s the type to protect his friends from annoying guys! No matter how scary they look...
So he steeled his resolve and marched on.
“Ex- Excuse me, s-sir,” Izuku stutters with every ounce of courage he can muster. “Y-you sh-shouldnt bo-bother our- our staff!”
The guy looks him up and down several times, as if he doesn’t even believe Izuku is talking to him. It’s unnerving and makes Izuku want to hide under the closest table.
Then the guy says “Oh really?” in the most challenging tone Izuku has ever heard. “And what are you going to do about it?”
Clearly asking nicely won’t work. Izuku will have to be strict with him.
“If yo-you keep bo-bothering my- my girlfriend, I’ll have to- to ask you to leave!” he says with a confidence he’s far from feeling.
That seems to put the guy off slightly.
“Girlfriend?” he asks, visibly confused.
“Ye-yes, the- the girl you ha-have been bothering. She- she’s my girlfriend and- and I want you to back off!” Izuku brings forth every single shred of aggressivity he has when he lands that line — though, granted, he doesn’t have much aggressivity overall.
“Fine,” the guy answers grumpily. “What-fucking-ever. Don’t need to pull a Detroit Smash on me, nerd.”
And with just that one line, the big scary guy immediately transforms into a dear old friend in Izuku’s eyes.
“Do you read All Might?”
“Yeah... I mean, it’s nerd shit, but it’s good,” the guy awkwardly answers, rubbing the back of his head.
“Detroit smash is actually my favorite move of his! I mean, everyone likes Texas Smash and surely the United States of Smash is grand but...” And then Izuku starts talking and doesn’t stop. He delves deep into all All Might’s signature moves and even a few others from other heroes of the series, and the big scary guy just nods along, offering small comments.
Izuku only comes back to himself when the line in the register gets long enough to reach them and he remembers he should be manning the other till.
“Oh! I’m so sorry! Look at me talking your ear out!” he says when he realizes what he has done. “I should go! And you- don’t bother the staff!” he says as a last warning before running back to work.
Later that day, Izuku thinks back to the interaction between him and the big, blond man and realizes he might have gotten lucky. That could have easily gone sour and he doesn’t know what he’d have done.
Well, in any case, now that’s solved and he doubts the blond man will show up again.
***
So, Izuku was wrong. That was not the last he heard from the blond. Much on the contrary.
The very next day, Kacchan (funny name for someone as big and threatening as him, but Izuku was too polite to question) showed up again. This time Izuku was proactive and went to talk to him before he could even spot Jirou. And after a few more warnings (“I really hope you’re not here to bother my girlfriend again!”), they fell in the same easy conversation as the day before. Kacchan ordered a coffee and they talked while Izuku prepared drinks. It was quite fun!
And then it became a kind of routine. Every couple of days or so, Kacchan shows up, asks for a black coffee, and talks to Izuku.
Their conversation quickly goes beyond just talking about comics. They share their works (grad student for Izuku and firefighter for Kacchan — it explains the fire-themed tattoos!), their hobbies (mostly comics for Izuku, but Kacchan is in a band), and everything else that came to mind. But, of course, Izuku never forgets to remind Kacchan that he shouldn’t bother his girlfriend.
Kacchan doesn’t like when Izuku mentions Jirou. He always makes an annoyed face when Izuku tells him to not bother her, but he respects the warnings and that’s why Izuku keeps giving them.
“Gotta go, Deku. Time to head back to the station,” Kacchan says his farewell that day.
“You know my name is Izuku, Kacchan,” he chastises as does every day.
“I do, but you also do look like a Deku,” Kacchan smirks, devilishly handsome.
“Well, do be on your way! You shouldn’t get late to work!”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fucking going,” he grunts half-heartedly.
“And don’t bother my girlfriend on your way out!”
Kacchan huffs and rolls his eyes. “What-fucking-ever,” he grumbles.
“See you soon, Kacchan!”
“See you, Deku.”
Kacchan is kind of weird, but Izuku likes him.
***
“Have youtalked to her?” Mina asks with little to no patience.
“I’m working on it,” Katsuki answers without taking his eyes off his drum set.
“IT’S BEEN OVER A MONTH, BAKUGOU!” Mina screeches.
“I fucking know that, Racoon! I go there every fucking day!” he barks back.
“Exactly! You go there every day and you still haven’t managed to ask her if she wants to join our band?” Mina asks in complete disbelief.
“I’m working on it!” he yells, angrily.
