Work Text:
There's a clatter to your left, the sound of metal clanging against metal, then of plastic being torn to shreds and waded through afterwards. A stray cat, you guess, or maybe a raccoon. More and more have been creeping out lately. You hope it finds whatever it is it's looking for, though the disaster of a town you live in seldom grants wishes.
The wind howls with each step you take down the winding path. There's a lull when you pass the old bakery, and your fingers wriggle to zip up your jacket before the gale returns tenfold. You should probably invest in a scarf — one that's so long you could cut gloves out of it, too, to save some money. For now, though, you settle your hands back in your pockets and trudge home.
There's a group loitering by the entrance of your apartment building, young adults who have nothing better to do than share a cigarette and pass around a can of beer, as if all that matters in the moment are the laughs they share, not the volume of their raucousness, nor the cold that nips at your cheeks and makes you wade through their huddle.
The sign plastered across the lift is crooked, but you already know what it says in that chipped away, bold font. “Out of order” for the third week running. At least the long walk up the staircase helps warm you up.
Light filters out through the gaps between the door and its frame, and you would probably be more alarmed considering the area you live in, had you not already known who was behind the wood. You don't remember him texting you that he'd be here, so it must have been a spur of the moment choice. You just hope he's not covered in blood like the last time he decided to surprise you.
You almost think he's dead with how he lies on your sofa, head resting on the back of it as he tilts his head to the heavens, as still as an ocean, calm unlike the breeze that flitters into the room.
"Hey," you murmur, toeing off your shoes and hanging up your bag and coat.
The first thing you do is give him a quick once-over. He's fine, thankfully. No more blood on your floor, no more staples poking out of your sofa. The next step is shutting the windows.
His response is a mere grunt until you sit beside him. Then, his eyes are fluttering open and he's tipping his head the slightest degree to look at you.
"Shit day?"
You sigh. "That obvious?"
There's a smirk tugging gently at the corner of his lip, and his eyes are so intense — they always are, that vibrant, melancholy blue telling stories he can't quite voice yet — staring as you slump into his lap and avoid his gaze.
Smoke weaves through the threads of his trousers, ash lingering around the tattered holes in the fabric, but it's comforting. It's something you've grown to find a home in. Blazing fire no longer reminds you of devastation and despair, families wailing for help, loss and death and hopelessness; instead, you think of hands that drum along your cheek to an unheard song, you think of fingers slotting with your own cold hands, warming them up without needing to ask.
"You eaten?" Dabi asks, fiddling with the belt loops on your trousers, letting his hands wander just beneath the hem before they move away entirely, poking at the very top of your knee only to find their way back to your belt loops.
"Not since lunch."
It's nearing midnight now, and you're beyond surprised that your stomach hasn't started growling for food already. You should probably make something to eat, but you’re savoring the feeling of being in his arms; it's been a while since you've been this intimate with him.
"I brought food."
Your hand finds its way to his, and he stops moving, letting you cover the back of his hand with yours. There's a teasing smile on your face as you let the cold from your fingertips sink into his unmarred skin, trailing them down to the scarred flesh of his wrist, tracing the fatigued metal found there.
"As in… You bought food with your own money, or you robbed a helpless little food stall on your way here?"
He pinches your thumb in retaliation, but his touch is as harmless as always. "Does it matter?"
You shake your head at his reply, but share his fond smile.
"Have you eaten?" you repeat his question.
"Nah. I would have, but someone's—" he jerks his knee up slightly to jolt your body where you're still sprawled across his lap "—in my way."
"Poor you."
Another pinch, to your hip this time, before his hand eases you up.
He goes to the kitchen and you stay behind, watching him open the fridge and flit between the cupboards, wondering whether or not you should ask why he's here.
He's carrying a box when he returns, a single fork balanced on top of the lid. Just a plain, white box with no emblem on it to hint at what it is or where he's gotten it from.
He hands it to you, and the curiosity must be evident in your furrowed brows; all he supplies you with is: "Not stolen. Paid for it myself 'n everything, so even if you hate it, we're finishing it."
(You both know he doesn't mean that. He's never been averse to taking your leftovers. He's grown to like all the foods you hate, if only for the way your face sours when you taste them, and then sweetens like sugar as you offer it to him, instead.)
