Chapter Text
It had started out as flashes.
Little blurbs that decorated the edges of his vision and buzzed distractedly in his ears. Hizashi didn't pay them much mind at all. He got distracted easily and had a hyperactive imagination, so honestly he wasn't too worried about them. Most of the time he blamed it on his ever wandering mind and even used some of the flashes as inspiration for segments during his radio show.
The flashes of riding on horseback, colorful fields of flowers, rainy days watched from the porch of a traditional Japanese house...and the innumerable times he saw different visions of Aizawa Shouta.
Maybe that was why he didn't bother worrying about the flashes. Hizashi had been harboring a pathetic crush on the man since he'd met the other during the sport's festival in their first year at UA (Who was he kidding? It wasn't a crush – it had never been a crush. It felt like from the moment Hizashi had laid eyes on the other something had clicked into place, had connected pathways in his heart that told him simply that this was the person he loved. This was the person he had always loved.), but try as he might Shouta just...didn't seem interested in anything beyond friends. He'd tried to ignore the feelings fluttering in his chest for years – but really, he should have known it was hopeless.
Kayama Nemuri and Iida Tensei both loved to tease him about how lovesick he could get around the scruffy man. Hizashi did every damn thing he could to cement a place into Shouta's life throughout the years while still trying to keep the feelings hidden. Shouta never seemed to realize exactly how much Hizashi cared.
So these flashes he'd been getting? Of all sorts of different scenery and eras and of Shouta? Well, if he couldn't have the real thing, Hizashi was more than happy to let his imagination run wild with whatever it wanted to come up with. And he really, really had thought it was his imagination.
There were a few times he'd even laugh and tell Shouta about the things his mind had come up with. “Once I imagined we were fishing together in this really murky pond!” or “Hey, I think you'd look so cool in Samurai armor – wha'do'ya think?” and even “Oh, oh, I had a dream the other day that I was a fancy noble and you were my bodyguard!”
Shouta always rolled his eyes and looked exasperated. Usually he scowled and told Hizashi to focus on the present, please and thank you. Hizashi laughed each time, but he enjoyed the day dreams too much. Shouta always looked at him so softly in them.
He never looked at him like that in real life.
Eventually the flashes got...longer. More real. Instead of brief glimpses, Hizashi would see and hear a few seconds of these other realities, it seemed, and Shouta was always at the center. In newly made Samurai armor, receiving orders from the Shogun. Hair pulled back as he carefully planted rice in the fields of water, hakama rolled up so that it wouldn't get wet. Standing in a stiffly pressed uniform as he looked out on the sea, engines of planes starting up in the background.
But never more than a few seconds. Not enough to make him wonder.
Nemuri was the first to notice that Hizashi would go into a daze every now and then. “Earth to Present Miiiic,” she called the first time, jolting him out of his day dream of Shouta helping him find the perfect flower for a bouquet he was making for his sick mother in the village they lived in. She grinned at the flush that spread over his face. “What were you just thinking about, hmm?”
“Nothing!” He didn't sound very convincing.
“Me'thinks you might be lyiiiing,” she sang at him, sitting on his desk and leaning forward to pinch his cheek. When he pulled away with a pout, she laughed. “Let me guess, you were thinking about...” She smirked. “Shouta?”
“No!” Hizashi was really, really bad at lying.
Nemuri threw her head back and laughed. Unabashed in the face of Hizashi's embarrassment. “Oh, honey, it's fine! Just don't get so caught up in your head you forget to go after the real Shouta, okay?”
“Yeah, if he ever shows any interest in me like that, sure,” Hizashi said, rolling his eyes and trying to tug an essay out from under the woman's butt. It wasn't budging, and neither was she.
“Hmm, I'm pretty sure if you just asked, he'd say yes.” Nemuri crossed her legs. “He's got a key to your place, you're each other's emergency contacts, go out for dinner with each other at least once a week, and let's not forget the movie nights you guys do – “
“But that doesn't mean he – look, if I ever actually get the courage without getting drunk I'll let you know, okay?” Hizashi tugged on an essay again. “Can I go back to grading these essays now?”
“Oh?” Nemuri blinked, looking down at the desk she was sitting on. An entirely too innocent expression stretched across her face. “Is that what you were doing? And here I thought you were imagining rolling around with Shouta in between the sheets – “
“Nemuri I swear to god – “
For a brief time after that talk, Hizashi tried to stay focused on the present. On the relationship he had with the actual, real Shouta. But Shouta, while his friend – his best friend – well, he yearned for more so much that when another flash of those somethings drifted across his mind, Hizashi had no qualms with falling back into the fantasies.
