Katsuki Bakugo

The apartment had never felt this quiet before.

Not even during the nights Katsuki came home at three in the morning, smelling like smoke and exhaustion, his hero costume torn in places and his eyes barely open as he mumbled an apology for missing dinner. Not even during the mornings when he left before sunrise, pressing a distracted kiss to your forehead while promising he'd make it up to you tomorrow.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow. Tomorrow.

You'd spent years loving a man who saved everyone else.

And for years, you'd convinced yourself that being the person waiting for him at home was enough.

You'd been together for so long that imagining a future without Katsuki had felt almost impossible. You'd survived his temper, his stubbornness, his demanding career, the sleepless nights spent worrying whenever he was sent on a dangerous mission. You'd learned which silences meant he was angry and which meant he was simply exhausted. You'd learned to recognize the sound of his footsteps in the hallway, the particular way he'd drop his keys into the bowl by the door, the rare softness in his voice when he called you by a nickname no one else was allowed to use.

You'd learned how to love him.

Somewhere along the way, however, you'd forgotten how to stop feeling lonely.

The breakup hadn't been explosive. That would've almost been easier.

There had been no screaming match, no cruel accusations, no sudden revelation that either of you had stopped loving the other. Just another evening spent waiting for him to come home, another dinner growing cold, another message from Katsuki telling you that a villain incident had kept him at work.

And then you'd finally said what had been sitting in your chest for months.

"I can't keep doing this, Katsuki."

He'd stood in the middle of your shared living room, still wearing his agency uniform, his expression twisting into something you rarely saw on his face.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"It means I'm tired."

"I'm working for us."

"I know."

"Then what the fuck do you want me to do? Quit being a hero?"

You remembered the way he'd said it. Defensive. Frustrated. Almost desperate.

And you remembered how badly you'd wanted him to understand that you weren't asking him to abandon his dream.

"I wanted you to be here, Katsuki. I wanted to feel like I had a boyfriend, not someone I had to make appointments with."

For once, he hadn't had an answer.

You'd both cried that night. Katsuki would deny that until his dying breath, but you'd seen the tears in his eyes when you'd told him you couldn't keep begging for scraps of his time.

He'd asked you to stay.

You'd almost said yes.

God, you'd almost said yes.

But loving him had never been the problem. It was loving him while slowly becoming a stranger in your own relationship that had finally broken you.

So you'd left.

And now, several weeks later, you were sitting alone on the couch in your apartment, wrapped in a blanket that still smelled faintly of his detergent, listening to "Sierra" by The Marías.

It was one of those nights when memories seemed to have teeth.

The song drifted through the room, soft and hazy, filling the silence with the kind of ache that made you feel as though you were remembering a life that belonged to someone else.

Your phone rested in your hand.

You hadn't deleted Katsuki's contact. You couldn't bring yourself to do it. His name was still there, accompanied by the stupid little explosion emoji he'd insisted on adding himself years ago.

You stared at it for a while.

Then, inevitably, your thoughts wandered to Haruto.

Haru, for short.

Your imaginary son.

The little boy who'd never existed outside the countless conversations you'd shared in bed, on long drives, and during those rare, perfect mornings when Katsuki had nowhere to be.

You'd talked about him as though he were already waiting somewhere in your future.

You'd argued about names. Katsuki had insisted that if the kid inherited your habit of crying over every sad movie, he'd be doomed. You'd teased him about how your son would inevitably inherit his temper, his stubbornness, and his ridiculous inability to admit when he was wrong.

He'd said Haru would learn to swim.

You'd reminded him that he hated swimming himself.

"That's different, dumbass. I'll teach him properly."

You could still hear his voice.

You could still picture the way he'd looked at you when you asked whether he'd be a good father. He'd scoffed, called the question stupid, and then pulled you closer, his palm resting over your stomach as he quietly promised that your kid would never have to wonder whether his dad loved him.

You believed him.

You still believed him.

That was the worst part.

Your thumbs hovered over the keyboard.

You knew you shouldn't text him. You knew that one message could turn into ten, that hearing his voice could undo weeks of trying to convince yourself that you were learning to live without him.

But you weren't trying to get him back.

Not tonight.

You just missed the future you'd once been so certain you'd have together.

And you wanted him to know that, somewhere in the middle of all the things you'd lost, you still remembered the little boy you'd dreamed of raising with him.

You opened your messages.

His last text was still there, sent the night you'd finally moved your things out.

Katsuki: Let me know when you get home.

You'd replied that you were safe.

He'd answered with a simple "Good."

Nothing after that.

Your throat tightened.

You typed a sentence, deleted it, then typed another.

Eventually, you stopped trying to make it sound casual.

You: Haru... would've been cute.

