"Just don't make a mess," Rina muttered as she finally let herself rest, curling up in the chair, her body aching with exhaustion. She could still hear the soft rustle of Dabi shifting on the couch, his movements slow and deliberate.
"Mess?" he scof...
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The night was quiet, and Rina found herself once again sitting beside Dabi on her worn-out couch, the faint smell of smoke lingering in the air between them. Dabi had shown up with little explanation, his usual smirk on his face as he'd let himself in. He looked more at ease here than he did anywhere else, almost as if he'd claimed her apartment as his own.
They sat in a comfortable silence for a while, Rina watching him out of the corner of her eye. The dim lighting softened the hard angles of his face, but his scars were still so prominent, twisting across his skin like they were somehow both a part of him and not. She couldn't help but wonder what it was like to bear them every day, to carry those reminders.
"Why do you keep staring at me like that?" Dabi's voice cut through the silence, his tone casual but with a hint of amusement.
Rina felt her cheeks flush slightly. "I was just... wondering."
Dabi raised an eyebrow, clearly intrigued. "Wondering what?"
She hesitated, her gaze lingering on the scars stretching from his jaw down his neck. "About... your scars." The words were tentative, but she felt her curiosity push her forward. "What happened?"
For a moment, Dabi's expression closed off, his usual lazy smirk replaced by a harder, more guarded look. But he didn't pull away or shut her out. Instead, he looked at her, studying her face as if weighing whether to trust her with an answer.
"It's not a pretty story," he said at last, his voice quieter than usual.
Rina nodded, knowing it was a risk to even ask. But there was a gentleness in her gaze as she reached out, her fingers brushing one of the scars on his jaw. His skin was rough and warm beneath her fingertips, the texture different from the rest of him—like the flame had left him with marks that even time couldn't soften.
Dabi didn't move, letting her touch linger longer than she'd expected. His eyes, however, never left her, as if trying to read her intentions in the faint lines of her expression.
"When I was younger," he finally began, his voice low, "I thought fire was my power, something I could control. Turns out, it was the other way around."
Her hand stayed, fingers lightly tracing the roughness of his skin. There was a sadness in his voice, buried under layers of anger and bitterness, but it was there. She could feel it in the way he spoke, in the words he chose.
"Fire doesn't care who you are, what you want," he continued, his gaze distant. "It just... consumes. I got burned because I thought I could be something more than I was. Something people wanted." He let out a dry laugh, though there was no humour in it. "Guess that didn't turn out so well."
Rina's fingers stilled against his skin, and she let her hand fall back to her side. "You didn't deserve this," she murmured. "No one does."
Dabi's smirk returned, though it was softer now, almost tired. "Maybe. But it doesn't change anything. This is who I am now. Scars and all."
