Chapter Text
“I’m seriously getting sick and tired of being handled like a useless piece of luggage that needs to get carried around…” Bakugou grumbled, arms crossed over his chest as he was taken from the bathroom back to the bedroom. This time around, Todoroki was carrying him under his arm, his legs dangling only an inch or two above the floor. A damp towel was wrapped around his waist, but that was about it as far as his still semi-naked appearance went.
“Would you rather I start carrying you bridal style?” deadpanned Todoroki, fully aware that there was no actual winning ‘carrying position’ when it came to his fussy ‘husband’. Hence, the very in-theme joke that came out of his mouth. They might have already gotten ‘married’, but Bakugou was still technically the person he had gotten instead of one of his father’s ‘ideal brides’. So, again, technically, he was Todoroki’s ‘bride’.
“So long as you don’t mind dying five seconds later, be my fuckin’ guest,” retorted Bakugou, the frown on his face deepening. He felt so very tempted to shove his elbow against Todoroki’s guts, but he controlled himself and allowed him to finish the transportation back to the bed. Barely.
“That was just a joke, in case you didn’t notice,” explained Todoroki after a small sigh. Bakugou might be physically tired in quite a lot of different ways, but his petty nature and potty mouth were still as energetic as usual. One wouldn’t think he was currently unable to walk properly from the begrudging tone of his voice.
“Yeah, no shit, Sherlock,” groaned Bakugou while rolling his eyes at Todoroki’s needlessly obvious remark. “You might be frustratingly dense and a total moron in a lot of regards, but you still have a good sense of self-preservation. Unlike a few other morons we’re unfortunately acquainted with…”
“I’ll make sure to keep it that way,” acknowledged Todoroki with a small, expressionless nod of his head as he carefully lowered his ‘spouse’ onto the bed. No one was going to be dropped or fall while under his watchful gaze ever again, or so Todoroki had promised himself a while ago. He let Bakugou do the rest of the work and sit up straight on the bed all on his own. After making sure he was all settled, Todoroki turned around and walked up to his wardrobe, where he began looking around for a few pieces of clothing. As soon as he found what he had been searching for, he made a straight beeline back to Bakugou.
“What?” asked Bakugou, an eyebrow slightly arched as he saw Todoroki motioning those pieces of clothing towards him.
“It might be summer, but you will catch a cold if you stay naked for too long,” explained Todoroki, briefly dropping his gaze from Bakugou’s grumpy face to the clothes he was holding. “You can wear these for the time being. They’re on the smaller side, so they should fit you just fine.”
“Fuck you too!” hissed Bakugou, his crimson eyes turning into glaring daggers at the ‘smaller’ comment. Sure, he was shorter than Todoroki, but he was still fairly tall for Japanese standards. He wasn’t about to be demeaned so bluntly with this backhanded offering just because of a few centimetres of height difference! “Go get some clothes from my room! Now!”
“I don’t want to,” Todoroki refused without missing a beat. He wasn’t as petty or stubborn as his ‘husband’, but hadn’t he promised to get some payback for what had happened earlier in the bathroom? Well, Todoroki would consider that petty revenge to have been accomplished so long as Bakugou were to wear these clothes right here and now. They weren’t anything out of the ordinary or even embarrassing to the wearer - it was a simple pair of underwear and a loose-fitting t-shirt. In a way, it was pretty similar to the style Bakugou himself wore almost every day. The only difference was that the t-shirt was probably a size or two bigger than what Bakugou typically had on; though not by a lot, as he did tend to wear baggier clothes rather than form-fitting ones. To make sure that there was no way for Bakugou to weasel out of wearing his clothes, Todoroki was smart enough to add a little verbal bait to get him to cooperate with his petty revenge. “If you want to wear your own clothes, you can go get them yourself once you’re able to walk normally again. Until then, just put these on.”
“I’d rather be naked,” grumbled Bakugou, every single cell in his body screaming at him not to fall for that obvious goading. Todoroki had another thing coming if he thought he could use against him the same aggravation methods that Bakugou partook in daily.
“Are you sure about that?” asked Todoroki, his head ever so innocently tilted as he ran his heterochromatic eyes from Bakugou’s pouty face all the way down to his naked torso. “I have yet to get my revenge for that earlier kiss torture. And you’re looking pretty inviting right now. Should we use this opportunity to give that 24-hours-in-bed thing a try?”
