Chapter Text
—1—
Izuku silences his alarm as soon as it goes off, one groggy hand flung off the bed to knock it, more or less accidentally, to the ground. Last night, high on the familiar buzz of planning and mental pep talks, Izuku had set it for an hour earlier than usual. He kind of hates himself for it now.
But he has a plan. And for that plan to succeed he needs to get to the office earlier than Bakugou Katsuki.
Agonizingly sleepy, Izuku breathes slow and deep, the heels of his palms pressed against his eyes while his nice, soft, cozy bed does its best to lure him back into restfulness. Then he moves his hands away, blinking blearily at his ceiling fan. Early morning shadows creep quietly over the spokes in hues of orange-gold, shifting and morphing with every whispered breeze of his fluttering curtains. There's more birdcall filtering in through the open window at this hour than car horns and daylight noise and he doesn't hate it, even if his eyes are still crusted over with sleep.
Izuku smiles to himself.
He has a plan.
He has a plan and Katsuki Bakugou is going to love it.
"The fuck is this?" Katsuki asks later that morning, one eyebrow arched at the steaming travel cup of tea Izuku is trying to hand to him.
"Um," Izuku says uselessly.
Katsuki raises his own paper cup, expression landing somewhere between searing and reluctantly pitying, and says, "I ain't taking your damn coffee, Greenie. We're square."
Square because Izuku had accidentally run into Katsuki in his haste to catch up with the man who, for some reason, felt the need to powerwalk to the elevator like he was running late even though Izuku's 90% sure nobody else from their office is even in the building yet, and then slammed to a halt just as Izuku was gaining speed.
"Um," Izuku says again, and then because he's an idiot: "It's tea, actually."
"Right," Katsuki says. "Same."
Exactly the same. Izuku overheard his order last week when UA Publishing House brought in a tea and coffee cart for employee appreciation and Izuku had snagged the coveted position right behind his office crush.
"See you up there," Katsuki says, the silver elevator doors closing on his face. The sight snaps Izuku out of his daydream and he watches the floor counter rise: 1, 2, 3...
There are a few seconds of silence before he awkwardly reaches out to hit the up button. Because he and Katsuki work on the same floor. Because Izuku should have stepped into the elevator with Katsuki instead of just standing outside of them like he was new to having legs and/or a brain.
"Better luck next time?" Kirishima offers sympathetically from his place near the building's front door.
"On a scale from one to ten, how embarrassing was I just now?" Izuku asks, spinning on his heel to face their kindest security guard as the elevator glides open once more.
"Um," Kirishima says, which is all the answer Izuku needs.
Izuku steps into the elevator. He takes a sip of the tea meant for Katsuki.
It's not bad, actually, and half of Izuku's attention splinters off into whether he should be drinking tea instead of coffee in the mornings, or maybe with his lunch, even, since he always takes lunch at the office and there are dozens of cafes nearby. Maybe Izuku will even bump into Katsuki at one naturally one day and they can bond over their mutual tea enjoyment like normal people, Izuku's previous blunder totally forgotten.
The elevator softly dings, opening onto the seventh floor.
"You've got this," Izuku mutters to himself, embarrassment making way for determination.
"You've got what?" Katsuki asks.
Izuku jumps, clenching his paper teacup so tightly the hot liquid jumps out and sloshes over his knuckles.
"Uh, spreadsheets!" Izuku all but shouts, red-hot pain lancing through his hand. "Numbers and…analysis," he finishes tightly, frozen in place by Katsuki's searching, crimson eyes.
Izuku's face is steaming and his hand burns and Katsuki is standing there at the whiteboard- half of the publishing team's monthly goals written out in a bold, black script- watching Izuku, eyes flicking from his face to his injured fingers and back, wearing an expression Izuku doesn't have half a clue how to interpret.
Katsuki's the one to break the silence.
"Are you gonna-?"