All your questions are answered when you open the box and see 'happy birthday' written in perfect cursive atop a layer of fresh cream; succulent, fresh fruits skirt along the edge of the cake and blue icing drips around to complete the decor.
(He had told you he didn't remember when his birthday was. "Childhood trauma," he'd brushed off with a laugh, "never really celebrated that shit at home."
Your birthday became his, too.)
But it wasn't your birthday today.
He's staring down at the cake when you turn to him, awfully fascinated by the elegant piping, too busy eyeing up the fresh fruit to notice your mouth open and shut as you think of what to say. Instead, you place the box back in his lap and head to the kitchen.
After today, you should start collecting candles. For now, though, a matchstick will suffice as decoration.
You wedge it into the cake and he snorts at the realisation, pinching the tip and setting it alight.
"Make a wish, birthday boy."
"This is stupid."
"Hurry, the cake's gonna melt."
Maybe it is a bit stupid. Two adults — one working 12 hour shifts in a run-down store in the middle of nowhere, the other a notorious villain — huddled around a store bought birthday cake, wishing on a matchstick.
You think you understand why that group stayed outside. You don't really care about the wind that rattles your shutters, nor are you paying attention to the sirens in the distance. All you can think about is how pretty he looks above the small glow of the match; in this moment, the only picture ingrained in your head is of him, stupid smile and all, blowing out the little spark. All that matters is the way his lips pull into something soft, something almost childlike right after.
"Happy birthday, baby," you murmur, nudging him in the arm. "You're, what, pushing thirty now? Forty?"
"You into older guys?" He teases, grabbing the fork and breaking off a bite of the pastry.
Despite the occasion, Dabi feeds you first, and he's nothing if not insistent on doing so.
"Only if they look like you," you reply, tugging the utensil from him and feeding him a too big slice. "Say 'ah'." Frosting coats his upper lip, and he glares at your giggling form, nudging you back when your shaking shoulders bounce off of him.
"C'mere," he rasps, muffling your laughter with those sugary sweet lips of his. It's a little rough, a little messy, with his scarred lips brushing against your grin before he dips to focus on your bottom lip, spite sinking into your flesh as be bites with vengeance.
You hum at the taste of the frosting, flicking over the blue icing before he tangles his tongue with yours. The sharpness of strawberries lingers in his mouth, cutting through the sweetness as his tongue slides along yours, curving over the point of your canines before he finally pulls back.
The fork in your hand clatters to the floor, but neither of you pay attention to it. His eyes are simmering with unbridled desire, rooting you to your seat with their intensity — they, alone, are enough to bring great heroes to their knees, yet you feel nothing but exalted under their laser focus, as if the universe is your oyster and you are unstoppable only because he thinks so.
When he tips his head to yours once more, you expect the lust blooming in his eyes to translate into teeth clacking against yours, to a controlling grip on your cheeks as he tilts you into a long kiss. Instead, however, you're met with a soft caress, patience and gentleness moulding your lips to his as he steals your breath away.
Hands wander up the sides of your body until one settles on the nape of your neck, holding you steady and close, and the other curls around your back, keeping you there, right there.
A groan bubbles in his throat when your fingers slink up the marked skin of his neck and weave through his hair, tugging on the strands to bring him even closer.
Another break and his breaths, light and airy, warm your wet lips. There's a timid smile lilting his lips, a fleck of frosting dusting the upturned corner, but he looks perfect. You want to sit and stare at him for longer, memorise the curve of his lips, the heat of his hands on your body, the way his eyes, half-lidded, look at you as if you're all that matters to him.
(You are. You are. You are, but he's never been too good at voicing his vulnerability.
He doesn't need to speak to convey the message, though. You know. You know. You know he loves you.)
He puts aside the cake box and pulls you to stand, hands on your hips, feet almost touching, so close and yet not close enough.
A tentative wisp of a kiss dances over your lips before he asks, "Can we… Bed?"
Your nose grazes against his when you nod your head and, without another word, follow him to your bedroom, hand in hand.
There's a quiver in his hands as he takes you to the bed, only noticeable because his touch is all you can focus on as you settle beneath him. There's hesitance in his fingertips, a nervous tremble that cumbers his gentle touch, but you lay there, perfectly still, perfectly pliant and perfectly patient.