“Begone, you damn perverted demon…” hissed Bakugou with a clenched jaw, readily yanking the clothes out of Todoroki’s hands in a move that was through-and-through 10% passive, 90% aggressive. He promptly put on the t-shirt, wanting to cover his exposed torso as soon as possible before this ‘husband’ was tempted into going after his sensitive chest for what already felt like the millionth time. Bakugou was about to move on to the next piece of clothing when he came to a halt. “Wait, this is all? Where’s the rest?”
“I don’t think any of my pants would fit you,” Todoroki pointed out, sort of getting the gist of what Bakugou was talking about without needing a direct question about the missing clothing item. He could also sort of predict what Bakugou was about to hiss at him next, so he preemptively added, “I don’t usually wear shorts, and the few ones I do have are all training clothes I mainly keep at my hero agency.”
Well, to be honest, I do have a few pairs here at home, for when I train on my days off and don’t feel like going all the way to the training facilities at the agency, but lending one of them to Katsuki would defeat my current purpose so I’m just not going to mention any of that for now, inwardly added Todoroki, his face outwardly getting more blank and stony as those thoughts crossed his mind.
“I can easily fold the pants legs a few- Hey, don’t just turn around and pretend you can’t hear me!” groaned Bakugou, annoyed that he even had to spell out the easiest solution to that ‘problem’. However, as he was doing so, Todoroki turned back around and returned to his wardrobe, very obviously ignoring him while he went to get some clothes for himself next. Bakugou clicked his tongue in annoyance, grumbling to himself under his breath right afterwards as he unwillingly put on the underwear he was given and, only then, removed the towel from around his waist. Free from his previous nakedness, Bakugou now had the leeway to ball up the towel and throw it straight at the back of Todoroki’s head.
Truly childish… Todoroki chuckled in the back of his mind, even though he remained completely expressionless as he glanced at Bakugou and his stuck-out tongue. He moved on with his changing after setting that towel aside, while also restarting their back-and-forth conversation. “What should we do about breakfast? I doubt you’re in a condition to cook anything too elaborate right now. It’s also pretty late already since we slept for so long.”
“All of that is your fault, so you fix it,” scoffed Bakugou, adjusting his sitting position so he could pull his feet from the floor and sit half cross-legged on the bed.
“You know my cooking repertoire is still extremely limited, especially when it comes to breakfast meals,” deadpanned Todoroki, not even bothering to try to defend himself this time around. He was indeed the reason why his ‘husband’ couldn’t stand for long enough to get some food done, at least for the time being.
His makeshift sore-back treatment had worked somewhat in terms of alleviating some of the pain. However, it hadn’t helped much to fully restore Bakugou’s waking ability. Or, to be more precise, Bakugou could walk (somewhat) but at the cost of looking like a toddler giving his very first steps and all the accidental tumbles that went along with such a learning process. Todoroki would know, as that was precisely what had happened when Bakugou tried to get out of the bathtub on his own. The only reason his ‘husband’ didn’t crack his head open on the tiled floor was that Todoroki also had god-tier reflexes and caught him right in the nick of time.
But that was besides the point.
“I’m fully aware of that, thank you very much,” sighed Bakugou with a fed-up roll of his eyes. “Plus, you still haven’t gotten my approval or permission to use my kitchen. So you cooking breakfast is obviously out of the question.”
“What am I supposed to do, then?” asked Todoroki, walking back to the bed now that he too was done putting on the first few clothes that he had come across.
“Just go buy something somewhere or whatever,” said Bakugou while dismissively shrugging his shoulders. He placed both of his hands on the bed and leaned back a little bit, so he could more easily peer up at his stupidly tall ‘husband’. “Actually, you should do that and get some groceries. We still have enough for today and maybe even tomorrow’s breakfast, but we might as well clear a few additional tasks with a single outing.”