"Yeah," Izuku says, speedwalking away towards the office break room and the precious, cooling water of the sink where he stands with his head bent over the basin, heart jumping, until the sun actually crests over the horizon of their floor-to-ceiling windows and other workers start to trickle in with bleary eyes and paper cups of their own.
Izuku is ready to call Operation Favorite Tea a complete and total bust but there's a hacked off piece of aloe vera sitting at his desk when he finally gets there and Izuku has no idea how Katsuki found it at all, let alone so quickly, so when the ache in his hand starts to lessen, Izuku pulls out his favorite notebook and makes an addendum.
Operation Favorite Tea: Bring Katsuki tea in morning, not busy → talk?
Operation Normal Person: Have a proper conversation. No burns. Thank for aloe? Pretend it never happened? (no note- on purpose?)
In the end, Izuku makes a compromise. He waits for Katsuki to disappear down the hall that leads to the restrooms and races to leave a yellow sticky note on his desk, ignoring all the odd looks from his coworkers, that says, thank you!! :)
After Izuku comes back from his lunch break, there's an orange note stuck to his own monitor.
Stalker, it says, the S underlined three times like Izuku's grade-school teachers used to do, in red pen and everything. Then, underneath that:
Tea is hot, dumbass.
Izuku huffs out a quiet laugh.
He re-sticks the note on the page opposite Operation Normal Person and ignores the intense side-eye Ochako is shooting him from her adjoining cubicle. As far as Izuku's concerned, he's been 60% successful.
**
The thing about an office crush is that it's made up of the small moments. Izuku's not pining, per se, he's just basking in the bits of Katsuki-related joy he gets to experience while he's in the office.
Izuku hides his smile behind an All Might-themed tea thermos while Katsuki- striking in his black suit- strides toward the communal whiteboard and starts aggressively scribbling in red marker.
Idiot Counter, he writes, underlining it twice before moving to the next line. Kaminari Denki. Offense: putting a metal fork in the fucking microwave.
"Aw," Kaminari says, sticking his head out of the break room. There's a green tupperware in his hands. "I didn't know you knew my first name."
"Die," Katsuki hisses. Then he does a double take. "Is that my fucking lunch?"
"Oh shit," Kirishima laughs.
Izuku scoots in his swivel chair until he can see the red-haired man lounging on one of the break room counters, his uniform nowhere to be seen. He must have come to visit after his shift, then.
Kaminari makes a run for it, laughing. Katsuki stalks after him, hands clenched into tight fists at his sides. Only when he crosses the threshold of being truly out of sight from Izuku's cluster of cubicles do his footsteps transition into a flat out run.
On the seventh floor of Heights Alliance, UA Publishing takes up the whole floor. The elevator is closest to the long row of cubicles that Izuku calls home, and the few closed-door offices that belong to literary agents like Katsuki. On the other side of the break room are the IT workers, a few managers offices, and a symmetrical aisle of cubicles that the social media team shares with accounting.
The building is large, and long, and still Izuku can hear heavy, plodding footsteps and a squeal of what might be terror from Kaminari. Ashido's bubbly laughter quickly follows, though Izuku doubts Aizawa will let her post about anything currently happening on the other side of the break room.
"What do you think Katsuki brings for lunch?" Izuku asks idly, most of his attention still aimed at trying to pick out actual words from the rowdy din of conversation across the way.
Ochako eyes him mirthfully. "He's committing a straight up homicide and that's what you wanna know?"
Izuku shrugs.
"It must have been something good, right?" he says. "For Kaminari to risk it?"
Izuku wonders if Katsuki cooks. He seems like the type who would be good at it.
Ochako rolls her eyes, painted nails clacking, unbothered, at her computer keys. "I think Kaminari just likes to poke the beast."
Izuku's brows furrow.
"Isn't the expression poke the bear?"
Ochako shrugs, the corner of her mouth ticking up. "I said what I said."
"Rude," Izuku laughs.
Then he returns to work. But not before straightening the little plaque his mom had proudly pressed into his hands before his first day at UA.