“Really, dude, this is getting ridiculous,” Kaminari joins Mina. “It can’t be that hard.”
“I told you idiots already, her boyfriend doesn’t let me fucking talk to her!” Katsuki defends himself.
“I’m so done with this excuse! We need a new vocalist! I suck at vocals! I want back on the bass!” Mina whines.
“You know you will keep doing back vocals anyway, bitch,” Katsuki accuses.
“Hey, hey! Calm down, everyone!” Kirishima interrupts them. “I’m sure Bakugou is doing everything he can. Her boyfriend must be super jealous, or strict or something,” the redhead ponders, and Katsuki looks away to not show the guilt in his eyes.
“Yeah, but after a whole month I’d expect that Bakugou would have managed to convince him that he isn’t interested in Jirou like that,” Mina huffs. “Come on! You’re gayer than a feather boa! Why haven’t you told him that?”
“It’s not that simple, bitch!” Katsuki defends himself.
Because, yeah, it’s not that simple.
Sure, from the way he approached her and then followed her to her workplace, it was understandable that Jirou would get spooked. And sending her boyfriend to deal with a stalker is a pretty standard move. But that’s when things got complicated...
Because her boyfriend is exactly Katsuki’s type.
Deku is cute and fluffy and soft and squishable and Katsuki wants to eat him up. Their nerdy talks easily became the best part of his day — and the farewell when Deku reminds Katsuki to ‘not bother his girlfriend’ the worst.
Trust Katsuki to crush on a straight, committed guy.
And yeah, maybe Katsuki hasn’t been working too hard to convince Deku he’s just interested in Jirou as a vocalist for his band. But can you blame him? It’d be hard to work with the girlfriend of his crush! And, after inviting Jirou to the band, Katsuki wouldn’t have any more excuses to talk to Deku often.
Still, his bandmates are starting to realize that there’s something wrong in this situation and the pressure is getting heavy on him.
“We have a gig next week,” Mina whines “At this pace, I’ll have to sing in it again!”
“Yeah, even if Jirou agreed to join the band, one week isn’t long enough to get her ready for a show,” Kaminari agrees.
“Hey! I have an idea! What if Katsuki invites Jirou and her boyfriend for next week’s show? This way we can all show them this is strictly about music and that no one wants to mess up with their relationship!” Kirishima offers with his big, dumb, supportive smile.
“That could work,” Mina agrees, nodding.
“Yeah, I guess it’s our best plan, since just letting Explodey talk to the guy hasn’t worked so far,” Kaminari quips.
For a second, Katsuki thinks of protesting, but he really doesn’t have a good argument for why he can’t invite the couple to their show. ‘I’ll be too distracted checking out Jirou’s boyfriend’s ass to play’ isn’t going to go well with the others. So he just agrees to invite them both on his next visit to the cafe.
Katsuki is screwed.
***
Unfortunately, against Katsuki’s best judgment, the next time he went by the coffee shop, he talked to Deku and said what he should have said from the get-go.
“So, you know I’m in a band, right?” he grumbled halfheartedly.
Honestly, he was hoping that some other barista would call Deku and cut their time short, but he was out of luck. And if he came back to the station without having invited Jirou to see their band, he’d find his bunk bed covered in ice cubes. Mina had threatened to do that before and he’s sure she’d go through with it.
“Of course! With your coworkers, right?” Deku asked with his usual warm smile.
He looked so damn cute and innocent. Katsuki wanted to bite the smile right off his lips.
“Yeah, those fuckers… So, we’re out of a vocalist and my bandmates were wondering if your girlfriend would like to join us.”
“Oh, Jirou?” he tilted his head cutely. “Well, I’m not sure… I mean, she’s already in a band.”
“Yeah, but they fucking suck,” Katsuki said straight to the point, making Deku look at him surprised. “Listen, there’s this gig this Saturday. We’ll be playing. We fucking rock. Way harder than the pussies she’s singing for today. You two should swing by and check it out.”
And to Katsuki’s infinite astonishment, Deku agreed.
“Sure!” he chirped. “I mean… Sure, I’ll invite her to see you guys playing this Saturday. I can’t guarantee she’ll want to join, though.”
“She will,” Katsuki grumbled, annoyed. “Once she hears us, she’ll join.”
Katsuki wished that wasn’t true, but he knew his band was good — and the band Jirou sang for wasn’t. It wasn’t even a competition. That’s why he was postponing fixing the misunderstanding; if he thought Jirou wouldn’t join the band, there wouldn’t be such a big mess to begin with.