Until they got...more intense.
* ~ _ ~ * ~ _ ~ *
It started with a dream that didn't feel like a dream.
Hizashi was drinking sake with Shouta, both in loose kimono and haori. Cicadas sang outside the open doors in the summer evening, a breeze ruffling the belled charms hanging just off the overhang covering the porch. His friend – no, his lover, Hizashi just knew they were lovers, knew it like he knew the back of his hand and how to breathe – looked at him with those soft eyes that he adored so much as they traded stories of their week apart from each other.
Shouta looked so happy to be there with him.
Hizashi could only feel a cold pit in his stomach.
When Shouta gave him a dark-eyed once over, cheeks pink with more than the alcohol in his system, Hizashi tried to give him the same look back. Asked Shouta to close the door in as even a tone as he could. Shouta grinned at him and stood slowly, and when his back was turned Hizashi had to be quick. Quicker than his shaking hands wanted to be. He reached into his haori and grabbed what he needed, standing and rushing up behind Shouta as the man had just slid the door closed.
The dagger sunk into Shouta's back before he could turn around.
“I'm sorry.”
And as Shouta collapsed to the floor, gasping for air and bleeding from the fatal wound he'd just been given, Hizashi bolted out of bed.
He had only a second to register he was going to be sick before he was puking over the side of his bed. Gagging as his stomach rolled. His hands shook where they clutched his bedsheets, the phantom sensation of Shouta's blood still clinging to his fingers, and Hizashi puked again. Tears welled in his eyes and dripped down into the mess on the floor, and while he knew he would need to clean the mess up soon, there was no way he could concentrate on that.
What was that?
Why the hell would he – why would he have a dream about Shouta dying? About killing him?
A sob ripped from him and the tears from getting sick turned into tears of upset. What the fuck was wrong with him that he would be dreaming of something so, so sick? Hizashi curled up and shook, hands pressed to his face as he tried to get his panic and horror under control.
A dream. It was just a dream.
It had to be, otherwise Hizashi didn't think he would be able to handle it.
It took nearly an hour for him to calm down. Crying as the memory of the dream (so very real) replayed over and over in his head. But he finally got ahold of himself. He cleaned up the mess he'd made and took a long, hot shower.
If he spent a long time scrubbing at his hands, no one would know but him.
The next day he was exhausted.
“You look like shit, Zashi,” Nemuri commented as he plopped himself down into his desk chair.
“Thanks, Nemuri, I try,” he muttered, rolling his eyes and taking another sip of his coffee. It was his second cup of the day and honestly it was starting to look like it wouldn't be anywhere near the last. Hizashi sighed and blearily booted up his computer, tugging the last few essays from his bag to look over before the school day began. “Just a rough night, that's all.”
“Too busy daydreaming again to actually sleep?” Nemuri teased, and Hizashi knew she was joking, but all he could think of was the slick feeling on his fingers and the choked noise Shouta made as he –
“Whoa, hey, are you okay?” Nemuri was next to him, crouched low to get a good look at his face, her usual coy expression gone in place of concern. A hand came out to tip his face towards hers, her blue eyes darting over his face. “You got really pale all of a sudden. Are you sick?”
“Ah, no, I just...” Hizashi managed a weak smile and cleared his throat. “Just some bad dreams, I guess. They weren't very pleasant.”
That was the biggest understatement of the millennium.
She hummed, squinting at him for a moment before nodding and patting his cheek. “Alright. But let me know if you need anything, alright?” Nemuri stood, offering him a wide smile. “And don't go overboard on the coffee – Shouta's supposed to be the one with sleeping problems, not you.”
He had to laugh at that, turning back to his desk. “Yeah, yeah, whatever. If I wanna overdose on my delicious sugary cream and coffee drinks I will, Midnight, and no hero or villain will be able to stop me.”
“I don't think you can overdose on coffee,” came a tired voice from the door.
Hizashi stilled for just a moment. Just one. And then he looked up at Shouta, who was walking in and was alive, alive and not bleeding or hurting and looking like he did every day, tired and bored and absolutely perfect. “Eraser! Good morning!” He couldn't help reaching out a hand to squeeze one of Shouta's shoulders – warm and solid under his hand. “How are you this delightful day!?”