“Sure, I can do that,” acknowledged Todoroki with a quick nod of his head. He was more than happy to be of use to Bakugou while he recovered, all the more so if doing so would also prove to him once and for all that he was no longer the useless ‘husband’ that he had married the previous week. Todoroki was still far from the perfect ‘spouse’, but he definitely wanted to graduate from the label of ‘incompetent’ as soon as possible. However, all that got him was a silent, doubtful stare from Bakugou. Todoroki deadpanned, “I swear I will follow your shopping list down to a T and not add unnecessary things to the shopping basket without your approval first.”
“Heh, I’ll believe that once I see it,” snorted Bakugou, a knowing smirk already creeping into his lips. He motioned his hand forward and curled his fingers a couple of times in a beckoning motion. Without needing further instructions, Todoroki passed him his smartphone after unlocking it so the shopping list could be written directly in his notes app.
While Bakugou did that, Todoroki went to get himself ready to leave, which included not only getting all the stuff he’d need for his solo shopping mission but also grabbing a few of Bakugou’s belongings from the living room area and bringing them over to his bedroom. The main things had been his smartphone and the notebook where he had been jotting down his ‘cooking lessons' until Todoroki interrupted him with the wedding ring exchange conversation the previous night. But he also made sure to bring him a bottle of water from the fridge, as Bakugou would most likely want to have something to drink while waiting for his breakfast to be delivered.
“From the top of my head, I think that’s all,” said Bakugou once Todoroki returned to his bedroom and stopped by the bed to give him his things. As soon as his hands were free, he gave him his smartphone back and then went to take a sip from the water bottle. “Do you have any questions?”
“Not really, no,” confirmed Todoroki as he methodically and very seriously ran his eyes down the list of items to be purchased. “Ah, but there are a few things that we’re missing that aren’t in here. Like condoms.”
“Pffft…!” All of the water that Bakugou meant to swallow and rehydrate himself sputtered out of his mouth like a high-speed geyser. Some water was still dripping from his wet lips as he blurted out, “Excuse you?”
“We used them all last night,” explained Todoroki with the calmness of someone relaying a very basic fact of day-to-day life rather than a possibly embarrassing remark regarding their sex life.
“Yeah, right. There’s no way that’s true,” scoffed Bakugou with a dismissive roll of his eyes. Todoroki had most likely made some sort of mistake with his dense brain and clumsy antics, just that. To prove him wrong, Bakugou leaned his body sideways on the bed while reaching out to the drawer where they were keeping those items. But the moment he grabbed the package that supposedly contained the condoms, he could already tell that it was foreshadowingly light for how it was supposed to be. In a rush, Bakugou opened it and flipped it upside down over the bed. However, nothing whatsoever fell off from its bare insides. “Are you fuckin’ for real!?”
“Yes, we have certainly been fucking for real,” said Todoroki with a serious nod of his head, wanting to confirm that no part of it had been dreamt or hallucinated, and neither had they been treating their sexual encounters nonchalantly. In their own way, they had been going all out right from the start. That was how they ended up using that entire package of condoms in what could be considered record time.
“Shut your dense trap!” hissed Bakugou, throwing the empty package at Todoroki and hitting him square in the face with it. “And don’t you dare buy more! We’re out, so we’re out! Forever! And without them around, you can no longer use the ‘wedding gift’ as an excuse either! This time for sure, we are definitely not having sex ever again! EVER!”
And we’ve gone full circle back to this ‘we’re never, ever doing it again’ conversation… Todoroki sighed in the back of his mind, not all that worried about Bakugou’s hissy claims and unreasonable demands. Every single time his ‘husband’ had said something along those lines, they ended up having sex again not even 24 hours later. If anything, that sentence was akin to raising an R18 event flag in their current dynamic. Todoroki truly had nothing to worry about aside from the unserious bickering and physical aftercare that followed their heated up nights. Yeah, I’m definitely buying more today. Even if we don’t end up doing anything tonight or during the weekend, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
“Hey, I know very well what’s crossing your mind right now!” admonished Bakugou while rolling his body onto his back so he could more easily kick Todoroki’s upper leg. “We definitely ain’t doing it! Got it!?”