After Deku’s agreement, Katsuki quickly scribbled the time and place for the show on a piece of napkin and bid goodbye. Part of him wanted to enjoy his last time talking to Deku without too much guilt, but another part of him was telling him to cut his losses. Things were about to turn bad for him and it was in his best interest to not let his friends realize why the hell it took him so long to figure this shit out with Jirou and her boyfriend.
So, when Saturday arrived, Katsuki had a whole battle plan on how to not let any one of his friends realize how much he and Deku talked. He’d be his most grumpy and unapproachable self, stick to the back, don’t make eye contact, don’t say a full word (much less a full sentence), and basically give every non-verbal cue possible that he wasn’t in the mood for socialization. If he was lucky, Mina would take over the conversation and, in an attempt to charm Jirou, not include Katsuki in the conversation whatsoever.
It was a solid plan. His friends know better than to force Katsuki to socialize when he’s in “one of his moods” as they say. And, in the loud mess that is the pub they play, it’d be easy to fall back in the shadows and let everything play out without his interference.
Too bad fucking Deku didn’t get the memo.
As Katsuki is distracted, setting his drums, Jirou and Deku arrive — and they go straight towards him. Katsuki only realizes what happened when it’s already too late to hide.
“Hi, Kacchan! We came!” Deku yells, approaching him with Jirou by his side.
His voice breaks through the noise in the pub and every single one of his bandmates perk up and look at the newcomers. Katsuki looks in silent panic as Deku keeps getting closer, a big, dumb smile taking over his whole face as Jirou walks by his side, looking slightly suspicious.
But before Katsuki has to actually do something, Mina takes the lead.
“Hi! You’re Jirou, right? And you must be her boyfriend!”, she greets them enthusiastically.
“Hey,” Jirou says, still side-eyeing Katsuki.
“Hi! I’m Izuku!” Deku says in his usual warm and welcoming way.
There’s absolutely no way in hell anyone will believe this guy was being a hardass and preventing Katsuki from even talking to his girlfriend. Deku looks like the exact opposite of “mean and controlling boyfriend”. Katsuki’s lies crumbled to dust the moment he smiled and greeted everyone.
“This is Kiri, Kirishima,” Mina pulls Shitty Hair to the conversation and then Dunce Face. “And this is Kami.”
“Hey! Glad you two could make it!” Kirishima welcomes them happily.
“Kaminari Denki, my dear friends”, Dunce Face says with a stupid curtsy.
“Izuku here said you guys wanted me to check out your sound,” Jirou says, getting down to business.
“Yes! Kacchan said they’d like you to join the band!” Deku agrees like an overly-excited puppy. Never before Katsuki wanted to kiss and kill someone at the same time.
“ Kacchan said, hm?” Mina eyes him with squinted eyes, showing that she’s onto his bullshit, before turning back to Jirou with a smile as if nothing had happened. “Well, that’s precisely it! We’re out of a vocalist and I’ve been filling the spot for now. But I really prefer to do backing vocals and play the bass. We saw you singing one night over a month ago and we knew you’d be the perfect piece for our band!”
“We sent Bakugou to talk to you that night, but we understand there was some… hm… misunderstanding.” Every word that comes out of Kirishima’s mouth makes Katsuki want to strangle him. “But we want to reassure you that there’s nothing sketchy going on! We totally respect you guys’ relationship and we’d never do anything to jeopardize it!”
“Yeah, dudes! We just want Jirou in the band!” Kaminari agrees.
“Yeah, I got that…” Jirou says, still looking suspiciously at Katsuki. “In any case, watching you guys play is the best way for me to see if I think this can work.”
“Great! We’re just finishing setting everything up and we’ll start the show in a bit!” Kirishima says.
“We’ll go down the bar to grab a beer. See you guys at the end,” Jirou answers.
“Good luck, guys! Have a good show, Kacchan!” Deku says, waving happily, before leaving with Jirou.
And the moment they’re out of earshot, everyone in the band turns to Katsuki with murder in their eyes.
“What the fuck, Baku?” Mina screeches.
“What?” he snaps back angrily.
“You know damn well what! That guy did not threaten you to not talk to Jirou for a whole month!”
“He specifically told me to not talk to her,” Katsuki growls through his teeth.
And that isn’t a lie. The issue is that Katsuki never tried to explain himself to Deku.
“Don’t fucking try me, Explodey! You thought we wouldn’t notice that Izuku is just your type?!”