You stared at the message for several seconds before hitting send.

Delivered.

Your heart gave a painful little kick.

You could've stopped there. You probably should've.

But the song kept playing, and you could practically see Katsuki's face in your mind. The sharp red eyes. The stubborn mouth. The way he'd pretend to be annoyed whenever you told him you hoped your son would inherit his smile.

You sent another message.

You: Haru... would look just like you.

Then another.

You: With a temper like you.

You: Avoiding the pool, like you.

You: Love all his pets the way I did.

You: Be confident like you.

You read the messages over and over, your vision blurring slightly.

There were so many other things you could've said. That Haru would've probably loved explosions because his dad would've taught him how to make tiny, harmless sparks in his palms. That he'd have fallen asleep on Katsuki's chest during movie nights. That you'd imagined standing in the kitchen together while your little boy sat on the counter, stealing pieces of fruit and getting scolded for it.

That you'd imagined Katsuki coming home from work and actually having someone to come home to.

You locked your phone and set it facedown on the couch.

"There," you whispered to the empty room. "That's all."

You tried to believe it.

Across the city, Katsuki Bakugou was sitting in the break room of his hero agency, staring at a half-finished report on his laptop.

It was past midnight. His shoulders ached, his knuckles were sore, and he'd spent the better part of the evening dealing with a villain incident that had dragged on far longer than it should have.

Normally, he'd have gone straight home by now.

Except home didn't feel much like home anymore.

The apartment was too quiet without you. There were no slippers abandoned beside the couch, no familiar voice calling his name from the kitchen, no messages asking whether he'd eaten anything besides convenience-store garbage.

He'd kept expecting you to text him.

Every time his phone lit up, his attention snapped toward it before he could stop himself.

He hated that.

He hated even more that he understood exactly why you'd left.

He'd spent years telling himself that everything he did was for the future you were supposed to have together. Every extra shift. Every dangerous assignment. Every night he came home too exhausted to hold a proper conversation.

He'd thought there would always be more time.

More time to take you on the dates he'd promised. More time to listen when you talked about your day. More time to sit with you on the couch and plan the stupid little details of the life you'd wanted.

More time to become the man you'd deserved.

Apparently, there wasn't.

His phone vibrated against the table.

Katsuki glanced down without much thought.

Then he saw your name.

His entire body went still.

For a moment, he simply stared at the notification, afraid that if he opened it, he'd discover he'd imagined it.

He unlocked his phone.

The first message made his brows draw together.

The second made his chest tighten.

By the time he reached the last one, he was no longer looking at the screen like a tired man checking his messages.

He was looking at it like someone had reached into the future he'd been trying desperately not to imagine and reminded him that it had once belonged to both of you.

"Haru..." he muttered under his breath.

He remembered.

Of course he fucking remembered.

He remembered you curled against his side, telling him you liked the name Haruto because it sounded warm. He remembered pretending not to care while secretly looking up baby names on his phone after you'd fallen asleep. He remembered telling you that your kid was going to be a menace if he inherited both your stubbornness and his temper.

He remembered your laughter.

He remembered the way you'd looked at him when he promised that, when the time came, he'd make room for his family no matter how demanding his career became.

His fingers tightened around the phone.

He'd meant it.

He'd meant every damn word.

And yet, when you'd finally asked him to choose between making time for you and continuing to live the way he had been living, he'd stood there with nothing to offer except another promise.

Another tomorrow.

His eyes moved back to your messages.

He read them again.

Then a third time.

He could almost hear you saying every line, your voice soft with that particular fondness you'd always had whenever you imagined your future child. He could picture you smiling sadly at your phone, probably listening to some song he'd never bothered to learn the name of.

He wondered if you were crying.

He wondered if you were alone.

He wondered whether you missed him as much as he missed you.

His thumbs moved over the keyboard.

Katsuki: Yeah.

He stopped.

Stared at the pathetic little word.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" he muttered to himself.

He deleted it.

He tried again.

Katsuki: You remember all that?

Sent.

His heart pounded as soon as the message appeared beneath yours.

He wanted to say more. He wanted to tell you that he'd thought about Haru, too. That sometimes, after particularly bad shifts, he'd catch himself wondering what it would be like to come home to a little boy who ran toward him with his arms outstretched.

He wanted to tell you that he'd never stopped wanting that future.

That he'd never stopped wanting you.

But he didn't know if he had the right to say those things anymore.

Because wanting a family with you had never been the difficult part.

Being present enough to deserve one had been.

He sat there with his phone in his hand, waiting for your reply, his unfinished report forgotten on the laptop in front of him.

For once, the hero who could face down an entire building full of villains without flinching had absolutely no idea what to do.

All he could do was wait.

And hope that, for just a little while longer, you still wanted to talk to him.

