l m a o I suck ass at titles, man. no, i was not tagged in one of those things that go around wattpad - this is an actual chapter xD

also! thank you guys so much for all the feedback about the whole 40 chapters thing! i'm really glad so many of you are on board for a decently lengthy fic :3

cHECK THE END NOTES FOR A REALLY COOL PIECE OF FANART SOMEBODY DID FOR THIS FIC ASLKJFA

also i'm really sorry if the images are too big ;-; i've never put images in ao3 before so i'm still learning, please bear with me and i'd be happy to hear any pointers you guys might have to make them smaller or format it better or whatever :3

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Kirishima

"Okay, I've had enough of this shit for now," Kirishima groaned as he slumped back, letting his head fall back against his bed and his eyes shut. Even on the backs of his eyelids he could see afterimages of the stupid textbook he'd been staring at for far too long.

"You're fucking telling me," Bakugou muttered. "Math is shit."

The sound of Bakugou's book slamming shut and the vibration of it hitting the floor between them prompted Kirishima to look up again. Ironically enough, the blonde had just slumped back into the same position, his hands rubbing down his face. Somehow, though, he hadn't smeared his eyeliner down his cheeks.

"I couldn't agree more," Kirishima sighed, reaching for his phone. With a long yawn he unlocked it, scrolled through his notifications to clear them, and began his usual routine of mindlessly scrolling through Instagram. It was only a moment later when Bakugou followed his lead, and the two sat in a comfortable quiet save for the music still emitting from the speakers of Kirishima's phone for a while.

"Dude," Kirishima said with a snort after a bit. "This is you."

"What?" Bakugou muttered, briefly looking up.

"Hold up, I'm tagging you."

"The fuck...?" Bakugou's narrow, confused eyes fell back upon his phone when it dinged with a notification. Kirishima couldn't help peering over the top of his own phone to watch the other's reaction. He only knew Bakugou saw it when is brows smashed together.

"What the fuck is wrong with that cat?" the blonde muttered.

Laughing, Kirishima said, "I dunno man, but that's not the point."

"I fucking know that, you idiot."

"What, you don't like memes?" Kirishima asked, lowering his phone into his lap. "Even cat memes?"

"They're fine, I guess..." the blonde mumbled, the edgy tone lacking in his voice for once. "I don't usually give a shit if I'm late, though. It's everyone else who gets bitchy."

"Yeah, but because you gotta pass you know you freak out at least a little," the redhead teased lightheartedly.

Kirishima thought he heard the blonde huff sarcastically but he said nothing more as he went back to his phone. Kirishima followed his lead and scrolled a bit further down the page.

"Here, I found a better one," he said after a minute as he was typing Bakugou's username (that still sparked a laugh) into the comment section of said post. "I think you can probably relate to this one even better."

Again he watched Bakugou's reaction as his eyes skimmed across the image. By the end his eyebrows had inched upward and Kirishima swore he saw a going of amusement in his eyes.

"Make it vodka and fuck yeah, I'd do it."

Kirishima chortled. "You like vodka?" he asked.

"What, you don't?"

"Never had it," admitted Kirishima, sitting forward.

"Then you're fuckin' missing out."

The redhead merely shrugged; he'd never had any interest in drinking, though he couldn't say he was surprised that Bakugou had delved into it before.

"Oh crap," he muttered suddenly as his eyes caught sight of the clock when he was closing Spotify. "The mess hall is gonna close in half an hour. Wanna go get some dinner real quick?"

"Fuck yeah I do," Bakugou said, mirroring Kirishima in standing up. "Whatever gets me away from this math shit." He nudged said book with his foot until it disappeared under his bed.

Quickly the two stuffed their feet into their shoes, grabbed their keys, and headed out of the room side by side. It wasn't until they were halfway to the door at the end of the hall that Kirishima realized that, for once, Bakugou had finally agreed to join him. His stomach fluttered at the thought.

"So where'd you find those, anyway?" Bakugou was muttering as they strode down the sidewalk. Kirishima's arms swung lazily at his sides while Bakugou's hands were stuffed into his pockets. The redhead was super aware of how close the other walked beside him with only about a foot of space between them. He didn't want to over-analyze it and try to determine if it was a good thing but damn, his thoughts were already there and it was impossible to prevent.