Izuku Midoriya, Data Analyst
**
Izuku squints at his monitor, then increases the font size of his name once- no, twice- in the upper right hand corner. It looks…odd, sitting up there like that. Like a school assignment. Izuku frowns and minimizes the font. Then, before he can second guess himself again, he sends his pages off to print and remains sitting at his cubicle, doing his actual work. (None of which has his name printed in the upper right hand corner).
It only takes a few moments for Katsuki to amble over, papers in hand, but Izuku still jumps slightly when he drops his arms on the cubicle wall, peering down with his bright, red eyes.
Izuku smiles.
"You left your papers on the printer again, dumbass," Katsuki says, dropping them onto Izuku's keyboard. "Did your mother not love you or something?"
The question takes Izuku so off guard that he doesn't answer immediately. His mouth drops open but no sound comes out.
"Who the hell names their kid Deku?" Katsuki continues, squinting at the papers he'd delivered. He idly picks up one of Izuku's All Might figurines to examine.
The first thing Izuku thinks is: I should have gone with the bigger font.
"It's not…"
Then he joins Katsuki in squinting down at his own name.
"I, uh, I guess you can read it like that, but no, my name's Izuku, actually. Izuku Midoriya."
Awkwardly, Izuku gestures to his name plaque.
Katsuki blinks.
"Damn," Kaminari says, rolling his chair over from his office across the way, a bag of chips in hand, "even I know how to read."
Katsuki's expression goes from blank to murderous in a blink and he swipes viciously at Kaminari as he whirls around. "I know how to read!" he snaps. "I read it that way on purpose!"
The backs of his ears are bright red, and the lie is so obvious Izuku can't help but feel a little charmed, despite himself, because really, who in their right mind would name their child Deku?
"Ooh, bullying the newbie," Kaminari taunts.
"I'm not-!"
The door to Aizawa's office creaks open, revealing a sliver of pitch dark office. Aizawa doesn't say anything and he doesn't emerge, but everybody swiftly and quietly returns to work. They know better than to interrupt his naps.
And now Katsuki Bakugou knows Izuku's name.
Mostly.
Izuku hums to himself, then readjusts the figure Katsuki had picked up and returns to work.
**
It rains. Through all of Wednesday and all of Thursday the sky remains cloudy and dark, heavy downpours broken up only by light mists and sprinkling. And Izuku- still out of an umbrella since the last time he lent his to an old woman caught unawares on her grocery run- walks to the bus stop with his briefcase held over his head and nothing more.
So when Friday rolls around and Izuku wakes up to the sound of rain, he doesn't think much of it. It's dark, anyway. He doesn't even open his eyes, just rolls over in bed and presses his cheek further into his pillow.
And then he hears the music. Just tinkling notes, here and there, hard to fully make out over the heavy rain and the slight pounding in his temple- more noticeable now that his mind's awake and straining to figure out where the noise is coming from.
Izuku sniffles. Drags his heavy body upright.
Slowly, his attention moves towards his nightstand.
ALARM
Snooze?
"Shit," Izuku swears, scrambling out of bed and then leaning heavily against the nearest wall because his head is pounding, sinus pressure pulsing through his face. His body aches where it's curled against the firm stretch of wall beside his open closet door.
Izuku's alarm continues to play.
"There's nothing for it," Izuku tells himself. "You're already late so just…buck up."
Only Izuku doesn't buck up. He continues to stand there, pressing his aching forehead against the cool plaster, sniffing pitifully when his nose starts to run.
It takes a Herculean effort to lift his tired head.
"Go beyond, plus ultra," he tells himself, eyes drifting to the poster of his favorite comic book superhero, positioned above his bed.
Izuku shuffles blearily toward his phone to shut off his alarm, then gasps when he sees the time.
In a flurry of uncoordinated, sluggish limbs, he climbs into his suit and chokes down some medicine with a slice of toast that hangs halfway out of his mouth as he rushes for the bus stop, scurrying beneath the awnings of his building and the next to avoid the worst of the rain. He's not wearing a tie. He still doesn't have an umbrella.
