Midnight Skies - A DabixReader Story

Death of Peace Of Mind

She wouldn't say anything.
Dabi couldn't decide whether it was a blessing or a curse that she didn't even acknowledge it.
He knows for a fact that she heard it. He let his walls down for a split second in the afterglow of their little tryst and his mind completely betrayed him, the most vulnerable admission he could have possibly made slipped out.
So why was she ignoring it?

That was almost worse than her outright rejecting him.
(It wasn't.)
He wouldn't even care if she didn't say it back.
(He would.)

And so he sits on his couch, her cuddled into his side, arm lazily wrapped around her shoulders like nothing was wrong.
But it was.
The potential of rejection was getting underneath his skin, and beginning to gnaw a hole in his stomach.
He was sick of wanting to be loved and never receiving it.
The more he dwelled on the possibility of her just using him, like his family had, and the humiliation of her clearly having heard what he'd thought and actively ignoring it, watching some dumb show on TV like he hadn't just railed some self-love into her, tended to the stupid burns he'd left behind like no-one ever had for him, and then accidentally spilled his guts about his true feelings for her.

Her arm wraps around his stomach under his shirt, yelping a little when her arm makes contact with his apparently white-hot staples.
"Sorry." He manages to say, despite it coming out as hissed and insincere.
He hadn't meant to hurt her. He hadn't noticed his temperature rising, something she did usually pick up on.
She doesn't look scared of him at least. Or disgusted. That may have just tipped him over the edge if she had.
She rubs her arm a little, checking to see there's not been any damage to her tattoos from the looks of it.

"What's going on?" She eventually asks with a sigh, pulling away from him and looking at him with a look of concern.
She was going to make him say it.
"Nothin' doll, just was thinkin' about what ya said earlier." He lies, pointlessly.
She deadpans at him, looking unfairly good even with her smudged makeup in his shirt and her panties. She wasn't an idiot. He knew she wasn't an idiot, regardless of whether or not she had the quirk she did.

Eventually he caves, looking away.
"You know what's going on." He mutters sourly.
Her expression softens, and she sidles a little closer to him again, rubbing his arm as though he was some kind of child that needed to be comforted.
"You don't need to be mad about it." She tries to soothe.
"You ignored it. Why?" He asks, his voice leaving him a little harsher than he intended.
She blinks, shrugs.
"Usually if people mean it, they say it." She explains as if it's really just that easy. "It's really okay, Dabi. I've thought the same after sex before."

"That's..." Dabi shakes his head and doesn't even bother finishing the sentence.
That's not what it was.
He can feel her eyes on him even as he looks away, scarred cheek resting on his fist and his leg bouncing anxiously.
Eventually, one of her hands splays on his thigh, pressing his leg down. He spares a glance at her, her stare intense as she looks straight back at him.
"Let me in." She says simply.
And that's what he gets for promising things he didn't really intend on keeping.

He wanted her, sure. And he wanted to do all of this properly. He didn't want to see the fear on her face that he had before, he wanted her to want him for him, not because of some kind of weird trauma response he may or may not have triggered when he broke into her house all those months ago.
But he didn't want to let her in. Not really.
This would end in tears and he knew it. He accepted his eventual demise years ago when he'd woken up from his coma in a body that wasn't his own.
She wasn't ready to know that. She wouldn't be able to handle that, as much as he'd accepted it.

She'd try to stop him.
Just like everyone else had.

All he can do is stare at her, straight lipped, battling internally between his need to be loved and accepted, his fear of rejection, and the concern of what it meant if she felt the same way back.
"You're steaming." She points out calmly, giving him a soft smile, as though that's a normal thing to see anyone do.
'Get it together, Touya.' He thinks to himself, closing his eyes and trying to regulate his body heat once more.
"Who's that?" She asks, pulling him straight back into a reality that he did not want to face. He wasn't ready. This was too soon. She wasn't meant to find out.

His temperature shoots up drastically, and he hops out of the seat beside her to avoid any more accidental burns.
She looks a little hurt, but respects his space, remaining seated on the couch in his room, her legs curled up underneath her.
"What's going on with you?" She asks, her voice painfully patient.
He needs to get away, now. He pulls out a cigarette, practically setting the thing alight without even trying.
"Back in a bit." He mumbles, cigarette in his mouth.

He passes her smoothly, but she grabs his arm before he can get too far.
He tries not to let any more stray thoughts escape, particularly ones about his father when she grabs him.
"You promised no more secrets." She says. "Sit down and talk."
Yep. She was definitely going to make him say it.
He fucked it.
He royally ruined everything.
He allows her to pull him onto the couch again, snatching the smoke from between his lips and stubbing it out on the ashtray he kept on the table.

He's too far in to fight it now.

She doesn't even force it out of him, though.
She just straddles his waist, looking at him expectantly, waiting for him to explain.
He tries to meet her eyes with a cool gaze of his own, but she holds it until he eventually has to give in.
"I..." He begins, fingers running through his hair and tugging at the strands roughly. "I'm Touya."
She just nods. He supposes the name Touya itself may not be too surprising, a lot of people had villain monikers, and he may be able to drag out the full story for a little longer thanks to her lack of interest in getting a full name out of him.

"So what're you hiding, Touya?" She asks, his name rolling off her tongue like honey.
His heart, embarrassingly, even leaps a little. It'd been a while since someone had used his true name. Especially in such a sweet, gentle tone.
"What's gotten you so worked up?" She sighs. "We should be having fun."
Guilt does begin to weigh at his heart a little. He hadn't seen her for a while, she was right. They should be having fun. He should be treasuring her company, but here he was, fighting a conversation he knew they were going to have to have sometime.

Thing is, Dabi- no, Touya, had a lot of emotions. He had big feelings, despite his mask of stoicism, and very rarely truly indulged people in them.
He'd learned to hide a lot growing up. Dear old dad not taking too kindly to his pawns having much emotion. So now the task of being asked to open up and force himself to willingly share information with her, to be short, terrified him.

"You heard and didn't say anything." He says, trying to hide his vulnerability by sounding gruff, as though he's annoyed. The wobble in his voice isn't very successfully concealed by it, however.
"I didn't want to make you uncomfortable." She shrugs. "Would you like me to say something about it?"
Yes and no.
Depends what she was going to say.
Touya settles for a shrug, clawing desperately to maintain what little remained of his aloof persona.
"I love you too, Touya." She says, the words leaving her as though it was easy.
His breath catches in his throat, and he prays that it wasn't audible.

"We still have some work to do on your communication skills though." She says with a teasing grin. "You really didn't need to torture yourself over that."
Unfortunately, Touya was the king of torturing himself. But she didn't need to know that. For example, she'd said it. She'd said those three words he hadn't known he was yearning to hear, and yet his brain was busy trying to convince him it was all bullshit.
After all, how come his own family couldn't love him, but someone he just so happened upon one day could?
He realises it's been a while since he last spoke, just staring at her, likely in shock, or as much shock as his scarred and stapled face would allow.

"If that's all, I'd really like to enjoy my evening with you without Blue stealing you from me now. 'Kay?" She says, smiling.
He bobs his head up and down, a little dumbfounded still, and she presses a quick kiss specifically to his gnarled bottom lip.

Like he wasn't irreparable.