"Find what?" he asked, forcing himself to outwardly remain cool. "The memes?"

"Yeah."

"Just Insta—"

"No shit, Dumb Hair. I meant on Instagram."

"Oh, um..." Kirishima swallowed. "They were... just on my timeline," he said. And okay, it wasn't a total lie. The first one really had been on his timeline. He wasn't about to tell his roommate that he'd sorta, kinda went slightly out of his way to find the other. It was one he'd seen before only a few days ago that immediately reminded him of the blonde, but back then Bakugou was still kind-of avoiding him. Then he hadn't nearly the kind of confidence it would take to send memes to Bakugou, but after their conversation in the room and exchanging stories about getting in trouble (mostly on Bakugou's end) for a couple of hours, his confidence was restored and multiplied.

Needless to say, a night he expected to suck because of studying actually turned out to be fairly decent, and it was because of Bakugou.

Mina's words from days ago snaked their way into his mind: "Like, if there are butterflies and you feel super happy when you're talking to him, and you start to feel like you wanna be around him all the time and stuff, I think you'll know then." They were followed by Jirou's: "I think when you know, you'll just know."

Damn. Kirishima was screwed.

Bakugou

Bakugou was annoyed yet somehow entirely not surprised to see stupid Deku in the mess hall when he and Kirishima got there. Because that was just his luck.

Fortunately the loser was on his way out with the half-and-half bastard, but unfortunately it was right as he and Dumb Hair were on their way in, which gave him no room to dodge the weird, broccoli-haired loser. Even if he tended to sit with them during lunches and stuff, he could only take so much of Deku in one week, and this week's quota after having been avoiding Dumb Hair was way past full.

"Hey, Kacchan! Oh, hey Kirishima," Deku said with that gross grin of his.

"Yo, Midoriya," Kirishima responded cheerfully, bumping fists with him, and then doing the same with Todoroki, who remained passive as he greeted him. "You know Bakugou?" Kirishima asked.

"Unfortunately," Bakugou muttered.

"Yeah, he and I go way back," Deku said as if Bakugou hadn't even spoken. "We didn't used to get along, though."

"Nah? I think I can see why, man. Bakugou was telling me about some shit he's gotten into in the past," Kirishima said.

"Would you losers stop talking about me like I'm not right fucking here?"

Kirishima sent an apologetic smile in his direction. "Sorry, dude. 'S pretty cool that you know Midoriya, though."

"I'm surprised you never noticed. We all eat lunch together," Midoriya said.

Dumb Hair shrugged casually. "Anyway, we were studying and totally spaced getting dinner, so we gotta hurry before the kitchen closes."

"Oh, alright. We'll see you guys later," Deku said.

"See ya," Kirishima said.

Bakugou didn't so much as call out a 'later, loser' as he normally would have before he took off toward the dinner buffet. As expected, Kirishima trotted along behind him.

"How long have you known Midoriya?" he asked.

"Since we were like four," Bakugou mumbled. They each took a plate from the end of the buffet before heading for their food of choice. Bakugou to merely throw a half-assed sandwich together while Kirishima practically attacked the macaroni and cheese.

"Really?"

"Yep. Sadly."

"Aw, Midoriya's not so bad. I mean, he's pretty smart and probably the only reason I'm not failing math, honestly."

"Well whoop-dee-doo for you," Bakugou muttered. "He used to be the biggest fucking crybaby on the planet."

Kirishima only chuckled under his breath—something the idiot did a lot—as they each grabbed a drink and languidly walked over to one of the nearest tables together to sit across from one another. "So, 'Kacchan,' huh?" he said with what he was probably trying to play off as a somewhat taunting grin, but his big, stupid, sparkling eyes ruined the effect.

Bakugou bounced a shoulder. "At least he doesn't eat macaroni and fucking cheese."

"What, you got somethin' against mac and cheese?" Kirishima said defensively.

"No. I'm just not five."

"Hey, bro, don't diss the mac n' cheese. This stuff's the greatest food invention there ever was. Even over sliced bread."