But in a stroke of luck, the skies clear by the time the bus approaches UA and stays clear just long enough for Izuku to duck inside. It's raining steadily again by the time he reaches the elevator.
He's two hours late.
Cringing, he hopes that nobody noticed. That he can just slink over to his cubicle and pretend he's been there all morning, actually. There are no important meetings that he's missed. No deadlines. No benchmarks. Izuku is a good worker.
So it's only natural that Aizawa is at the water cooler when the elevator doors open, revealing an Izuku who still has his brief case in hand, hair frizzy, tie missing.
Without removing his water bottle from beneath the slow-trickling spout, Aizawa merely raises an eyebrow.
Izuku feels his heart plummet. Tired and sore and a little wet, he open his mouth to confess.
Then Katsuki snatches Izuku's briefcase from his clammy hands.
"Thanks," he says gruffly. The word sounds awkward in his mouth.
Izuku- mouth still hanging partway open- only manages to blink at him. Katsuki's red eyes are so bright, and they're searing right through Izuku like there's a second, silent conversation happening between them, only Izuku's ears are plugged with cotton.
"…For?" Izuku eventually asks.
Katsuki's brows twitch with irritation. Then he huffs and rolls his eyes, holding Izuku's briefcase carelessly over his shoulder.
"Idiot," he says. "Obviously for grabbing my shit from the lobby since I've been too swamped to go down myself."
Izuku blinks some more, and when he shifts, his shoes squelch- courtesy of the puddle he stepped in on his mad dash to the bus.
Mouth twisting, Katsuki eyes Izuku once more, than disappears down the hall with Izuku's briefcase.
Aizawa's water bottle squeaks as he screws the cap back on, his expression boredly neutral.
"Don't make a habit of it," he says.
"Right," Izuku replies gratefully. "I won't, sir. I promise."
Aizawa nods. Then, with a knowing glint in his dark eyes:
"Bakugou can retrieve his own things."
Izuku smiles gratefully, his cheeks pink with fever and gratitude.
"Of course, sir. I'll remember that next time."
"See that you do."
Aizawa treks back to his office and Izuku slumps into his spinny cubicle chair with a gusty sigh. The spinning quickly makes him dizzy, so he grips the sides of his desk to stop.
Katsuki still has his stuff, but it's fine. Izuku has enough of his notes and files transferred over digitally that he doesn't need them.
So, he works. Squinting and sniffling, but making progress nonetheless.
A hour later, he slips off to the building's cafeteria for breakfast lunch and comes back with a face mask over his nose and mouth. He spends the last fifteen minutes of his break mostly asleep with his head down on his desk and a much louder alarm on his phone.
By end of day, he feels almost normal. If not dizzy and achy and exhausted, with an eye strain headache on top of the sinus pressure and a trash can full of tissues to boot.
He doesn't even realize until he's back in the lobby that it's still raining. Heavily. And that Katsuki still has his umbrella briefcase.
Izuku sniffs, watching the storm pound against the tall glass doors.
He needs a tissue.
"Oi," Katsuki calls, striding up on Izuku's right. "You know we get sick pay for a reason, right?"
Izuku shakes his head, then squeezes his eyes shut when that sends a wave of pain up his temples. "I haven't been here long enough to earn any."
Katsuki frowns, though Izuku's not really sure what he's displeased about. It's not like Izuku can go back in time and start working here earlier than he did.
"Whatever," Katsuki says. "Here."
Katsuki presses Izuku's briefcase into his chest and something thin into his hand.
"Take care of yourself, dumbass. Don't you read the forecast?"
Without waiting for an answer, Katsuki strides away. Izuku watches him meet up with Kirishima at the front door and bully his way under the other man's red umbrella, which leaves each of them with a shoulder out in the open.
Kirishima laughs and says something that makes Katsuki scowl. Then Kirishima books it down the street and away from view, leaving Katsuki shouting after him and chasing the safety of the red umbrella.