The apartment had never felt this quiet before.

Not even during the nights Katsuki came home at three in the morning, smelling like smoke and exhaustion, his hero costume torn in places and his eyes barely open as he mumbled an apology for missing dinner. Not even during the mornings when he left before sunrise, pressing a distracted kiss to your forehead while promising he'd make it up to you tomorrow.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow. Tomorrow.

You'd spent years loving a man who saved everyone else.

And for years, you'd convinced yourself that being the person waiting for him at home was enough.

You'd been together for so long that imagining a future without Katsuki had felt almost impossible. You'd survived his temper, his stubbornness, his demanding career, the sleepless nights spent worrying whenever he was sent on a dangerous mission. You'd learned which silences meant he was angry and which meant he was simply exhausted. You'd learned to recognize the sound of his footsteps in the hallway, the particular way he'd drop his keys into the bowl by the door, the rare softness in his voice when he called you by a nickname no one else was allowed to use.

You'd learned how to love him.

Somewhere along the way, however, you'd forgotten how to stop feeling lonely.

The breakup hadn't been explosive. That would've almost been easier.

There had been no screaming match, no cruel accusations, no sudden revelation that either of you had stopped loving the other. Just another evening spent waiting for him to come home, another dinner growing cold, another message from Katsuki telling you that a villain incident had kept him at work.

And then you'd finally said what had been sitting in your chest for months.

"I can't keep doing this, Katsuki."

He'd stood in the middle of your shared living room, still wearing his agency uniform, his expression twisting into something you rarely saw on his face.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"It means I'm tired."

"I'm working for us."

"I know."

"Then what the fuck do you want me to do? Quit being a hero?"

You remembered the way he'd said it. Defensive. Frustrated. Almost desperate.

And you remembered how badly you'd wanted him to understand that you weren't asking him to abandon his dream.

"I wanted you to be here, Katsuki. I wanted to feel like I had a boyfriend, not someone I had to make appointments with."

For once, he hadn't had an answer.

You'd both cried that night. Katsuki would deny that until his dying breath, but you'd seen the tears in his eyes when you'd told him you couldn't keep begging for scraps of his time.

He'd asked you to stay.

You'd almost said yes.

God, you'd almost said yes.

But loving him had never been the problem. It was loving him while slowly becoming a stranger in your own relationship that had finally broken you.

So you'd left.

And now, several weeks later, you were sitting alone on the couch in your apartment, wrapped in a blanket that still smelled faintly of his detergent, listening to "Sierra" by The Marías.

It was one of those nights when memories seemed to have teeth.

The song drifted through the room, soft and hazy, filling the silence with the kind of ache that made you feel as though you were remembering a life that belonged to someone else.

Your phone rested in your hand.

You hadn't deleted Katsuki's contact. You couldn't bring yourself to do it. His name was still there, accompanied by the stupid little explosion emoji he'd insisted on adding himself years ago.

You stared at it for a while.

Then, inevitably, your thoughts wandered to Haruto.

Haru, for short.

Your imaginary son.

The little boy who'd never existed outside the countless conversations you'd shared in bed, on long drives, and during those rare, perfect mornings when Katsuki had nowhere to be.

You'd talked about him as though he were already waiting somewhere in your future.

You'd argued about names. Katsuki had insisted that if the kid inherited your habit of crying over every sad movie, he'd be doomed. You'd teased him about how your son would inevitably inherit his temper, his stubbornness, and his ridiculous inability to admit when he was wrong.

He'd said Haru would learn to swim.

You'd reminded him that he hated swimming himself.

"That's different, dumbass. I'll teach him properly."

You could still hear his voice.

You could still picture the way he'd looked at you when you asked whether he'd be a good father. He'd scoffed, called the question stupid, and then pulled you closer, his palm resting over your stomach as he quietly promised that your kid would never have to wonder whether his dad loved him.

You believed him.

You still believed him.

That was the worst part.

Your thumbs hovered over the keyboard.

You knew you shouldn't text him. You knew that one message could turn into ten, that hearing his voice could undo weeks of trying to convince yourself that you were learning to live without him.

But you weren't trying to get him back.

Not tonight.

You just missed the future you'd once been so certain you'd have together.

And you wanted him to know that, somewhere in the middle of all the things you'd lost, you still remembered the little boy you'd dreamed of raising with him.

You opened your messages.

His last text was still there, sent the night you'd finally moved your things out.

Katsuki: Let me know when you get home.

You'd replied that you were safe.

He'd answered with a simple "Good."

Nothing after that.

Your throat tightened.

You typed a sentence, deleted it, then typed another.

Eventually, you stopped trying to make it sound casual.

You: Haru... would've been cute.

You stared at the message for several seconds before hitting send.

