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By the look on Bakugou’s face, Eijirou suspected that he was supposed to think that he was making a rather large mistake. The blond was grinning, but not in a friendly way. It was slightly predatory, as if he was preparing for Eijirou to falter so that he could swoop in with a smug laugh and an ‘I told you so.’ It was irritating but also kinda hot, so Eijirou didn’t really mind.
He inspected the piece of meat held between his chopsticks.
If Eijirou didn’t know any better, he would have assumed the meat was innocent, that the colour on it was merely from the combination of sauces and spices it had marinaded in before cooking. Well, that wasn’t totally untrue, but it was a matter of which sauces. Some would be benign. Some would not.
Like, for instance, capsaicin oil. Also known as (at least in Eijirou’s opinion) the concentrated sweat of all the damned beings rotting in the underworld. This substance was the stuff that gave heat to chili peppers, the stuff that induced that awful, terrible burning sensation that Bakugou liked so much.
The heat wasn’t real, of course, but the capsaicin fooled the mouth into thinking it was. It got into the temperature detecting nerves and played havoc.
This particular meat was part of a range of Bakugou’s favourite dishes at a restaurant known for its stupidly spicy meals. It was Bakugou’s turn to pay this week, so he was the one who got to pick the place to eat at. It was apparent to Eijirou that this place was payback for him being ‘embarrassing’ at their last outing together.
‘Embarrassing’ was, of course, code for ‘Bakugou got too flustered by Eijirou’s obvious flirting and exploded a menu’. Honestly. One of these days they were going to stop dancing around this Thing between them and admit that these outings were dates. The main obstacle was Bakugou’s understandable hesitancy over the whole declaration of feelings stuff, but really, the moment Eijirou got the go-ahead to kiss his best friend he wasn’t ever going to stop.
Anyways. The spicy meat. Eijirou knew that Bakugou was expecting Eijirou to crumble in the face of such an object. Maybe have a spice-related breakdown in the middle of the restaurant. Thing was… Eijirou had a Secret Plan to deal with exactly this sort of situation.
He ate the meat. Eijirou chewed it, slowly, so that he could watch the gradual, delicious change in Bakugou’s expression as it became clearer and clearer that Eijirou wasn’t going to even blink. Eijirou swallowed.
“What the fuck,” Bakugou hissed, having transformed from gleeful gremlin to grouchy grump.
Eijirou took a swig of water to make sure he washed everything out of his handily-hardened mouth before he responded. “You call that spicy?”
“You cheated,” Bakugou said, narrowing his eyes as he sat back in his chair and folded his arms. “I don’t fucking know how, but you cheated.”
“Oh? Are we playing a game?” Eijirou said, leaning forwards to flutter his eyelashes a little. He privately thanked the genetics lottery for giving him the power to turn into a non-porous rock specifically. Huh. Imagine if he became like basalt? Would he float in water instead of sinking? Would-
“You know what I mean,” Bakugou said, pouting off to the side. There was a little colour smudged over his cheeks and Eijirou mentally high-fived his brain.
Eijirou just ate another chunk of meat. Pork? It was hard to actually taste at all thanks to his hardening. He took another swig of water. “S’good! Don’t forget to eat yours!”
“I bet they forgot to season it,” Bakugou muttered darkly, plucking up a piece from Eijirou’s plate.
“Hey!” Eijirou said. “That’s mine.”
“I paid for it,” Bakugou ate it with a glare and then pulled a face. “Okay, what the hell are you doing?”
Eijirou beamed at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Blasty.”
“Yes you do you-” Bakugou cut himself off mid-insult. He sighed. “You big dumb rock. You’re using your fucking quirk, aren’t you?”
“Your words, not mine,” Eijirou snorted. Damn, Bakugou had sniffed him out already. “Aren’t you impressed by my fine control, though? I had to practice for ages so I wouldn’t turn my lips to stone, too.”
That got Bakugou staring at Eijirou’s mouth, which counted as a big win in his books. Bakugou seemed to realise what he was doing all too quickly and turned his attention back to his own plate. “Whatever.”
Oh yeah, it wouldn’t be long now. Some day very soon would roll around and Bakugou would finally reach for his hand. Eijirou didn’t feel bad about pushing things sometimes - he’d tried to back off once when he thought his feelings weren’t reciprocated and that had just ended in Bakugou not-so-subtly hinting that Eijirou should go back to ‘normal’.
The rest of the meal went by smoothly, Bakugou rolling his eyes as Eijirou ate his food without a sweat and Eijirou nodding along to stuff his friend was saying.
All too soon they were on their way back to the dorms. It was nice, Eijirou thought, that now they were in their third year they were allowed to go out for short trips by themselves. The school wouldn’t be able to give everyone bodyguards after graduation, after all.
It was also nice to walk side-by-side with Bakugou in companionable silence. Eijirou very much looked forwards to the time when they could be holding hands as they went, too.
The Heights Alliance building came into view, and Eijirou heard the sound of paper tearing. Huh. He turned to look at Bakugou. The blond had a very weird expression on his face, but Eijirou didn’t have time to ask what was up because all of a sudden there was a hand tugging at the collar of his shirt and a pair of lips meeting his own.
Holy shit.
Eijirou responded eagerly. Greedily, even, clutching at Bakugou to bring him closer. He melted into the kiss, surprised but not displeased in the slightest when Bakugou slipped his tongue into his mouth. Bakugou kissed with aggression and fire, almost burning in the way that he- Wait a second.
The burning wasn’t metaphorical. Eijirou’s mouth felt like it had been set alight, and that wasn’t typically supposed to happen in a kiss as far as he was aware. He pulled back from Bakugou, detached his limbs, saw the triumphant look in his best friend’s eyes and felt the burning sensation increase. Oh. Holy fucking shit. Bakugou was an absolute bastard and Eijrou liked him so damn much.
“Did you just hot sauce me?”
Bakugou grinned and held up a small empty packet labelled ‘XXX SUPER HOT’.
“You’re an asshole,” Eijirou said, panting and feeling himself break into a sweat. Spice tears began to pool at the corner of his eyes and he leant foward to put his hands on his knees. Maybe if he jumped into a pool of ice he could stave off this feeling?
“Yeah,” Bakugou agreed. “You good?”
“I’m dying,” Eijirou said, dropping to the ground and rolling onto the grass. “Call the fire brigade, Blasty. I need water!”
“Nah, water makes it worse,” Bakugou said, looking down at Eijirou with amusement. Holy shit he’d just kissed Eijirou for the first time. “What you want is sweetened milk.”
Eijirou groaned. He was sure his nose was streaming along with his eyes now. It was only because of the spice. That was the only reason he was teary. “Call the milk brigade, then.”
“Dramatic. There’s milk in the kitchen,” Bakugou said, kicking lightly at Eijirou’s side.
“Ugh, I think I’m gonna spontaneously combust from the face down,” Eijirou stuck his arm up so that Bakugou could help him to stand. Once he was on his feet, he moved Bakugou’s hand to the other of his own and linked their fingers together. Heh. Bakugou didn’t even try to pull his hand away! “Today was nice until you tried to murder me. With your tongue, what the fuck? Not that I’m complaining about the tongue bit - that was great - but the hot sauce?”
Bakugou looked almost unbearably smug. “That’s what you get for cheating.”
“What, poisoned kisses?” Eijirou asked, fanning himself with his free hand. “I cannot believe you used our first kiss as a prank. I mean, I can, but like,” He paused his fanning for a moment. “You know what? Worth it. You should definitely kiss me again. Without the pain.”
Bakugou turned a little pink and pulled Eijirou towards the Alliance building. “Maybe I will.”
He did.