“And you even gave him your fuckboy nickname, bro,” Kaminari teases. “We know you just go by Kacchan when you’re hoping to get laid.”
To that, Katsuki has no retort. Yes, he knows he can look a bit intimidating to some people and, sometimes, when he’s interested in a guy, he introduces himself with his cutesy childhood nickname to seem more approachable. Understanding that there’s no saving face, Katsuki turns back to his drums without saying a word.
He’s half-expecting Mina to keep yelling at him or Kaminari to keep making stupid jokes. But turns out, it’s Kirishima who takes issue with Katsuki’s attitude.
“Bro, totally unmanly,” the redhead says, shaking his head. “He’s Jirou’s boyfriend. You can’t come between them! Besides, if everything goes right, she’ll be in our band after today and things can get pretty uncomfortable if she realizes you’re into him.”
“I fucking know, ok?” he hisses. “I’m not doing any fucking thing! We just talked, alright?”
“Talked?” Kirishima squints.
Katsuki should feel insulted by his friend’s skepticism that he spent a whole month chatting up some guy he had no plans of hooking up. But Katsuki knows he’s not the most social person and everyone knows Katsuki doesn’t do idle chatting.
“Yeah. Talked. He’s into All Might and shit,” he grumbles, without meeting Kirishima’s eyes.
“I guess he looks the type…”
Though Izuku hasn’t come to the show wearing superhero merch, he still looks as dorky as ever. He’s wearing his usual khaki shorts, a green plaid shirt buttoned all the way to his chin, and his big, dumb red sneakers. Side by side with his girlfriend, who seems to be going for the title of Gothic Princess of the night, it looks like the oddest of couples. But who is Katsuki to judge? It’s not like his wardrobe has any color other than black with hints of orange and there’s nothing he wants more than to look weird by Deku’s side.
“Oh shit, you like him,” Kirishima says with doom in his voice.
“What? I don’t-” Katsuki tries to deny, but his friend doesn’t let him.
“No. Don’t even try, bro. I saw your face just now. And I’ve known you since high school and have never seen you make this face.”
“I’m gonna explode your dumb face,” Katsuki threatens — because if he can’t deny, he might as well threaten people with bodily harm.
Kirishima doesn’t heed to him, though. “Oh my God, what are you going to do? What are we going to do? This is the worst situation possible! Mina is going-”
“Are you guys ready to start?” The pub manager approaches the stage and interrupts their conversation.
Mina and Kaminari who were finishing setting up their instruments, unaware of their bandmates’ conversation, answer for them.
“Yes!”
“We’re ready!”
Katsuki decides to take this cue to get away from Kirishima’s freakout. “Let’s fucking play.”
“Right, alright,” Kirishima nods. “We can talk about this later.”
Or not. Katsuki would be pretty happy to not talk about this ever again.
Things run smoothly after that, though. Besides what it may look like, his band is quite professional and wouldn’t let anything get in the way of them performing a good show. Mina easily takes the front of the stage, greets the public, and then they’re playing.
And to keep things professional, Katsuki does his best to not look towards the bar, where Deku and his girlfriend are. The only time Katsuki lost hold of himself and looked towards them, Deku happily waved at him like the complete dork that he is and Katsuki felt the urgent need to kiss the living shit out of him. So he didn’t make this mistake again during the rest of the show.
Their band, the Sound Saviors, plays a mixture of classic rock and hard rock. The kind of shit Katsuki can bang away on the drums to his heart’s desire. And today he takes this opportunity to release all his anxiety and frustration on his drums. The rest of the band follows his lead and they put on one hell of a show. The public loves every single second of it.
So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that, when the show ends, Jirou and Deku approach the band and the girl seems to be impressed.
“Not bad. I really dig the setlist,” she praises them.
“You guys are really great!” Deku says excitedly, a big smile pushing up his blushing cheeks.
“I’m glad you guys liked it!” Kirishima smiles back.
“Liked? I think you’re my favorite band now!” Deku answers and Katsuki looks away to contain the need to smother him in kisses.
“There’s only one thing that could make it better,” Jirou says, making everyone look at her confused. “A vocalist who doesn’t prefer being on the back vocals.”
“Ahh!” Mina yells happily. “So you’re joining?! You’re joining, right? Please tell me you’re joining!”
“Yes, I’m joining,” Jirou answers, chuckling.
Oh shit. Katsuki’s life just got way fucking harder.