Shouta somehow managed to look even more exhausted at that. “It's too early for that level of enthusiasm,” he said dryly. He gave the cup of coffee on Hizashi's desk a suspicious look. “How much sugar did you put in there?”
“Probably too much,” Hizashi said honestly and with a beaming smile.
The disgusted grunt Shouta gave at that brought a bright laugh to Hizashi's lips, and since he'd woken up he finally felt like he could put the nightmare behind him.
* ~ _ ~ * ~ _ ~ *
Of course, it only got worse from there.
It was like that one nightmare was a tipping point for so many more. Night after night, Hizashi tossed and turned to different ways Shouta died. Stabbed, pushed from a ledge, hung, left to bleed out, trapped in a fire, blown up – Hizashi wasn't sure it was possible to for there to be so many different ways for people to die horrifically, but every night in his dreams he'd be forced to watch all of them. It was awful. He already didn't get a whole lot of sleep, what with his overloaded work schedule, but the images and scenes were just making it worse.
It made looking at Shouta during the day difficult. Hizashi was terrified of looking at him and seeing him missing a limb or coughing up blood or something worse – and there was no way he was going to explain it to anyone. Hell no. He'd be written up for a psych eval and with three jobs on the line? Present Mic had an image to maintain and that was crazy in only the best of ways.
So he plastered on a smile, did his best to gesture and flail and be the big personality in the room, and only looked at Shouta if he managed to gather the courage to do so before hand.
And that first nightmare? The one where he – where he – it kept coming back. Over and over, he'd have to experience the way the dagger stabbed into Shouta's back, the blood soaking his hands, the terrible gasp of pain and the look of confusion and betrayal on Shouta's face.
The overwhelming guilt. The overwhelming shame. The knowledge that he was in between a rock and a hard place and that what he had just done, just committed to, was irreversible.
Sometimes he'd be forced to watch the whole thing, where he watched the light die in Shouta's eyes in the last rays of sunlight of the evening, forcing himself to watch as Shouta stopped breathing and go still. He'd had no control of himself as he stumbled away and collapsed against a wall, trembling all over and sobbing harshly because Shouta was gone and he only himself to blame, heartache and loss and so much pain running through him.
Sometimes he'd be forced to watch the reason why – the bandits returning with his mother's brother and his little cousins, dirty and scared and so relieved to see a happy face for the first time in weeks. He'd be forced to watch as he greeted them back home, no relief in discovering they'd been unharmed because he only felt cold.
He'd be forced to watch as less than a day later he walked himself into the river and disappear.
Luckily, a few weeks into the nightmares, the daydreaming started back up again as well. It was such a relief to have flashes of a smiling and happy and alive Shouta to see instead of. The other Shouta. They were so welcomed that the first flash he had he sank into it willingly and just closed his eyes and lived it. Allowed himself to sink in and experience every single little thing he could.
It was funny, actually. The more he allowed himself to sink it, the more details he could...feel.
The breeze through his hair. The material of the clothes he wore. He could hear background noises, like birds or other people talking. The smell of flowers or frying noodles or the stench of too many fish at the docks...Shouta's hand in his.
But that's crazy.
...Right?
* ~ _ ~ * ~ _ ~ *
“Yamada, no more than five minutes, alright?”
“Got it, got it – I'm just refilling my coffee, alright?” Hizashi waved off his techs. “Just stick to the track and I'll be back before you know it.”
“Five minutes.” The tech shut the door on Hizashi's pout.
“Jeez, it's like they don't trust me to add cream and sugar to my coffee in a reasonable amount of time,” he grumbled to himself as he walks towards the break room. Of course his grumbling didn't last too long – not with the state of the art coffee machine waiting for him. It had different settings for just about everything, and Hizashi loved it. He happily trotted over to it, delighting to discover that the pot seemed to be freshly made.
Humming he reached into the mini fridge on the counter, pulling out the creamer and uncapped it. He poured what most would call an unhealthy amount into his mug, set the creamer back, then riffled around for the sugar in the cabinet. “Pour some sugar on me, in the name of love,” he sang softly, the old English lyrics familiar on his tongue. “Pour some sugar on me, come fire me u-up...”
There were footsteps behind him as he struggled to reach the box of sugar in the back of the cabinet, marching quickly up to him. “Hey, I know it hasn't been five minutes just yet – I haven't even gotten to the pot just yet – “
Before he could finish whatever he was going to say, though, a hand clamped onto his shoulder and swung him around. He yelped in surprise, barely catching himself from knocking an elbow, and was pushed roughly until the small of his back was digging almost painfully into the counter. “Whoa, what's the big – “
And then Shouta was kissing him.