Bakugou raised his brows incredulously. "Who the fuck says 'diss' anymore?"

"Me, I guess," Kirishima said around a mouth full of macaroni. He looked stupid with his cheeks stuffed with the stuff, but weirdly... not stupid in a bad way.

Shoving that thought aside, Bakugou dug into his sandwich. It was silent for a while as they ate and, being the only ones in the mess hall, there was no background chatter to fill the silence, rendering their little bubble of space awkward for the first time that evening. The slight uneasiness let up a bit when Kirishima tugged his phone out and, in the midst of practically sucking down his food, occupied himself for a bit with it. Bakugou was just about to do the same when Dumb Hair's fork clanked against his plate.

"Dude," he said, those giant, expressive eyes wide with surprise.

"What?"

"How the hell do you have over seven thousand followers?!" he practically shouted.

"What the fuck are you yelling about, Dumb Hair? 'S not that big 'a deal," Bakugou grumbled. "Why are you looking at my page for, anyway?"

"'Cause I was curious. But you only have like fifty posts. And you barely even use hashtags. Seriously—how?"

"I don't fucking know, but it's fucking stupid."

"What? Why?"

"Because I don't use those shitty hashtags. I don't even know how the fuck all those people found me or why the hell they decided to follow me in the first place." Bakugou stuffed in a few more bites of his sandwich before asking around a mouthful, "How many followers you got, anyway?"

Kirishima frowned at him. "What?"

The blonde rolled his eyes before swallowing. "I said, how many fucking followers do you have anyway?" he grumbled.

"...compared to you, not a lot," Kirishima said a bit wistfully. "I only have a little over four hundred, and then that's mostly 'cause a bunch of people I follow have followed me back."

Bakugou couldn't help but snort. "You act like having a bunch of followers matters," he said.

The redhead shrugged. "I mean, I like people to see my art," he said. "But hey, if you don't like having so many followers, how come you don't make your account private?"

It was Bakugou's turn to shrug. Truthfully he didn't really give a fuck if so many people followed him—what he didn't get was why, but he figured it didn't really matter. He was too lazy to change the stupid privacy settings anyway.

"Guess if you want more followers you gotta make it clear you don't like people," the redhead said with a somewhat teasing grin. "'Cept I don't think I could pull off the whole middle finger thing."

Bakugou snorted. "You're too damn nice for that," he responded.

"Aw, thanks man," Kirishima said before laughing again—that dumb laugh that Bakugou totally should be annoyed by, but actually wasn't. Hmph.

"Who said it was a compliment?" the blond muttered under his breath before stuffing in another bite. It was clear Kirishima hadn't heard him or at least chose to ignore him because he said, "I guess people like lotsa middle fingers, motorcycles, and piercings."

"Or maybe I'm just hot," Bakugou grumbled, half-sarcastic.

"Touché," Kirishima said with a nod, though his gaze didn't leave his phone. Bakugou was just about what the fuck he meant by that when Dumb Hair spoke up again. "Hey, so how many piercings do you have, anyway?"

Finally he locked his phone and merely set it on the table beside his plate, his big, dumb, shiny eyes locking with Bakugou's own. Genuine curiosity shone through them. Quickly, Bakugou took a long swig of his Mountain Dew.

"Depends. You count these as more than two?" he asked, jerking his thumb at his own mouth, where there were two piercings in each side of his bottom lip. The outer two sported simple black studs while the inner two held rings with spikes on either end.

"Nah, I think each individual one counts since they all had to be done separately."

"Then, like, twelve. Or fourteen, if you count the stretched lobes."

"Damn, dude."

Bakugou could feel himself tense while Kirishima studied over his piercings. Normally he didn't give a fuck if someone looked—that was partially what they were there for. But Dumb Hair's eyes were so fucking huge and red and right there, it almost made him nervous. Almost.

"Which one hurt the most?"

"'S a tie between my tongue and the vertical industrial."

"...vertical whatnow?"

Expecting that answer, the blonde swiveled his head to the right and tapped the black bar running straight up and down through the center of his ear.

Kirishima grimaced. "Eesh! That looks painful as hell!"

"It was, and it took for-fucking-ever to heal."

"Then how come you said your tongue, too?" Kirishima's eyes shined with curiosity.

