Work Text:
Bakugou quietly shuts the door behind him, mindful of the late hour, and slips off his shoes. The lights are all off, but maneuvering the apartment is easy. After living here for years, he knows it well enough to walk it blindfolded. He hangs up his coat in the closet by the door and puts down his work belongings on the coffee table.
He rubs his face with a muted sigh, exhaustion dragging at his limbs and telling him to sleep. It’s not that he hates late-night patrols, but he also had work that same morning, and that took its toll. No matter how much he wants to sleep right now, he refuses to go to bed with sweat and grime all over him. It takes some effort to grab his pajamas and trudge to the bathroom, but he manages.
For a second, he thinks he sees something move from the corner of his eye, but he dismisses it. He’s just tired and imagining things in the shadows.
With that thought of reassurance, Bakugou flicks on the bathroom light and steps inside.
He
can’t
breathe.
Bakugou’s eyes open in panic and he jerks his head to the side. He hears a loud mrowl! as the weight on his head vanishes, and he proceeds to go into a coughing fit, spitting and choking on hair? that’s gotten into his mouth. He feels the bed suddenly lurch, and turns just in time to see Todoroki tip over the side. The familiar weight beside him disappears and the sound of a low thud and “Ow…” fills the room. Through watery eyes, Bakugou glares at his boyfriend, who’s dazed and bleary-eyed on the floor.
A bundle of orange and white puffy fur sits on Todoroki’s chest.
A cat. There is a cat on Todoroki’s chest.
“Why the fuck?”
Bakugou pinches the bridge of his nose. “So you’re the fucking reason I almost died?”
“Um,” Todoroki says, “no?”
“Shouto, we are not keeping the cat.”
“Why not? Our apartment doesn’t ban them, and we can financially support her.”
“Who’s going to take care of her?”
Todoroki blinks. “Us?”
Bakugou sighs. “With what time?”
His boyfriend raises an eyebrow at him. “Is that what’s stopping you? I didn’t think you’d let something like time stop you from doing anything. Can you not multitask?”
Infuriatingly enough, that almost gets Bakugou to snap at him because like hell he can’t multitask. Maybe two years ago, that would’ve gotten him. Not this time, bitch.
Bakugou glares. Sly bastard.
“In case you haven’t noticed, it’s not simple taking care of an entire living being. I know this is the stray outside our apartment, but just because you’ve been petting the damn cat for a week—”
“Three weeks,” Todoroki interrupts.
“Shut the fuck up, that isn’t the point.” Bakugou scowls. “Have you even taken care of an animal before?”
“No, but—”
“Shouto, you kill plants. You’ve got the fucking opposite of a green thumb and you could make killing plants a profession.”
At that, Todoroki looks offended. “I’m not that bad.”
“You killed a cactus. A cactus. How the fuck do you kill a cactus?” Bakugou snorts at the pout on his face. “How are you going to take care of a cat?”
“But she likes me,” he whines. As if on cue, the cat saunters over to the couch and rubs its face against his left leg. A quiet purr rumbles from her throat and Todoroki visibly melts. “See?”
Bakugou studies Todoroki from head to toe for a solid ten seconds before he scoffs. “It’s because that’s your fire side, you dingus. She likes the warmth, not you.”
“That’s rude, Katsuki.” Todoroki frowns. “... She likes me for me, okay? Look.” He reaches down where the cat is nestled against his leg and, very pointedly, uses his right hand to pet her.
The moment his fingers touch her fur, the cat screeches and launches herself five feet away from him, hissing the whole while. Bakugou snickers at the heartbreak on Todoroki’s face. When the cat prowls over to Bakugou instead, the heartbreak turns into betrayal, and Bakugou’s snickers become full-blown laughter.
“Told you, dumbass.”
“Shut up. I’m mourning.”
“Heh. You got rejected by a cat.”
“My heart, Katsuki. Let me recover.”
“Absolutely not. This is what you—”
“Apartment 2-A, there are multiple packages here for you.”
“... What the fuck did you do?”
Apparently, the packages? They’re supplies. For the cat. The cat Todoroki said he took in last night.
“How much money did you fucking pay to get it here this fast?” Bakugou asks, disbelief evident in his voice. “And why? ”
Todoroki stops cooing at the cat to look at him. “I didn’t want her to get bored,” he says, the duh blatant without being said. The cat mrows in agreement atop her new cat tower. “She likes it.”
“You’re such a dickweed. You were going to keep the cat no matter what I said.”
“Yeah. Don’t you like her, too?”
“No.”