(Sometimes — more often than not, truthfully — he doesn't believe he deserves this. He bides his time, waiting for the ball to drop, expecting the universe to steal away the slivers left in his rotten hands, to tear him apart until he's a shell of the man he is right now, until he's nothing but a broken, hollow body with nothing to give and even less to lose.
Until that fated day, he'll take and take and take. How can he not when you offer yourself up to him so sweetly, so foolishly?)
When you are bare beneath him, his breath hitches in his throat. This isn't the first time he's seen you like this, but it feels different. Maybe the bedside lamp's bulb has changed, or the moon has tilted just for you, for him, for this moment, but you're swathed in a mixed honey and silver glow and he can't look away. He can't peel his eyes away from the arch of your back, from the shiver that racks your body when he slides his fingers along your wetness.
Your voice has never sounded so gratifying, and he swears he can feel himself grow intoxicated just by the lilt in your voice; a flick of the wrist, a graze against your labia has your sighs keening, makes you pant a little more wantonly, and he’s damned if he doesn’t try to elicit more of your singing.
It’s when you whine — desperation leaking into the dulcet syllables, drawing them out so he can bask in your craving — that he slips his fingers in, one, then another to stretch you out a tad further.
(You should never beg for anyone or anything, least of all him.)
Your pelvis digs into the mattress when Dabi crooks his fingers, body mimicking the way they curl as he pumps them in and out, back and forth, savouring the way your walls clench around them. He knocks the breath out of your lungs when he leans over you to litter kisses up the side of your neck, teeth leaving tiny crescents as he trails up, up, up to your ear. Just as his lips sweep across the shell of your ear, a third finger joins the mess between your legs, and he buries himself as deep as you allow.
A sharp trill runs down your spine when he nibbles on your skin and his fingers pinpoint those sweet spots in your core, tapping away diligently to bring back those honeyed moans.
His mouth finds its way back to yours as the coil in your stomach winds tighter, following along the curve of your jaw before slotting against yours in a slow kiss. You’re groaning into his mouth, helpless to the way he does that special something with his tongue that has your eyes rolling back.
“Cum for me.” His voice is raspy, headier with impatience and laced with a rampant longing to see you fall apart. “Fuck, please, wanna feel you.”
It isn’t long before his other hand slides up your thigh, thumb coming up quickly to prod at your wet lips before returning lower, rolling over your clit in steady motions until you feel the coil snap.
There are no shrieking whines or shrill cries, not when he swallows down your sobs so eagerly, as if he lives and breathes for you pleasure.
(He does, he thinks. There isn’t anything he wouldn’t do to make you happy, to bring you to unimaginable heights, to keep you safe and sound and alive.
He wishes he could do more for you — buy you the books you’ve got an eye on, give you a real house with heating and proper lights, get you a car so you’re not stuck walking home in the dead of night — but there’s only so much a man with his face plastered on wanted lists can do. He’s not the kind of man who can waltz into a library, and he’s more adept at blowing up cars than purchasing them.
You tell him that he’s doing enough, that he doesn’t need to go out of his way to do something for you. That doesn’t mean he’s given up on learning the recipe to your favourite meal. He can’t afford a two-storey house, but he’ll get the seasoning perfect, if it’s the last thing he does. He promises.)
A tremor runs through your legs as you gradually come down from your high. Little puffs of air warm his face as he dips in to kiss you, languidly scraping the metal of his scars over your chin before his lips seal over yours once more.
“You okay?” Your murmur is so quiet, he wouldn’t have heard it if he wasn’t so focused on you, if he was any less attuned to everything you say and do.
“‘m fine,” Dabi replies, and he wishes he could be half as soft as you, wishes he could stay silent and just listen to you for the rest of his life.
Your hands follow the lines of his shoulders until they cup his face, thumbs tracing over the rough patches beneath his eyes with a delicacy he doesn’t deserve, with a fragility he has longed for for too many years.
“You’re crying,” you say.
