Katsuki

Katsuki finds himself unable to get comfortable in the carved rosewood seat. Growing up, he'd always fantasized about being rich but the more time he spends around Iida and Yaoyorozu and Todoroki, the more he realizes that rich people are fucking weird.

Despite their genuine goodwill, they're always desperate to come off as philanthropic. He's witnessed this once with Natsuo when he'd endowed a scholarship for zoology in his girlfriend's name, and again when they were getting ice cream with Yaoyorozu and she'd tipped the cashier two hundred percent of their order.

This could just be how the wealthy flex on each other, not by how much money they have, but by how much they're able and willing to give.

Maybe guilt evokes their generosity, or maybe they just really do have money to burn. Whatever the case, it led to Iida inviting them all to his family's ski lodge in Sapporo.

He's positive this was Camie's idea—not the vacation itself but making it a couples-only thing. Everyone who isn't together wasn't invited, and even though none of them are upfront about their relationships, Camie still took it upon herself to play matchmaker. That's why closeted assholes like Todoroki and Yaoyorozu and freaks like Deku and Froggy were included.

Not that any of that shit actually matters. What's important is that he's away from his parents and gets to spend the holidays with Ochako. She's the only reason he agreed to spend two weeks in the snow. He looks over at the frosty window. The state-of-the-art insulation in this place keeps him from remembering it's winter.

Most of them were in the kitchen, the others were getting settled upstairs. Iida had taken the liberty of splitting the cooking responsibilities by gender, so the guys were on kitchen duty tonight.

Ochako's over by the sink, soaking bamboo skewers with Mina. Neither of them is supposed to help but they both kinda do anyway.

They're making yakiton for dinner. They'd asked him to grill, so he's sitting idly while they prepare everything. Kirishima's beside him, cutting pork belly into neat little cubes. Katsuki watches Kaminari shake salt into the dry rub until a tiny white hill piles up among the spices.

"That's enough," he snaps, grabbing hold of his wrist.

Kaminari tries to shove him off. "I need my electrolytes."

"Then go stick your dick in the power outlet and fuck off."

Kaminari's eyes locate the nearest socket. He looks tempted for a moment.

"Or you can just keep the salt with you, Kaminari," Deku suggests from across the table. He's sitting by Todoroki, helping him chop scallions and peppers.

Katsuki stares at the mesh gloves they're both wearing on their hands. This has to be some sort of excessive precaution from Iida, because Deku wouldn't hesitate to slice every square inch of his fingers if it meant someone gets their grilled veggies.

He nods over at him. "Nice gloves, puss."

"Thank you," Todoroki says without looking up from his red pepper. Camie braided his hair earlier to keep it out of his face. The strands weave through his scalp like some fucking candy cane.

He scowls at the impenetrable, icy hot bastard. Teasing is only fun when the person is socially competent enough to get offended.

Todoroki finishes dicing the pepper into uniform pieces before putting his knife down. Katsuki redirects his attention back over to Deku and frowns as his clumsy hands chop up uneven coins of scallions. His technique is all wrong, from his grasp of the stem to his grip on the knife. This is definitely something Mitsuki would've smacked him upside the head for.

"Your mom teach you how to hold a knife?" he asks, "Or was that something your dad never got around to showing you?"

Iida looks over his shoulder from the pantry to give Katsuki an unreadable stare. Katsuki can brush that off, but when Ochako looks up from her conversation with Mina, he finds himself fumbling with his sleeve.

Todoroki reaches for another pepper and gives his unsolicited input. "I don't think my dad actually taught me anything besides how to fight."

"Damn," Katsuki shakes his head, "And half the time, you can't even do that right."

Kaminari snickers on his right. Kirishima's shoulders give a tiny skip because he's too kind to outwardly laugh at someone else's expense but still finds it funny. Katsuki himself cracks a grin. This is sadly the most fun he's had since he got here.

"I think it's really cool that your dad taught you to fight, Todoroki." Deku tells him, "I mean, with him being a pro-hero and all. Honestly, I wish my dad could've been around to teach me a thing or two— n-not necessarily something violent! Just something we could bond over."

