like izuku, you have your own nightmares.
it’s the thing no one talks about—you aren’t in the middle of battle with him, but you’ve watched him get knocked down enough times on the nightly news that you’ve taken the batteries out of the remote and refuse to let him buy more.
you’ve never told him about what happens behind your eyes when they close. and luckily, he’s been gone when it’s woken you up in a cold sweat. you want to spare him this—the knowledge of what it’s doing to you. except tonight you are not so lucky.
your subconscious shows you the same scenes in snippets—a reel of sickeningly close calls—except here in the dream, they are not. over and over you watch the love of your life die, alone and in vain. dissolved, skewered, burned alive by countless quirks, right in front of your eyes.
you’re there and then you’re not, torn from the nightmare by familiar hands. warm palms, thrumming with the rush of blood and an elevated pulse. the sheets are too hot and wrapped around your limbs like a vice. terrified and disoriented, you fight back.
“sweetheart—” the croak comes from the outline of him, green curls made wiry by his pillow. they sway with each of your sporadic defenses that he dodges. “hey, i’m right here—”
and he is, towering over you now. shielding you instinctively from a danger his brain tells him is at his back. he’s vulnerable—you both are. the knowledge of it stops you in your tracks.
“there you go,” he murmurs, leaning down to touch his forehead to yours and believing the wrong thing, “come back to me, baby.”
the touch melts the fear that had kept you frozen, if only slightly. you reach up to him, smoothing over every inch of skin and muscle you can get your hands on. he keeps you caged there beneath him and watches you search him for something he can’t help you find.
your palm stops over the beat of his heart and nothing in you trusts the kick against your own skin. you watched him die. you watched him—
“shh, my baby.”
the freckled face you saw go too pale is warbled and distorted in your watery view, but the thick limbs that settle over you helps some. he doesn’t go dead weight—just enough to keep you here. to remind you that he is here, too.
“i can’t watch you die.” again, you mean. but he couldn’t know that.
“i’m right here,” he reminds you, pressing gentle kisses to your temple and promising nothing. he is not so cruel, even when you need him to be. “i’m right here.”
it’s too much and it won’t ever be enough—in the dark you lose the grasp you had on your strength, and you cry. you bury your face in his neck and sob until you wring yourself out dry. he’s a pillar above you, whispering his love between words that placate into your hair. only you know now how little it would take to knock him down.
“—zuku,” you can barely get it out under the weight of the burden, “i’m afraid.”
“i know, sweetheart.” he sounds far away. the fingers that brush through your hair are disembodied. “i am too.”
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