“If you’re going to lie, at least make it convincing,” Todoroki tells him drily. “I saw you smiling.”
“Ugh. You’re such an idiot.”
“I’m your idiot,” Todoroki replies matter-of-factly. He gives the cat some scritches under the chin, starry-eyed when she purrs loudly.
“We’re taking her to the vet.”
“Can’t we wait until after lunch?’
“We don’t know where the fuck she’s been. I swear to fucking hell, Shouto—”
They take the cat to the vet.
The cat is a she. Todoroki seems overly proud of the fact that he figured it out already. She’s a flame point Himalayan cat, the “flame point” having to do with her color pattern. The veterinarian says she’s about a year old and had likely been a stray for a month or two. She receives the necessary vaccines and shots, and by the end of it, the cat is cleaner than it had been. It’s also grumpier, despite the vet telling them that Himalayan cats are usually friendly and outgoing.
On the way home, she rests comfortably in Bakugou’s arms, much to Todoroki’s disappointment. The moment he’d tried to lift the bundle into his arms, she’d recoiled from the coldness of his right arm. Bakugou had laughed at his plight for a solid minute, rubbing the cat’s between the ears like a proud parent.
The moment Bakugou unlocks their apartment door, the cat leaps out of his arms and scampers over to the same cat tower she’d been sitting on earlier. Todoroki follows soon after, trying to coax her into playing with him. This goes on for eleven minutes without success. The cat just stares down at him, unimpressed at his attempts, and mrows haughtily at him.
Bakugou, while finishing up what he’s cooking in the kitchen, thinks he hears Todoroki muttering to himself about how maybe it hasn’t forgiven me for earlier?
His boyfriend is ridiculous. He’s an idiot. But in the few hours he’s known the cat, it seems like something she’d do to spite him.
“Are you done? Wash your damn hands or you’re not coming anywhere near the food.”
Giving the cat one last pat, Todoroki gets up and reluctantly trudges to the sink. Once he’s washed his hands, he takes his usual spot at the dining table.
“You...made cold soba?” Todoroki asks, blinking as if it might disappear.
“No, shit,” Bakugou says. “What, you don’t want it?”
“I want it. Just… I didn’t expect you to be in a good mood.”
Bakugou raises an eyebrow at him. “Who said I was in a good mood?”
“I think I can tell when my boyfriend is in a good mood,” Todoroki replies. “But? You seemed so against having a cat. If you were really upset, you wouldn’t have cooked cold soba for me.”
“Hah? Who said it was for you?” Bakugou scoffs. “The cat has nothing to do with it.”
Todoroki completely disregards his denial. “So, we’re keeping the cat?”
“... You’re cleaning the litter box. Every time.”
“Okay.”
“You’re going to run any more toys or cat trees or whatever the fuck by me. No fucking impulse purchases.”
“... But—”
“No buts. If you were given the choice, you’d spoil the cat to death,” Bakugou cuts him off. “Our apartment doesn’t have space for fifty goddamn cat towers. That shit is expensive, and I’m not letting you buy anything without making sure the products aren’t overpriced.”
“... Fine,” Todoroki mumbles.
“And if the cat fucking sleeps on my face again, I’m going to make sure she suffocates you instead.”
“Hey, that wasn’t even my fault.”
“You brought the cat in. It’s essentially your fucking fault.”
“Okay.”
“Okay, then.” With that, Bakugou goes back to his meal.
Todoroki furrows his brow. “Is...that it?”
“Yeah.”
“Huh.” He leans back in his seat. “Okay.”
“If you fuck up, I’m shoving cat hair into your clothes.”
“Wh—”
The soft tap of paws against the floorboards stops Todoroki mid-sentence.
“Katsuki, I think she’s forgiven me,” he whispers.
“You’re so fucking lame.”
The cat jumps up onto one of the empty seats and onto the dining table. With a hopeful glimmer in his eyes, Todoroki raises his left hand for her to approach.
She completely bypasses him. She pads over until her belly hovers above his plate of cold soba. She then proceeds to stretch languidly, yawn, and wiggle a bit before crossing the table to plop herself onto Bakugou’s lap.
Todoroki stares at his plate.
There’s cat hair on his noodles.
There is cat hair on his cold soba.
Bakugou cackles madly. “We’re keeping her. Holy shit.”
The cat just lets out a self-satisfied purr, completely unrepentant. Bakugou rewards her with chin scritches.
(Todoroki doesn’t cry, but he comes close to it.
He finally has a cat, but at what cost? At what cost?)
FIN.