A short pause settles over them in which they're all obliged to feel bad for Deku. Katsuki rolls his eyes at the sob story.

"Can you really blame the guy?" he says, leaning back into his seat. "If my kid was quirkless, I'd probably leave him too."

Mina cuts herself off to peer over at them. The glare of the light fixture reflects on Iida's lenses when he adjusts his glasses. Todoroki finally looks up at him. Kirishima's hands pause over the cutting board. When not even Kaminari laughs at that, he suspects something's wrong.

This silence is different from the one before in which it's almost stifling and Katsuki feels largely responsible for it.

Deku's hand wraps over the stalk until he makes a fist. The knife trembles in his grip before he sets it gently off to the side. His lips wobble like his mouth isn't sure if it wants to smile or frown.

"I, um." Deku swallows, "He left before we found out."

He shrugs his shoulders. "Yeah, well—"

"Katsuki," Ochako says, walking out of the kitchen, "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Right now?"

"Right now." she calls from the hallway. He notices the way Kirishima's hands hover over the slab of meat when she says that.

Now this silence is indisputably worse than both of the previous ones combined. It's kinda like the suffocating hush of getting called out in class for misbehaving, but about twenty-seven thousand times worse.

Katsuki knocks the cheeky grin off Kaminari's face as he pushes himself out of his seat. He ignores the looks he gets from everyone as he follows her out to the hall.

She has her arms crossed over her chest when he meets her.

"What?" he asks. She's acting like he forgot her birthday again.

She keeps looking up at him expectantly. He looks up himself and catches sight of the artificial sprig Camie hung over the doorframe.

"Oh." he breathes, taking a step closer. His brows lift with the corner of his lip. "Mistletoe?"

She pokes his chest with a supple fingertip but it feels piercing. "Why are you talking to Deku like that?"

Rejected, defensive, annoyed, he takes a step back and frowns. "Like what?"

"Like," she huffs, gesturing vaguely with her hand, "A dick."

He recalls being pretty tame in the kitchen. He shuts his eyes so she can't see him roll them. "What'd I say?"

She keeps her eyes open when she rolls them. "All that stuff about his dad."

"I was just busting his balls." he grumbles, rubbing the side of his neck. "It was a joke."

"It wasn't funny."

He's about to point out that humor's subjective, and that both Kirishima and Kaminari were laughing, and she should just relax so they could go back inside and resume their evening, but he gets a better look at her face and his mouth closes.

On the ride here, they kept sneaking glances at each other from across the train. He'd found it hard not to let his gaze linger on the gleam in her eyes as he was nodding along to whatever Kirishima was talking about.

That light is nowhere to be seen now. Her eyes have gone so dark, they don't even look brown anymore. She turns into a completely different person whenever he says anything about her friends.

One time they'd gone to the movie theaters as a group and he called Froggy out for using her tongue to grab popcorn from the communal bucket and Ochako floated him up to the ceiling for the rest of the film.

The over-protectiveness always made him sick— and over Deku, of all people.

"What the fuck do you want me to do?" he barks carelessly, "Bring his dad back?"

"Go tell him you're sorry." she says through her teeth.

"You're crazy if you think I'm about to go apologize for some joke." he tells her, "Besides, that wasn't even the top ten worst things I've ever said to him."

"And you're proud of that?" she snaps, "You just told your friend his dad was right for leaving him and it's okay because you've said worse?"

The volume starts rising to uncontrollable levels. When he catches Mina peeking over the doorframe, he takes a deep breath in and lets it out once they've both stepped a few feet out of earshot. The brisk walk calms him down a bit.

"Alright," he says as gently as possible, "First of all, we aren't friends. Second, I was making fun of everybody. Deku, Kaminari, Todoroki. You know me, that's just how I—"

"You don't talk to me like that."

"No, because you're—"

"You don't talk to Kirishima like that," she continues firmly, "So what's your problem?"