“Yeah, yeah…” sighed Todoroki, this time outwardly. He still didn’t believe Bakugou’s stubborn insistence on this subject, but he wasn’t about to waste his time arguing back and forth with him on it. He’d much rather use his time wisely on some other thing. The kicking itself was pretty light (in part due to Bakugou’s tiredness, but also because he wasn’t being serious with his retaliation), but Todoroki still gently grabbed his shin to bring it to an end and placed his leg back down on the bed. “Since I’m going outside on my own, I’m thinking of running a few other quick errands before coming back home. Is there anything else you want me to grab while I’m doing that? I mainly want to update my new address in a few places, but I don’t mind stopping by somewhere else if you need something I can’t buy at the grocery store.”
“No, I’m good,” scoffed Bakugou with a moody tone, once again adjusting his relaxed position so he could finally go back to doing what he had started the previous night. He lay down flat on his belly, notebook open on the page where he had left off right in front of him. “Just don’t take too long. And don’t you dare eat anything while you’re out and about doing your stuff. If I’m going to be made to wait for my breakfast, you can bet your ass you’re gonna have to wait too.”
“Okay. Any requests in particular for your food?” said Todoroki, inwardly chuckling at his ‘husband’s’ selfish demand. Or was it? He was indeed going to make Bakugou wait a bit longer for some food than initially planned. And if Todoroki himself was pretty hungry after such a physically demanding night, he couldn’t imagine Bakugou being much different either. The best way to go about his errands today was most likely to only update his personal information in the locations that were close by or wouldn’t take too long, and then finish the rest once they went back to work.
“I’m not picky. Just make sure it’s enough,” noted Bakugou while offering a small dismissive shrug with his shoulders. His brain was already moving on to the task in front of him, and he could no longer be bothered to be too passive-aggressive or sarcastic with his ongoing conversation with Todoroki.
“Got it,” acknowledged Todoroki with a single small nod of his head. Bakugou’s answer was possibly the worst kind someone could get when the topic was food, but it seemed he would have to wing it somehow. He knew that Bakugou had a preference for spicy food, but aside from that, he was open to eating almost anything - sweet, salty, and everything in between. The game plan for the outing was for Todoroki to get his errands done first, then go grocery shopping and, finally, grab something for their late breakfast (or brunch, if you will) on his way back home. There are quite a few stores and restaurants in our neighbourhood aside from the shopping district, so I’m sure I’ll be able to find something nice for us to eat.
With that settled, Todoroki began leaving his bedroom… or at least, that was his intention. But his legs refused to part ways from the spot they had planted themselves on. Even though he knew he should get going and get all of those side quests completed as fast as possible, Todoroki was finding it unusually hard to leave. The main reason for that was, well… quite simple, actually.
All Bakugou was doing at the moment was continuing to jot down the recipes he had taught Todoroki already while leisurely sprawled on his bed. That was all. There wasn’t anything special behind it, and Bakugou wasn’t up for any of his unconscious or otherwise seductive shenanigans.
However, there was something about this entire setting that Todoroki found tremendously captivating, or maybe even downright arousing.
Huh. I had no idea I’m into others wearing my oversized clothes, Todoroki commented to his own buttons, his heterochromic eyes taking their sweet time checking out Bakugou’s laid-down position. There wasn’t anything inherently sexual about his current appearance - Bakugou was simply wearing an oversized t-shirt that covered his body all the way down to his buttocks and a pair of boxers. It was a pretty casual getup, one that they would only be able to wear while in the comfort of their new home, but nothing too scandalous per se. And yet, Todoroki found Bakugou to be twice as hot right now compared to under normal circumstances. Could it be that he had just inadvertently discovered that he’s into that whole ‘boyfriend shirt’ thing that people in relationships went on about? Hmm… No, that doesn’t sound right. This might simply be yet another ‘Bakugou Katsuki exclusive’ thing, like that stuff about him coming across as super cute when he’s acting like a menace…
Todoroki did have a long track record of creating little rituals or exceptions that were only ever applied to Bakugou, after all. Like going out of his way to memorize every single one of his smiles or more heart-warming moments. Or his obsessive fondness for the delicious food that he cooked. Or even the leniency he gave to Bakugou’s inherent personality, even though he wasn’t necessarily a big fan of people who partook in abusive behaviours aimed at others. All of those things had only ever applied to Bakugou and no one else. Todoroki couldn’t even remember ever having created such specific focus regarding a particular feature that he observed in someone else - except for Bakugou, of course.