Because in Izuku's hands is Katsuki's umbrella- black, with reflective, orange lining. And Izuku's briefcase, which Katsuki kept hold of all day.
Izuku sniffles again, but this time he's smiling as he makes his way home.
**
"No, mom, he gave me his umbrella." Izuku adjusts his phone where it sits tucked between his ear and his shoulder. His hands are occupied giving his cat a bath that Meowmight does not want to be receiving.
"That's what I thought too!" he says, wrangling Meowmight back into the water for the fifth time, her agitated whines white noise to him at this point. "And Ochako calls him a beast," Izuku adds, smiling to himself.
Meowmight yowls.
"We wouldn't have to do this if you hadn't rolled around in the mud," Izuku chides.
Inko chuckles on the other side of the line.
"Hold on," Izuku says, "let me put you on speakerphone."
"—about a box of chocolates? You know, as a thank you for not letting you die of pneumonia all alone in your dark apartment."
Izuku sighs. "For the last time, I did not have pneumonia. It was a minor cold. A baby one, practically. And my apartment is not dark, Meowmight really livens up the place."
"Izuku, baby, there's a reason your rent is so low. I really think-"
"Mom."
"-just a splash of color on the walls would go a long way. I mean, you started work right after moving. You didn't even have time to decorate!"
"I did decorate," Izuku protests, spitting out a mouthful of soapy water that Meowmight's lashing tail sends towards his face. "I have posters. You know, like…art."
"Izuku," his mother says flatly.
"All Might is timeless," Izuku insists. "Ageless. Beyond your mortal understanding."
"Don't sass me."
"Alright," Izuku sighs. "We can…" Meowmight whines and Izuku strokes a gentle line down the center of her head, following her striped pattern with his fingertip. He starts to drain the water, softening at the sight of his dearest companion- his childhood pet- and she tolerates his affection, as cats do, with exaggerated disinterest. "Maybe we can go shopping this weekend," Izuku finally says. "Just to look. I'm not committing to buying anything."
"Deal," his mother says. "And maybe you'll find the right thank-you gift for for this Kozume."
"Katsuki," Izuku corrects gently.
"Well, whatever his name is."
Izuku rolls his eyes as he rescues Meowmight from the tub and wraps her in a soft, fluffy, All Might-themed towel. Bronze age, of course.
"Anyways," Inko says brightly, "how've you been outside of work? Do you have a girlfriend?"
Izuku presses his face into Meowmight's fur, cringing.
"Mom."
"What?" she replies innocently. "I'm only curious. You're getting older and I want to know about your life. Sue me."
Izuku raises his head slightly, scratching sheepishly at the back of his neck. "I'm barely 23," he murmurs. "A-and I don't have time, or…"
Inko hums. "Still," she says, "romance has a funny way of sneaking up on people."
Izuku cracks a smile, carding gently through Meowmight's fur with his fingers. She's purring softly.
"I guess."
"So, Sunday?"
"I'll see you then."
Izuku reaches for the end call button, plunging his little apartment bathroom into silence without any more voices to break it. He hadn't even noticed the hiss of his mother's stove top steaming in the background until now, its absence suddenly strange.
Meowmight shakes the last few drops of water from her fur, then trots out of the room.
Izuku pulls his knees up to his chest and gnaws on the inside of his cheek. He doesn't have a girlfriend, but…
Izuku swallows. Heat rushing to his face, says:
"There's someone at work that I…"
The rest of the sentence nosedives somewhere between Izuku's lungs and mouth and he laughs around the crash- an awkward, breathy, self-recriminating chuckle. Izuku runs a hand through his hair, snapping himself out of it.
"I'm being ridiculous," he says.
Izuku's knees pop when he stands from the bathroom tile and he shuts the door behind himself so he doesn't have to listen to the unending drip of the leaky bathtub faucet.
Even if it sounds like rain.
Even if it draws his eye to the black and orange umbrella sitting neatly in the stand by his front door.