He can’t. He shouldn't be able to. He doesn’t know when he last cried, can’t even remember the feeling of tears pouring down his face. But then he wonders when your face had become blurry to him — when he tips his head to yours and it’s as if he’s seeing you from a far distance, he wonders if you’re really there.
“‘m fine,” he chokes out once more.
(He is, he truly is. How can he not be when you’re right there? When you’re holding his face in the palm of your hands, and he can feel the flutter of your lashes on his cheeks, when your wispy breaths fan over his lips and he can taste you in the air. He doesn’t know why he’s crying, or how he’s crying, just that he is.
It’s irritating that he can’t see you properly, that you’re a warbled mess beneath him, but at least you’re there. You’re there, pecking his lips so gently, so how can he stay frustrated?)
“Are you sure?”
He nods, nose brushing against yours, forehead still resting on yours, mouth barely detaching from yours. He’s so close, and yet it’s still not enough. It’s that selfishness of his rearing its twisted head; he wants to be closer, wants to forget where you begin and he ends, wants to be buried in your body and carved into your bones — he wants to squeeze his body against yours until you’re bursting with desperation, with an unquenchable hunger, just like he is. He needs you, more than anything, he needs you to see how you’re embedded in his blood, his soul, his very being, how you’ve engraved yourself into the crumbling walls of his heart, how your name is written on every cell in his body, how he is nothing without you.
His body sinks into yours, and he can feel the press of his length against your pelvis, relishing the way you push back onto him, just as needily. You want him. You want him just as much as he wants you.
Your hands wander down his body as he steals your lips in another kiss, and then another, and another, until the skin is rubbed raw and swollen, and then another.
You’re unnecessarily gentle as you push his trousers down, as you graze your nails along the slant of his hips.
(He won’t break — not any more than he has already. And, even if he does, if it’s by your hand, then he wouldn’t mind a single bit. If your touch signs his death, he thinks he could go to heaven.)
And you’re unfairly soft as you stroke his length, as you tease the tip, but make him wait no longer than mere seconds. His desperation is tangible, suffocating almost, but you don’t cut through it and mock him, you bathe in it, breathe it all in and reciprocate. When he cants his hips against yours, when he buries himself, inch by slow inch, into your body, he sighs with relief.
He has an aversion to heat — some days (most days, really) he can’t stand the sight or feeling of his own flames — but when you’re wrapped around him so tightly, surrounding him with your own warmth, your goodness, he wonders how he can ever bring himself to dislike it. It feels like coming home, like finding the final piece of a puzzle left untouched for years, like a mother’s embrace when her child’s been out at war for too long.
Your nails dig into his skin, marking dents he’ll trace over for as long as they last, as you usher him to move. There’s a sigh caught in your breath, a whimper escaping in its stead when he rears his hips back then fills you up once more.
“More, please, baby,” you ask, breath pitching so sweetly, so eagerly, and he’s at your mercy, resigned to do your bidding for the rest of his life, though he will never complain.
His hand unclenches the sheets, treading down to yours to pin it above your head, and then he repeats with the other. Palm to palm, fingers entwined with yours to never let go, he dips his head to capture your lips in another bruising kiss as he thrusts in again, and again, and again.
It’s a slow, relentless motion, burying himself so deep your body has no choice but to mould to his shape, drawing out those saccharine sounds from you with every stroke. The bed creaks every time you arch off of it, the headboard knocks against the wall in sync with the wet sounds of his skin slapping against yours. Your legs tighten around his waist, heels digging into his lower back and he savours the feel of you pressing into him, careening up against his chest, pulling him in by his shoulders until he’s flushed against you, until not a single breath can pass between your bodies.
You’re gasping against his lips, hiccups jolting out of you with each drive of his hips, and you sound so needy, so wanton, that his hips surge forward with renewed vigor, sheathing himself so deep and then grinding his pelvis against yours. A thrill sparks up your spine when your clit catches on his body, and he rolls his hips to send shockwave after shockwave right through that little bundle.
“Ah— shit, shit, shit,” you mewl, bucking your hips for more friction, more of his touch. “Please, baby.”
“Fuck, what do you want? What d’you want, baby, tell me ‘n I’ll give it to you." He groans, revelling in the way your walls flutter around his length, how he can taste your craving in the grooves of your tongue, smell your lust floating in the air around you. "Give you what’ver you want, fuck— I swear.”