"'Cause it took even longer to heal and I had to fuckin' eat around it, which was annoying as fuck. Plus it swelled. A lot."

The redhead's shoulders visibly shuddered. "How come ya got 'em, then?"

"Why else? 'Cause I like them, dumbass."

"Wait, so is it true that a tattoo hurts less?"

"Yeah. Takes longer, but it's not like you're bein' shoved through with a needle. 'S just the surface of your skin."

Dumb Hair sat back and rubbed at his forehead. "Ugh," he said.

"What, you too much of a pussy to get a piercing?" Bakugou challenged.

"Honestly? Probably am, man. Like, I can't tell you how many times I've biffed it on my board and scraped myself up, and I even have some scars to prove it, but voluntarily letting someone shove a needle through me? I don't think I could do it."

Bakugou snorted. "Baby."

"Hey man, you try face planting into some broken glass!" Dumb Hair defended.

"Please. I'm not an idiot."

"Okay, so which one of your piercings hurt the least?"

"You sayin' you'll go for that one?" Weirdly, Bakugou could feel himself grinning at the loser across from him; he couldn't deny it was fun to tease him.

"Maybe. I dunno," Kirishima mumbled, his eyes averted down to his empty bowl.

"'Sides my lobes, eyebrow hurt the least," Bakugou told him. "But your eyebrows are too small so it'd look weird."

"Gee thanks," Kirishima said, but it was clear by his playful tone and the dumb grin that had come back that he didn't take the remark to heart. And it was about damn time Bakugou could finally spew his shitty joking insults at someone without them instantly getting butthurt about it.

"You could always get your dick pierced," said the blonde.

Kirishima's already big eyes practically bugged out of his head at that. "What? Why? Do you—" His teeth instantly snapped shut around the rest of the question. "Er... you don't gotta answer that. Sorry, man." And lo and behold, Dumb Hair was genuinely embarrassed, what with his eyes darting around at everything except at Bakugou himself and the way he fidgeted with his fork. The embarrassment didn't quite cause a legit blush to spread across his face, though Bakugou would have loved the teasing material.

"Hey you two. Mess hall's closing," came a voice from behind Bakugou. He merely glanced over his shoulder to see one of the kitchen staff poking their head out of the door.

"Crap, sorry! We'll head out," Kirishima said. The two of them gathered their dishes and left them in the appropriate spot before sauntering their way out.

"So you gonna get one or what?"

"A piercing?"

"Yeah."

"Like, a di—"

"No, moron," Bakugou interceded quickly. "Just a fucking piercing in general."

"Oh..." Kirishima let out a nervous laugh as he held the door for Bakugou to stroll his way through. "I dunno, man. I think my parents would probably kill me."

"How old are you?"

"Sixteen."

"When's your birthday?"

"Next month. The sixteenth."

"Then you're old enough to make that kinda decision on your own. Fuck what your parents think."

Bakugou could see the grin out of the corner of his eye. "No wonder your parents sent you to boarding school," Dumb Hair said. "Honestly I think my parents would put me in some private religious school if I thought the same way."

"Then do it when you're eighteen and then they can't say shit about it."

"I dunno, man. I'll have to think about it."

After that the walk back to the dorm was quiet between them. The night was fairly warm and, to Bakugou's pleasure, there weren't many people mulling about on campus, leaving it quieter than usual.

The blonde was the one to hold the door when they made it back. As he did so he said, "For the record, no, my dick isn't pierced."

As he stepped beyond the threshold, Kirishima only laughed. It was then, Bakugou was sure, that he realized he actually might like Dumb Hair.

I'll be damned.

---

THE FANART by Glassdevil on ao3: https://lasipaholainen.tumblr.com/post/172101563691/ 

And, because I couldn't think of a way to put a description of Bakugou's piercings in the actual chapter without it sounding weird, here:

-Bridge of his nose

-Tongue

-Shark bites (the four in his lip; studs on the outer and rings on the inner)

-Right eyebrow

-Stretched lobes at size 00

-Upper lobes

-Vertical industrial on left side

-Tragus and forward helix on left side

Super easy to google any of these if you don't know what they are :3