For you're writing requests:
I had an idea months ago of adult bakudeku being very domestic and in love in the middle of summer just absolutely dying of heat in their shared livingroom but refusing to be apart because WAHHH BAKUGO WORKS SO MUCH IZUKU BARELY GETS TIME ALONE WITH HIM LIKE THIS HE REFUSES TO LET GO and then Ochako and Todoroki show up with smoothies and popsicle and everything is so cool now
Can use in any way you want if you want to at all. I just think they're neat.
Author's note: Hi! First of all thanks so much for the prompt!! It was definitely a cute one to write and I hope you enjoy what I came up with :) Second, brief warning for Bakugou's swearing
Katsuki released a long sigh, sweat pooling uncomfortably on his brow and the place where his back met the hardwood floor of his living room. The fan he and Deku had bought on clearance at the beginning of the summer sent a pathetic wave of hot air towards his body, barely strong enough to be noticeable. Deku’s warm breath near his ear was much louder and much more obnoxious.
Katsuki rolled his eyes at the ceiling. His sweat was explosive for christ sake.
“Deku, I swear to god-”
“No don’t do that,” Izuku interrupted, rolling slightly off of Katsuki’s chest, then compensating for the loss of physical contact with a leg thrown over Katsuki’s stomach.
Katsuki angled his head down to frown at Deku- who was too busy trying to subtly tuck himself against Katsuki’s side to pay Katsuki’s expression much mind.
There was a suspiciously forehead-shaped sweat stain just over his heart. Right where Deku had face planted the second he’d returned from his latest overtime shift an hour ago.
It was a testament to how little they’d been able to see each other these past few weeks that Katsuki didn’t even complain at first. Sidekicks were worked to the bone for little pay and he and Deku had gone in on rent together knowing this. They’d confessed to each other one unsuspecting day in their third year of high school knowing this. Knowing that it wouldn’t be easy.
They snuck handholds and short, firm, meaningful kisses behind the backs of their superiors whenever they crossed paths and they knew, now, how horrible it was to actually experience being apart.
Somehow always on opposite shifts, Deku would traipse into the bathroom with his bedhead and bleary eyes, one hand on Katsuki’s arm or back or face at all times while Katsuki washed off the grime of the night-shift and Deku got ready for the morning and then Katsuki wouldn’t see him again until he was on the way out the door for his own shift.
It was complete and utter bullshit, in Katsuki's opinion. But it was fine.
Or, it would be fine, once they get enough experience to finally start their own agency together and got a little more control over their schedules. Or hell, any control over their schedules.
It would be worth it when Katsuki got to kick ass with Deku on the streets and then come home with him, too. No more of this passing ships in the night bullshit.
“You’re thinking something sweet,” Deku murmured, poking at the soft center of Katsuki’s cheek and then drawing a gentle line down the bridge of his nose.
“No ‘m not,” Katsuki said. “Sweaty ass.”
Deku pinched Katsuki’s nose closed, then laughed when Katsuki elbowed him in mild retaliation.
“You are too,” Deku insisted. “You’re making that face.” Katsuki scowled. “What face?”
Deku tapped the space between Katsuki’s eyebrows and Katsuki stared at the blue-green veins now taking up most of his field of vision.
“The one where you don’t have any frown lines here. And your eyes go all soft. And the corners of your mouth start to do this wobbly thing that-”
“Alright, alright,” Katsuki complained, swatting Deku’s hand away from his face and its apparently numerous tells. “I get the point already shithead, now quit touching my sweat. It’s a fucking fire hazard.”
Deku shoved himself more insistently into Katsuki’s side, nose squishing flat where it was pressed against the top of Katsuki’s ribcage.
“Not unless you detonate.”
Like this, Deku’s voice had a muffled, slightly nasally quality and Katsuki felt the corners of his lips wobble with the want to smile. It was sickening, really, the way Katsuki melted for Deku even while they were slowly being burned to a crisp in their shitty apartment.
“And who says I won’t?” Katsuki challenged.
He couldn’t even tell how much of the sweat on his body was his own, right now, and he wouldn’t trade a second if it for the world.
“Our insurance bills,” Deku replied dryly.
Katsuki scoffed, dragging his knuckles gently across the divots in Deku’s spine.
“Those fuckers,” he said, licking a line across his teeth. “One of these days I’m gonna fucking kill ‘em.”
Deku muffled a snicker in Katsuki’s tank top. “Kill…our insurance bills?”
Katsuki flicked Deku’s ear. “You heard me. I fucking hate those guys.”
“I’d help you hide their papery bodies, Kacchan.”