"Jus' you— oh god, just wan' you, Da—"
"Touya," he chokes out, burying his head in the crook of your neck, tightening his grip on your interlaced hands. "Please. Touya."
"Touya, want you— want you so badly, please."
"Yeah?" He pants, nestling himself further, so his mouth can kiss away the sweat shining on your skin and his chest scratches against yours with each thrust. "You want this? You want me?"
"Yes, yes, Touya, please. Need you, need you so much."
God, Touya doesn't think he'll ever get tired of hearing that — it's like a choir of angels praising him, singing his name as if it's the only prayer they know. He's found heaven between your thighs, but salvation drips from your lips every time you call his name, every time you whimper a little ah, Touya, please, every time he feels your body mould to his, seeking out his touch. He may be a sinner now, but he thinks he was a saint in his past life — why else would he have been blessed with you? How else could a man destined for hell believe he has a chance of absolution?
"I've got you," he says, and he can feel the flex of your thighs around him, can distinguish that keen in your voice to know you're nearing your end. "Fuck, I've got you, I swear, 'm never lettin' go. Fuck— fuck, baby, c'mon. C'mon, I can feel you, 're you close?"
"Yeah— yeah, 'm close, 'm s'close. Touya," you whine, a tender, impatient little sound that embeds itself into every recess of his mind, driving him insane with how much he wants to please you, wants to hear you call for him until your throat goes raw, until it's the only word you know. "Touya, please— please, cum with me. Wanna feel you cum f'r me, baby, please."
And who is he to disobey you?
His hand travels the length of your body, finding your clit easily, rolling the bud around until you're curving into him, stuttering his name between quiet sobs. He's helpless against you, at his wit's end when you cry his name so preciously, so deliciously, high off the way you use your free hand to drag his face back to yours and steal his breath away.
"Please, Touya," you pant, eyes half-lidded, but he can make them out through his tears; he can see the adoration softening the corners of your eyes, see the awe that wells at your lash line. He hopes beyond hope that he looks half as blissful as you do right now. It's the least you deserve. "I love you s'much, Touya."
There's nothing else he can do but let his tears fall as he bottoms out in you, as he lays his forehead on yours and whispers a fuck, I love you. Love you more against your lips, as he fills you up and feels you tighten around him in return.
His mind goes blank. Nothing flashes through his head as he basks in the feel of you fluttering around him, until he becomes a bit more cognizant, as he remembers the starry look in your eyes, as he replays you telling him, telling Touya, that you love him.
Your chest grazes his as you slow your breathing, but he can't bring himself to move off of you. He could die here, he thinks, happily buried in your arms. Your body, his coffin — he'll find a home in your bones, like he has in your hands, in your heart, reside deep in your marrow until the end of time.
"Touya?" You call, and it feels like a fever dream. He's terrified that if he opens his eyes, he'll be met with a cold, empty bed and no signs you've ever lived here, no proof you've ever existed, no evidence you've ever loved him. He doesn't answer. He wants to hear you say his name again, and again, and again, until you grow tired of it, until he's overstayed his welcome in your life.
So he sinks into you instead, head on your chest, listening intently to the way your heart beats, thinking (foolishly, hopefully) that it's pounding just for him. His arms wrap around you, so tight the metal digs into you, yet you stay still, you let him mark you up however he wants to, however he needs to.
He can feel himself slowly drift away, succumbing to sleep the longer you play with his hair, the longer you trace over the scarred lines in his body, the longer you let him stay by your side.
(He thinks you should let him go.
He won't ever let go of you, but you would be better off without him.
Yet, no matter how many times he says that to himself, he'll never voice it aloud in fear of you agreeing.)
It's that selfish part of him that has control now, that makes him embrace you just a little harder, that makes him murmur don't leave me, instead, that bares another part of his heart to you, and relishes the whispered I won't, Touya, you promise in response.
(Touya thinks he's in too deep, falling in love with someone that can leave him at any time, being vulnerable around someone who can take his heart and tear it to shreds right in front of him.
He also thinks he's an idiot, because if it was you breaking his body and burning his heart to ashes, he'd gladly hand you another piece and watch you do it all over again.)