**
Izuku's lying on his couch with his feet propped up and Meowmight purring quietly in his lap when he sees it. Right there on his feed, in between videos of a small dog holding a comically large stick and someone's recipe for homemade tiramisu, is the answer:
"So like, this book had a serious impression on me as a kid. A galaxy brain moment for real. And now, on its fifteenth anniversary, your girl is finally going to review her favorite sapphic novel. So buckle up, babes."
The account is called Camie'sCorner and the influencer, Camie, is bright and bubbly and so painfully modern that Izuku can't keep up with half the slang she uses in her intro. But it's their book she's reviewing- one of UA's- and it's the one that's been spiking in popularity these past few weeks despite its age and lack of any promotional material sent out by the author or the publishing house. It's been driving Izuku crazy. His whole job is to analyze trends to help predict the next big hit, and despite all his frantic digging and hypothesizing, all it takes a mindless scroll to bring him right where he needs to be.
Camie, Izuku discovers, is a fashion icon. She got her start as a teenager with the brand Dynamight and skyrocketed in popularity when she began appearing in fashion shows around the globe, then perfume ads, then took on rolls in a few small, independent films- to the surprise of many. She's currently working on her first line of clothing for Dynamight, and most of her following comes from her professional fashion vlog, CamieOnCamera.
Her side account is less popular, views generally ranging from 300-1,000, but a few odd ones here and there jump to 20,000, 50,000, 100,000 views.
This, Izuku credits to the reposts. The follow count of Camie'sCorner is pretty small, but there are some big name celebrities on there, and the reviews they repost are the ones that leapfrog into the general limelight.
It's astonishing, the reach they all have.
Izuku stares at the most liked comment on Camie's video again. A simple, Hard same!! :D written by a rock singer in one of the country's hottest bands. Two words, and UA's sales for that book in particular had spiked like the Tokyo Tower.
By now, Meowmight's wandered off toward her automatic feeder and Izuku's stomach is rumbling loudly. The sun has dipped beneath the horizon without Izuku noting its passing, leaving the room around him dark except for the square of light being projected from his phone and the sliver of yellow streetlight that's started to creep through his open window.
Izuku looks away and blinks, blearily rubbing at his eyes. His neck aches.
Stretching until his back pops, Izuku plods across the room to turn on the light, tosses on a beloved All Might sweater, and pulls the curtains shut. He sets an old, instrumental record softly on his second-hand Victrola and lets Camie's video play on loop while he puts together a simple grilled cheese. He finds himself more impressed with her at every turn.
Izuku may work at a publishing house, but he wouldn't really consider himself well-read. Not since high school, at least. He prefers to process the raw data, the big trends, and leave the genre-specific hypotheses up to his co-workers like Ochako or even his boss, who's been in the business long enough to tell a passing fad from a true wave, and whether it's wise to jump on and ride it out before it crashes.
Izuku eats standing up at the counter, his hip propped against it, and listens. Despite the slangy-intro, she "gets real" pretty quickly, turning more soft-spoken and earnest.
"As a queer kid, it can be so hard to find your people, you know? 'Cause sometimes you don't know. Not really. There's just a quiet, quiet voice in your head that makes you feel…apart. And a lot of people have this little voice, or one of it's cousins, talking in your ear like an Uber driver that will not be getting five stars. And no hate to the chatterboxes, either, but I don't need to know about your weird rash and why you think it's shaped like Oklahoma."
"Books like these? They hear you and they send that little voice to bed for a while so you can just…breathe. Let the rhythm of the prose wash over you, drink it in, and let out one big, cathartic sigh when you're done."
"I cried, reading it, but I think I needed to. And it's not slow at all, this book grips you. One hundred and seven pages of chaos and pure, crazy, sapphic love that tears you apart slowly and then puts your pieces back together. Third person point of view and hopeful, at the end of the day, instead of depressing. No burying the gays. It's five stars for me, babes."
Izuku washes his plate, brews himself a cup of tea from the newly-bought packets in his pantry, and listens to it again.