Katsuki bit down a laugh. Flicked his eyes down to Deku’s growing smile. Watched the shape of it for a while once he realized Deku’s eyes were serenely closed.
“Obviously,” he said, brushing a stray curl off of Deku’s forehead.
“Obviously,” Deku agreed, tightening his grip. Quieter, he said, “I missed you.”
With a drawn out groan, Katsuki pushed Deku onto his back and rolled on top of him, twining their legs together and plastering his own sweaty forehead onto Deku’s collarbones- which were jumping from Deku’s laughter and not entirely comfortable. Still, Katsuki didn’t move.
“Stop making me feel things, asshat.”
Deku pressed a kiss to the top of Katsuki’s head, still laughing. “Oh no,” he said, exaggerating the syllables. “The great and mighty Kacchan brought low by affection. How terrible.”
Katsuki reared his head up enough to nip at Deku’s cheek, a flush rising on his face.
“Jerk.”
Deku cupped Katsuki’s cheeks and pressed an even gentler kiss to his nose. “Love you Kacchan,” he murmured.
Katsuki swallowed and allowed his reddened face to be held in Deku’s large and clammy hands. God, he'd missed this.
“I lo-”
“Delivery!” Ochako sang out, slightly muffled from behind the front door of their apartment, followed by three loud knocks.
Katsuki let his forehead fall unceremoniously onto Deku’s chest, where his grumbled complaints were muffled.
Deku pet soothingly through Katsuki’s hair. Then tried to be subtle about the way he wiped his hand on the rug a few feet to their right a moment later.
“The knocking was just for show,” Ochako announced, voice much clearer as she pushed into their front door with the jangle of keys and the rustle of plastic bags Katsuki couldn’t be bothered to get up and investigate.
He kind of hoped it was another fan though, since she was already here.
“Hello. Sorry for the intrusion,” Todoroki called out next.
He kind of hoped Deku would put him out of his misery, actually.
Deku patted Katsuki’s back in silent apology and Katsuki understood that he would not be throwing his friends out on their asses like they deserved.
“Guys, we gave you that spare key for emergencies,” Deku reminded them from his spot on the floor, still trapped beneath Katsuki and his unwillingness to socialize with trespassers.
“Ochako said this counted.”
Katsuki could practically hear Todoroki’s apathetic shrug.
“Right, but…” Deku started, slowly sitting upright and maneuvering Katsuki’s legs and arms around himself with absolutely no help from Katsuki. “Um, what’s the emergency?”
Katsuki tried not to feel too pleased when Deku lifted them both from the ground with ease, his hands locked securely underneath Katsuki’s thighs. Sidekick shifts were hell but damn if they weren’t also paying off.
The rustling of plastic bags briefly paused. “You’re joking,” Ochako said.
Deku settled them into one of the two barstools beside their kitchen counter and Katsuki kept his eyes and mouth stubbornly shut, even if he could tell by the slight decrease in temperature that Todoroki was sitting on the other one.
“Uh, no?” Deku replied uncertainly, arms circling Katsuki’s torso like a beloved teddy bear. “Guys, is there actually something-?”
“Surprise!” Ochako shouted, dropping the seriousness from her tone and likely shoving something towards Deku’s face that Katsuki couldn’t be bothered to look at. “We came to save you from your badly insulated apartment!”
Then there was a loud pop and the vague sensation of something falling into Katsuki’s hair.
“...was that a fucking confetti popper?” he muttered in Deku’s ear.
Katsuki felt Deku nod against his temple. Fucker was probably smiling, too.
“What the fuck,” Katsuki said.
“Aw, that’s so nice of you!” Deku said, ignoring Katsuki’s confusion.
Annoyed, Katsuki opened his eyes and used the edge of the counter to spin their chair around. “Oi, what-?”
Todoroki shoved two plastic cups towards Katsuki’s face, both of them varying shades of pink. Katsuki stared. The one on the left had a single piece of blue confetti stuck to the lid.
“We brought smoothies,” Todoroki explained.
“And popsicles!” Ochako added.
Katsuki shifted his eyes to where she did, in fact, have a row of colorful popsicles lined up on the counter.
Slowly, Katsuki accepted the smoothies.
“Bribe successful,” Ochako whisper-cheered to Todoroki.
Katsuki clicked his tongue, and took a sip of the smoothie with the confetti. “I fucking heard that Pink Cheeks.” Then he cringed slightly at the taste of tropical fruits and handed it to Deku. “This one’s definitely yours.”
Deku smiled, seemingly unbothered about being turned away from the conversation. “Thanks Kacchan.”