"I don't have a problem. This is just how me and Deku are and it's none of your business."

"Of course, it's my business. Deku's one of my best friends and whenever I see you treat him like that, it makes me seem like I'm okay with it and I'm not."

He takes a step closer to her, crowding into her personal space. "Well, I hate to break it to you, but Todoroki's a lot closer to Deku and he didn't say shit, so maybe take a page from his book and stay the hell out of it."

"Katsuki," she raises a hand like she's aching to imprint her finger pads on his cheek. "Stop telling me to stay out of it."

Distantly, he knows that this is really getting out of hand. He needs to put the brakes on it before he ends up on the roof for the night. He closes his eyes to take a cleansing breath.

"Look," he sighs, reaching out for her, "That's how our relationship is. He doesn't take it seriously because he knows I'm just messing around."

He watches as the words finally seem to get through. Her eyes bounce uncomfortably around the room as she looks anywhere but at him.

"Well… still, you didn't have to say all that." she mumbles, frowning at the intricate design of the Persian rug, "And act like a dick."

He really doesn't see how he was acting any differently tonight than any other time. Thinking about it makes his brain throb with an impending headache. The tension in his temples grows until it spreads down his forehead and sets his eyebrows into a deeper furrow.

"Well, you didn't have to bitch me out like that in front of everybody."

She shakes her head dismissively and takes a step back like she's about to turn around and walk away. "Gosh. You know what? Forget it."

"Woah, hold up. What happened?" he sneers, seizing her wrist. "You wanted to talk, let's talk."

"No, because you don't wanna talk." she cries, trying to tear his hand off, "You wanna yell at me and be right, so this conversation's over."

Honestly, he doesn't think he can take it anymore. This back and forth between them never settles anything. It feels like they're going in circles and it makes his head spin trying to keep up.

"Oh, I see how it is," he nods along, releasing her abruptly. "You're losing the argument, so this conversation's over."

She crosses her arms again and rolls her eyes. "Whatever. I don't know why I even bothered. There's no getting through to you, anyway."

Of all the people who've tried to pacify his relationship with Deku, Ochako has always, always been the one whose rationale drove him up the wall. The PTA conferences back in Aldera never did anything. Todoroki's tried, Kirishima's tried, All Might still has hope, and all their attempts have been futile.

He starts scrubbing his face with his hands. "We've been like this since we were kids. Why do you pick now of all times to decide it bothers you?"

"You really can't acknowledge when you've done something wrong, can you? It's always bothered me. I just never said anything because I thought you'd grow out of it by now."

"Ochako, I was just playing." he explains for what feels like the trillionth time into his wet palms. If he isn't careful, he could risk singeing his eyelashes off. "The only one taking it seriously is you."

"It's not a bad thing to take bullying seriously. I'm not gonna speak to you until you've told Deku you're sorry."

He looks up from his hands to scowl at her. "Well then I guess you're keeping your mouth shut all night, 'cause I'm not saying sorry."

Her fingers freeze over the handrail. She'd painted her nails red for the trip. He fixates on the glossy lacquer as she says, "Then I'm not talking to you for the rest of the year."

"Fine by me," he shrugs, "I've been meaning to get you off my case so I can actually enjoy the holidays."

Ochako's lips give an almost imperceptible tremor. If he weren't already familiar with what she looks like before crying, he'd have missed it. Her eyes have a different twinkle in them now. He watches her blink tightly.

"Fine." she shrugs back with the same deliberate indifference and turns around.

"Fine." he echoes as she stomps up the stairs.

He blinks at the empty stairwell for a moment, trying to process what just went down. His mind feels blank. No thoughts, no sensation, just their pointless argument ricocheting off the walls of his hollow skull.

He shoves his hands into his pockets and doesn't even flinch when they detonate through the fabric and onto his skin.

Katsuki stalks over to the kitchen and doesn't look at anyone when he snatches up the tray of now-skewered pork. Then he walks himself to the freezing air of the grill and slams the door behind him and stays outside for the rest of night.