#dabihawks lil angsty at start but mostly soft, sweet, slow dancing

suggestion: listen to "(somebody) ease my troublin' mind" while reading

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the days have been getting longer and longer for hawks. not in the literal 'daylight is getting longer' sense, but his days at work––with patrols, with paperwork, with his infiltration mission––

are growing longer and longer. the knowledge that his mission is getting closer to its end–that his time with dabi, with the entirety of the league–is closing in on the fallout of the century holes up in the crevices of his mind.

he tries not to think about

that. tries to leave those thoughts for when the lights in his bedroom go off, when dabi's breathing is sound and gentle next to his ear, and dabi's arms are wrapped around him. in those moments, he turns his face away from dabi, stares at his pale walls and wishes they'd

swallow him and somehow allow for their time to be longer.

it's been one of these kids of days though, one where he's let the cacophony of thoughts seep from their corners and douse his brain like oil for fire, when he comes back to his apartment to find dabi at

his kitchen counter, chopping up carrots, with hawks' stereo playing lowly in the background. it's so domestic, the most wonderful image of everything he didn't know he wanted until recently.

hawks rarely turns on the stereo, he's hardly in his apartment for long

enough to play with some of the things just placed around for decoration. to be honest, he's not sure if he knew it even worked.

hawks bites at the inside of his mouth, chews over the flesh, trying, truly not to let the sound of dabi humming to whatever song is on get to him.

it almost works as he sheds his flight jacket, left in his longer sleeved compression shirt. while he shakes out his feathers, and kicks off his boots at the balcony door, he's left not seeing dabi watching him. but he can feel the moment that dabi looks up––hears the

stopping of the knife on the cutting board.

he tries–and tries and tries not to look up from where he's pushing his boots around with his feathers, fiddling with them. like if he allows himself to step further into his apartment,

he'll be stepping further into a dream he can't have.

he sighs: but he can have the dream now, for the moment, right? dreams are only meant to last through the night anyways.

he looks up, meets dabi's eyes and his raised eyebrows.

dabi must see something on hawks' face that hawks had hoped he'd perfectly schooled. but dabi––dabi is always so fucking smart. maybe it's not even intellect––but having known hawks for more months in

an intimacy he'd not had with anyone else.

"come here, birdie," dabi says, just a hair louder than the music breezing through the apartment. he steps around the kitchen counter, and hawks follows like ink from a pen on paper––with ease, with a glide,

he meets dabi halfway and dabi takes the entirety of him into his arms. he holds him like he can hold the weight on hawks shoulder, like he's trying to make hawks' weight his own weight. his arms wrap just underneath hawks' wings, and hawks lets his wings droop

and drag over the floor.

in a moment, dabi's warmth has settled into him, and he can breath––breath almost like he's high in the sky and nothing else is around him except for the louds and birds.

"you okay?" dabi asks, nosing at hawks' ear. one of his hands drifts up on hawks' back–up, up, slow with the pads of his fingers, just gently pressing into the muscles of where his wings meet his back.

hawks hums, pressing his head into dabi's neck, into the wrecked skin and

lets that wreckage become his own, much like dabi was doing with his weight.

"that's not exactly an answer," dabi murmurs, before taking his opposite hand and letting it fit at the base of hawks' skull before fiddling with the ends of his hair.

"long day," hawks says, still not looking up at dabi.

"mmm," dabi's opposite arm stops its up-down movement, before settling again and tugging hawks closer. like he's the ones with the wings trying to protect hawks from the sight of the world. "wanna talk about it?"

internally, hawks scoffs. they talk about anything, everything, and nothing, but the looming deadline of their end date is not one of them. if hawks can help it, it will never be one of them.

when hawks doesn't answer, dabi doesn't push. dabi just leaves his cheek on hawks'

head, lets his breath hall over the tufts of his hair, and lets himself be carried about by hawks' hands fisting the ends of his t-shirt. one of the many of t-shirts hawks had bought months earlier, and left in a drawer in hawks' bedroom;

and without a word, the drawer became dabi's, and the t-shirts as well.

hawks breathes out, and dabi takes a deep breath in.

hawks begins to listen to dabi's breath: his heart beating in his chest and thrumming against the pulse of his neck, before honing in to the music drifting across the apartment walls.

hawks smiles, the tiniest smile, as he begins to sway to the song.

"what are you doing?" dabi's voice rumbles in his ears and through his chest.

"dance with me?" hawks asks, pulling his face away from dabi's chest, and looking up, finally.

dabi's eyes are cobalt, deep, in the shadow of light cast from the kitchen behind him. if hawks' counted in shades of blue, he thinks he'd find an ocean, a galaxy, and planets worth of blues in dabi's eyes.

dabi huffs, "i don't dance, birdie," he says, but the hand at the back

of hawks' head drifts and his palm cups hawks' chin. his thumb traces over the bone of his jaw, up his cheek.

"mmm," hawks smile grows, he turns his face towards the wandering hand and kisses at the pulse of dabi's wrist. "it'll cheer me up though."

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"will it really?" dabi says, raising a single eyebrow. his eyes have focused though on hawks lips marking his wrist.

"absolutely," hawks answers, letting one of his hands come from dabi's shirt, to collect with dabi's hand on his face. "please?"

he asks, and he asks with a little, quiet plea, in his voice, closing his eyes so his eyelashes cast long shadows over his cheek.

dabi lets his thumb brush up, taking hawks hand with it, before thumbing under hawks' eye.

"okay pretty bird," dabi whispers, and before hawks can say anything––dabi has tugged him back towards his chest, and dabi has let them fold in together again as the sound of an old, slow, pre-quirk era song lets its lyrics drip over the two of them.

the words hold them,

and they hold each other, letting their troubling thoughts wander––letting the aches of the day turn around, before they begin to sway in the light of the kitchen.

((end))

biggest s/o to @seabhactine for lending me the braincell for a moment

LMASLKSFDSFSDF also, pt2 for this will be out later <3