“Bribe successful,” Todoroki agreed, offering her a fist bump.
“Fuck you both,” Katsuki said, narrowing his eyes over Deku’s shoulder while he drank from the strawberry banana smoothie that, on second glance, he could see had a sticker of a grenade on the far side. “I’m not so fucking easily swayed.”
Laughing, Deku squeezed Katsuki tighter with one hand and used the other to press his cold smoothie against the back of Katsuki’s neck. “Right.”
Katsuki hummed a pleased sound. Still, he said, “You’re damn right. Bastard. I'm un-bribe-able.”
Then Deku spun the chair back around to make cheerful small talk with their friends and Katsuki decided, just this once, that he wouldn’t confiscate their spare key. Not when Deku’s hand was scratching so gently up and down his side and Todoroki occasionally sent a spray of ice flurries over their heads. Even Ochako amused herself by balancing popsicles on Katsuki’s shoulders.
And it wasn’t often that he and Deku got to spend their days like this.
Katsuki tapped Deku three times on the hip.
I love you, it meant.
I definitely get the feeling that izuku has compartmentalized his gay thoughts by locking it away like “ok well sure I’m gay, but I’m only gay for kacchan and pffft THATS never happening so yay gay crisis adverted” and now kacchan is coming to him with big wet heart eyes like “hey Izuku I’m DEFINITELY in love with you btw” and cuts to Izuku shrieking and scrambling for the door
i keep coming back to this, i drew this on a whim/as a warm-up but it's so cute to me....... i like this a lot but it feels incomplete, so i'm working on a continuation :)
MHA 430 spoilers (3)
Happy boy :)
This panel gives me so much hope that post-war “my eye bags have eye bags” Izuku got the help he needed from his friends/teachers/Inko and he finally got to work through his complicated emotions and slowly but surely was able to be a (somewhat) normal teenager- going to the arcade with Bakugou after therapy and having sleepovers with his friends, etc, as they all worked to rebuild the broken world around them into something better
For me, I try to replace words like said with something more specific, but only if the dialogue needs it. So like:
“I hate you,” he said.
can be a lot less effective in an argument scene than,
“I hate you!” he shouted.
So advice #1 is add specificity so you can paint the image that you want your readers to have. If I’m struggling to find the specific word I want to use I’ll sometimes try OneLook Thesaurus, but honestly sometimes the simple ones you think of first work best (he shouted vs he vociferated, yk?)
But sometimes you don’t even need the specificity in the dialogue tag to make the image clear, you can focus on description and leave the dialogue standing on its own, like:
Tommy gripped Clarence by the collar, his nostrils flaring.
“I hate you!”
As long as it’s clear who’s speaking, stand alone dialogue can be really effective and it’s smth I’ve had recommended to me before. So advice #2 would be to simply drop some of the said’s or ask’s that aren’t doing much for your dialogue. (But this doesn’t mean it’s automatically better to cut out all of them, especially if some of those tags do a lot of work for the pacing of your dialogue, it’s really up to your own judgement as the all-knowing author)
And advice #3 is just that writers notice the said’s and ask’s way more than a reader ever does, bc to a reader those words tend to become part of the landscape of what they’re reading and feel very natural but if you choose a synonym of said that feels really out of place, then they’ll definitely notice it
So overall I’d say don’t get too in your head about it :)
Having a lot of said’s and ask’s is totally normal, it’s really just up to you if you think they’re not doing enough work to paint the picture you want or if it might be punchier to have to dialogue be without tags! Might even be worth it to look at a piece of writing you really like to see that author’s balance of said/asked vs more specific tags vs no tags at all, especially to note which ones you, as a reader, like the most
Hope this helps and best of luck with your novel!!
I'm using said and asked way to many times in my writing. Where do you all get your synonyms from??
And don't tell me 'Google'
Ooh I really like the idea of placing your writing day at the end of the week so you always have something to look forward to, that’s such a sweet ritual :)
I’ve been wanting to try out flash fiction Friday’s as well so maybe I’ll give that a shot!
Thanks so much for the suggestions and best of luck with your semester!!!
trying to find the time/energy to write now that the semester has started up again is not going to be as easy peasy as i thought lol
writers, pls reblog with your fav writing rituals/habits! i love getting inspired by seeing what works for other people :)
MHA tweets pt.12 ✨
Hello, I saw your writing requests were open thru October- does that mean you’re done for now?
Yup. I’m planning on opening requests again later this week, but for a specific type of challenge I wanna try. The next general one I’ll open will prob be sometime in the spring :)
More pixie hollow au!