the evening after the school festival, bakugou tells kirishima something... weird.

they're still in their orange shirts, bone tired from clearing out the stage, when they take a tiny break at the pavement behind the school.

"i used to play the piano," bakugou tells him, quietly.

kirishima drains out the rest of his sprite, looks at his friend, raises an eyebrow. "yeah man?"

and the thing about it is - when bakugou talks like this, kirishima tries his best to listen without scaring him off.

watching bakugou set out conversation is like watching birds settle. one wrong move and they beat their wings and flutter away.

his eyes are faraway. his expression calm, unlike the rough way it usually is: brows twisted and teeth bared.

it's getting dark out, and kirishima watches as the moonlight softly carves shadows into the dips of his skin, and his eyelashes charmingly shine silver.

he's pretty.

"i was in, fuckin', i dunno - middle school. i hated my teacher. he was this guy who constantly told me to stop cracking my knuckles - said it'd make my fingers less slender, less easy to play. he told me to stop sweating, all the damn time. the fucker."

kirishima laughs.

bakugou looks at his hands. "he made me feel like shit about my fingers."

/oh,/ kirishima thinks, and he stops smiling - he stagnates his lips, looks at him.

"so on the recital. i had to play number nine."

kirishima wants to ask, /what's number nine/ - but he doesn't interrupt.

"i was angry. i fucking hated that piece. it was bethoven's easiest one. so," he looks at kirishima, his eyes stark red in the night. "i blew up the piano."

"oh," kirishima says, out loud this time. "why?"

he shrugs, turns to the pavement. the moonlight races across the slopes of his face, and kirishima watches the light tangle in his hair, a little bit entranced.

bakugou shrugs again. "i don't fucking know. it was middle school."

kirishima purses his lips. middle school.

bakugou goes on, "i guess i didn't understand the piece. and i hated my teacher. so i blew it up. my parents had to pay for the piano - a huge expensive yamaha with strings, whatever. i'll pay the hag when she's older, as a pro hero."

"but the point is," he says. "i think i understand number nine now."

kirishima starts to ask, "what's number -"

"hey guys! a little help!" uraraka asks from somewhere behind a pile of streamers.

bakugou gets up, throws his aluminum can in the bin. "break's over, shitty hair." he walks away, stride rigid, hands in his pocket.

/but. what's number nine./

kirishima dunks his own can, follows behind bakguou, sneakers screeching on asphalt. "yo! wait up! ayy, come on, man!"

.
.
.

kirishima definitely tries to bring up the conversation again. bakugou cuts him off, every time.

weeks after the summer festival, kirishima gets a text from bakugou.

[bakugou:] get in here.

it's a puzzling three words, and kirishima's brows knit up in confusion, but he steps into his crocs and heads down the hall towards bakugou's dorm anyway.

"yo, man, what's happening? i wanted to grab something to eat but like..." his voice trails off when he sees bakugou seated in a neat black button down, jirou's keyboard in front of him.

he tells him, simply, "i perfected it."

kirishima blinks, and then a grin spreads across his face. "wait, bro, is this like a? like a recital? should i - call everyone else to see, maybe -"

bakugou shakes his head no.

"why..."

"you're the only audience i care about. sit the fuck down."

there's a pause. and then kirishima flushes, "hey, you can't just say stuff like that..." he awkwardly settles down on the edge of bakugou's bed.

he grumbles, "i'm playing on a fucking keyboard. i'll do it again, it has to be perfect. fuck." he huffs, puffs out his cheek as he presses a double c-chord, as if to start out.

he satiates, his english accent clearer than kirishimas - "bethoven's ninth symphony: an ode to joy."

kirishima watches, with wide eyes, as bakugou starts to play.

his sleeves are rolled up, sunlight from his room's window painted across his forearms. his eyes are downcast, and he's focused, as he presses keys down.

and bakugou's right. it's a simple song. the chords aren't even three-keyed, and the shifts of his hand are sparce.

bakugou plays without a single slip of his fingers, expression still, hair falling over his forehead. he doesn't look up at kirishima.

the piece finishes, and bakugou lets the note hold - as much as a keyboard can let it, anyway.

"that's it," he says, albeit awkwardly, "it's a fuckin -" finally, finally, he meets kirishima's eyes, and pauses. "are you /crying?/"

kirishima wipes his nose. "no. yes. come on, bro - men cry sometimes, this is way too much you're just -" he breaks into a tiny sob, " you're just so pretty, man, and i like you a lot, and the song is called ode to joy and you want to play it for me, ah," he wipes his face again.

"you're - i dunno man, you're making me feel things."

bakugou raises a brow as if kirishima has gone apeshit.

but kirishima has always been tactile, and he's overwhelmed with the want to reach out towards bakugou: the same way he did, in the dark winds of the night, in a rush.

so he steps towards bakugou, behind the keyboard. "a lot of feelings, and i can't really - you know -" he waves his hand around himself, briefly. "point out what each of them are, but like. thank you. you know? thanks for sharing... this side of you with me."

bakugou lowers his head again.

(kirishima wants to look at him, though.)

"the song is about peace," bakugou says. hesitantly. "the bitchass teacher -" kirishima snorts at that, a little sad, a little out of laughter; "- said it was about war. and shit."

"but for me," he says. "it's about you."

kirishima can't breathe here. because it's a small hint, a distant dream - that maybe, oh, maybe, bakugou likes him back, and that makes his head spin and he counts to ten in his head.

he says, a ghost-whisper: "bakugou. look at me."

kirishima wants to see him: the way his brows cramp up in a corner, the way his pupils dilate to the dark and he wants to /see/ him, because something like this makes his stomach twist up and it's a fucking. it's a fucking /dream,/ he want's to memorize it all, feel everything.

bakugou looks up at him, slowly.