Calloused hands gripped both at his face and at his hip, holding him steady as the other man practically devoured his mouth. Chapped lips moving against his, a slick tongue licking his mouth open and teeth clacking against his own in a way that should have been painful but only made the kiss more desperate and filthy. A hard body pressed against his front fully, a leg knocking his apart to fit more comfortably and Hizashi could feel something digging into his hip, something hot and solid and long and he moaned into the kiss, reaching up with his hands to dig fingers into the black hair tied into a messy bun.
“Sh-Shouta,” he panted when Shouta pulled away to bite down his neck, teeth scraping deliciously on his skin. “Shouta, you're – “
“I missed you.” Shouta punctuated those words by sinking his teeth into the skin just above Hizashi's collar, causing the blonde to shout. He pulled away, licking at the marks left behind, and moved so he could mouth at the ear just above. “I've missed this.” Hips rocked into his.
“Mmm,” Hizashi had to bite his lip in order to keep in the filthy moan, pulling hair from the bun to get a good grip on dark locks. “Missed you, too.” He tugged, silently asking for Shouta to meet his lips again. This kiss was shorter but no less filthy, no less desperate, and Hizashi loved every second of it before he had to drag himself away for air. “When did – when – “
“When did I get back?” Shouta hiked Hizashi up onto the counter, and Hizashi didn't have it in him to care that he was knocking over the basket of vegetables. Not when he could wrap his legs around Shouta's waist and bring him closer, closer than he'd been in weeks. “This morning. I skipped a meeting with my superiors to get home to you.”
“You're gonna get in trouble,” he said, pressing his lips to Shouta's cheek, to his brow, to his ear. Everywhere his lips could reach without letting go.
“Do you think I care?” Shouta rolled their hips together again, driving a long moan from Hizashi's lips.
“Oh, oooh you don't, and I don't either, and, ah – “ Hizashi lowered his hands to start working at the buttons on Shouta's uniform, fingers shaking with excitement and happiness. “And we are not going to have reunion sex on the kitchen counter, Shouta.”
“Yamada, what's taking you so long?”
Hizashi jumped, knocking a box of sweetener from the cupboard and banging his wrist on the inside of the door. He blinked, startled and flushed, and looked around. Wasn't he just with Shouta? Wasn't he just in his home making dinner? What happened, where was he, what's going on –
A tech came up beside him, frowning. “Yamada, it's been almost ten minutes. Everything okay?”
Hizashi could only stare in incomprehension for several seconds before his memories finally realigned. Coffee. Break room. Five minute break. Radio station. He swallowed, pulling his hand from the cupboard and giving a strained smile. “Y-yeah. Yeah! I'm fine, just. I just got lost in thought.”
The tech squinted at him, lips pursing. “...Okay. Well, you've got seven calls queued up for you already and Ishima is waiting on you so you guys can finish the segment on pets.” He nodded towards the doorway. “Come on.”
“I – “ Hizashi cleared his throat. “Give me just a minute, okay? I didn't finish getting my coffee just yet and I think I really need it.”
A frustrated sigh left the tech, but the young man started walking out. “Fine, fine, but if Ishima starts getting antsy I'm sending him after you!”
“You got it, listener!”
“I'm a technician.”
Hizashi waited until he heard the footsteps fade before breathing deeply, turning so that he was leaned against the mini fridge and able to bury his face in his hands. His pulse was still racing from Shouta's kisses and manhandling, and he could still feel the phantom sensation of teeth digging into his neck. With a swallow he reached a shaking hand up to his collar, pushing it just aside to press against where Shouta had bitten him.
Unmarked, unbroken skin. Not wet with spit, not warm from blood being forced to the surface.
He let out a shaky breath, trying to stop the panic from overwhelming him completely. It had felt so real, all of it – a part of him still was expecting to blink and be back in that kitchen, with the window open and the sound of the neighbor's kids playing in the street. Still expecting to be back in that little home that he and Shouta had bought together, saying they were just two men rooming together because it was cheaper, hiding the fact that they loved each other because the world thought that two people of the same gender loving one another to be a despicable and horrible thing. Still expecting to see the gas stove and walk by the their tiny 20 centimeter television with black and white as the only colors.
But that was wrong, because...because he and Shouta weren't together like that. He didn't live with the man, he didn't have a house with him, nobody cared about sexuality in this day and age and it wasn't 1966.
What was happening to him?