Inarticulate || Kiribaku AU

16 Again

"Or- y'know!!" Kirishima backed up, red immediately flushing his face as he registered what specific word he just used. "Sorry, man! I don't really know-"

"If you take it back I'll kill you," Bakugou responded quickly, able to tell that Kirishima wasn't actually sorry for anything at all. He was only saying all that in fear of a negative reaction.

"I'm not taking it back. I don't don't think I could no matter how embarrassed I am," he beamed a grin, sparkles practically in his eyes as he did so.

"Why the fuck are you embarrassed? That was smooth as hell," the blonde chuckled, no intention of moving his hands. "Took you long enough."

"What's that supposed to mean‽ Did you know all this time‽" Kirishima panicked slightly. Sure he wasn't exactly the best at explicitly hiding his feelings but he had no way of knowing if that got through to the blonde.

"Not really. Uraraka told me how everyone thought you liked me in school so I just assumed that you did, I guess," Bakugou responded, almost tempted to leave the redhead wondering for awhile.

"Oh... they did, huh? I've never really been the best at hiding this kind of thing, have I?" He felt sort of defeated, not even knowing that he was this apparent until now.

"They had me figured out too, apparently."

"Figured out‽" Kirishima jumped back again, trying to piece the puzzle together in his head but he didn't exactly have enough time to do so.

"Yes! It was fucking obvious I liked you in school, you damn moron!"

Katsuki's hands moved to pull at Eijirou's collar, shaking him a little bit to make sure it registered in his brain, which he was sure had just killed some of it's own brain cells.

"And here I was, scared that you like Midoriya or something!"

There was a second of silence in the room, Bakugou's face dropping immediately. Yep, he definitely had a few brain cells missing.

"Fucking really? You thought I liked that nerd‽ I literally said it's not someone from work!"

"Yeah I know, but you don't really work with Midoriya exactly so I didn't know if you were tryna pull the wool over my eyes!"

The blonde shook his head in almost disbelief before wrapping his arms around the other's torso, pulling him forward into an embrace.

"I promised myself that if it ever looked like you would be getting a boyfriend or you liked someone or something then I'd confess before I'd let anything happen, but you never gave me the damn opportunity. Besides, at least half of your friends have probably had a fucking crush on you at one point."

Their voices were both quieter as Kirishima's arms snaked up Bakugou's back, sighing into his shoulder as his eyes fell shut.

"What do you mean?" Eijirou laughed, barely even remembering that he had to listen to the response.

"You're like a goddamn magnet for everyone. If even I felt the fucking pull then I'd be dumb to believe no one else ever has."

Kirishima let out a hearty chuckle, Bakugou able to feel the vibration of his chest against his own.

"That's something only a guy working in some form of literature would say."

They stayed in that position for a minute before one of Bakugou's hands found it's way into Kirishima's hair. He tried to run his fingers through it but it got caught in some leftover gel for a second which clearly offended him.