Delivered.

Your heart gave a painful little kick.

You could've stopped there. You probably should've.

But the song kept playing, and you could practically see Katsuki's face in your mind. The sharp red eyes. The stubborn mouth. The way he'd pretend to be annoyed whenever you told him you hoped your son would inherit his smile.

You sent another message.

You: Haru... would look just like you.

Then another.

You: With a temper like you.

You: Avoiding the pool, like you.

You: Love all his pets the way I did.

You: Be confident like you.

You read the messages over and over, your vision blurring slightly.

There were so many other things you could've said. That Haru would've probably loved explosions because his dad would've taught him how to make tiny, harmless sparks in his palms. That he'd have fallen asleep on Katsuki's chest during movie nights. That you'd imagined standing in the kitchen together while your little boy sat on the counter, stealing pieces of fruit and getting scolded for it.

That you'd imagined Katsuki coming home from work and actually having someone to come home to.

You locked your phone and set it facedown on the couch.

"There," you whispered to the empty room. "That's all."

You tried to believe it.

Across the city, Katsuki Bakugou was sitting in the break room of his hero agency, staring at a half-finished report on his laptop.

It was past midnight. His shoulders ached, his knuckles were sore, and he'd spent the better part of the evening dealing with a villain incident that had dragged on far longer than it should have.

Normally, he'd have gone straight home by now.

Except home didn't feel much like home anymore.

The apartment was too quiet without you. There were no slippers abandoned beside the couch, no familiar voice calling his name from the kitchen, no messages asking whether he'd eaten anything besides convenience-store garbage.

He'd kept expecting you to text him.

Every time his phone lit up, his attention snapped toward it before he could stop himself.

He hated that.

He hated even more that he understood exactly why you'd left.

He'd spent years telling himself that everything he did was for the future you were supposed to have together. Every extra shift. Every dangerous assignment. Every night he came home too exhausted to hold a proper conversation.

He'd thought there would always be more time.

More time to take you on the dates he'd promised. More time to listen when you talked about your day. More time to sit with you on the couch and plan the stupid little details of the life you'd wanted.

More time to become the man you'd deserved.

Apparently, there wasn't.

His phone vibrated against the table.

Katsuki glanced down without much thought.

Then he saw your name.

His entire body went still.

For a moment, he simply stared at the notification, afraid that if he opened it, he'd discover he'd imagined it.

He unlocked his phone.

The first message made his brows draw together.

The second made his chest tighten.

By the time he reached the last one, he was no longer looking at the screen like a tired man checking his messages.

He was looking at it like someone had reached into the future he'd been trying desperately not to imagine and reminded him that it had once belonged to both of you.

"Haru..." he muttered under his breath.

He remembered.

Of course he fucking remembered.

He remembered you curled against his side, telling him you liked the name Haruto because it sounded warm. He remembered pretending not to care while secretly looking up baby names on his phone after you'd fallen asleep. He remembered telling you that your kid was going to be a menace if he inherited both your stubbornness and his temper.

He remembered your laughter.

He remembered the way you'd looked at him when he promised that, when the time came, he'd make room for his family no matter how demanding his career became.

His fingers tightened around the phone.

He'd meant it.

He'd meant every damn word.

And yet, when you'd finally asked him to choose between making time for you and continuing to live the way he had been living, he'd stood there with nothing to offer except another promise.

Another tomorrow.

His eyes moved back to your messages.

He read them again.

Then a third time.

He could almost hear you saying every line, your voice soft with that particular fondness you'd always had whenever you imagined your future child. He could picture you smiling sadly at your phone, probably listening to some song he'd never bothered to learn the name of.

He wondered if you were crying.

He wondered if you were alone.

He wondered whether you missed him as much as he missed you.

His thumbs moved over the keyboard.

Katsuki: Yeah.

He stopped.

Stared at the pathetic little word.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" he muttered to himself.

He deleted it.

He tried again.

Katsuki: You remember all that?

Sent.

His heart pounded as soon as the message appeared beneath yours.

He wanted to say more. He wanted to tell you that he'd thought about Haru, too. That sometimes, after particularly bad shifts, he'd catch himself wondering what it would be like to come home to a little boy who ran toward him with his arms outstretched.

He wanted to tell you that he'd never stopped wanting that future.

That he'd never stopped wanting you.

But he didn't know if he had the right to say those things anymore.

Because wanting a family with you had never been the difficult part.

Being present enough to deserve one had been.

He sat there with his phone in his hand, waiting for your reply, his unfinished report forgotten on the laptop in front of him.

For once, the hero who could face down an entire building full of villains without flinching had absolutely no idea what to do.

All he could do was wait.

And hope that, for just a little while longer, you still wanted to talk to him.