Taking all of that into consideration, it wouldn’t be all that strange if this captivating effect he was currently experiencing out of the ‘boyfriend shirt’ setting was happening only because Bakugou was the one doing it. If he had lent one of his t-shirts to pretty much anyone else, he wouldn’t even give it a second thought or glance. But with Bakugou? Yeah, Todoroki was currently going through this humongous internal debate about whether to continue staring at Bakugou for as long as humanly possible or to rip the clothes off his body right this instant.
Oh, crap. I’m doing it again. Todoroki suddenly remembered himself, his body jolting slightly into a more alert state. He couldn’t afford to be ogling Bakugou right now. He had some errands to run, hopefully before his ‘husband’ got all cranky and belligerent from extreme hunger. It wasn’t as if Bakugou was going anywhere or getting changed out of this get-up any time soon, so he could continue enjoying this fine view once he was back home.
“I’m leaving then,” said Todoroki, intending for that verbal statement to help him get back in gear and motivate him actually to follow through with it. Bakugou gave him a very tame, uninterested ‘uh-huh’, which was a bit of a damper, in all honesty. To make up for it, Todoroki quickly leaned down and delivered a small kiss to the top of Bakugou’s head, only to retreat equally as fast.
“Grrr…” growled Bakugou, lifting his gaze from the notebook and whipping his head around at the speed of light so he could sulk and glare at Todoroki. “Stop half-assing your current mission and get going already, you damn useless slowpoke!”
Todoroki simply chuckled at that grouchy reaction and, this time for sure, began walking out of his bedroom. Bakugou would be having the whole apartment to himself while he was out and about, but he still made sure to close the bedroom door after he left the room to give him some privacy and peacefulness while he did his thing with the ‘cooking lessons’ notebook. (There might or might not have been some unconscious possessiveness involved in the act of closing off Bakugou inside his bedroom, but Todoroki was still far too unaware of all of that at the time to notice that little detail.)
Having a vehicle at his disposal would facilitate the conclusion of his errands, so Todoroki didn’t have to think twice about grabbing the car keys on his way to the door. It would save him both time and energy that he could later redirect back to his ‘spouse’.
Thoughts like that one truly put into perspective how much one’s world and schedule changed the moment they got married. Even though it was just a temporary marriage of convenience, he could no longer be the sole deciding factor in every facet of his day-to-day life. Bakugou and his needs and wants also needed to be taken into consideration, and then a compromise that was smack dab in the middle needed to be found.
It certainly wasn’t the kind of lifestyle that either of them was used to, as they valued their independence and solo way of life extremely highly. There was also a very much needed adaptation period, as mistakes and crossed boundaries were bound to happen as they adjusted to the new environment and shared living arrangement. But Todoroki had to admit that this state of affairs wasn’t all that bad, even in its current trial period.
I wonder if my parents’ marriage was also sort of like this at the start, Todoroki wondered as he drove himself to the first location included in his short list of errands. His parents hadn’t had a marriage of convenience, but rather a Quirk marriage organized by both sides of their families. In a nutshell, Enji wanted his children and possible bloodline successors to overcome the physical limitations of his hell flame Quirk and surpass him in the hero rankings, and Rei had been the perfect ‘bride candidate’ for such a goal, for reasons that went far above good Quirk compatibility. Enji eventually got what he wanted in the shape of his youngest son, and his maternal family also regained the standing and support they had been lacking after a long period of decline.
However, just because their Quirk marriage ended up having a bad ending with terrible repercussions that affected the entire country, it didn’t mean it also had a bad start. While it had been an arranged Quirk marriage right from the start, both his father and mother had always been aware of it and, in their own way, agreed to the idea. Rei had been as supportive of Enji’s goals as she could, even putting her own body and life at risk multiple times by giving birth to four children in a very short span of time. The cracks and fractures that eventually led to that bad ending only started showing at a later stage, once the pressure, neglect and abuse began piling up over the shoulders of everyone involved, the children included.
Had the beginning of their Quirk marriage been as peaceful as Todoroki’s fake marriage had been so far? Had they also had instances where they didn’t know what was the best approach and ended up creating disagreements and arguments? Had they discovered new things about themselves as they adapted to their new shared life? Had they also had some moments where they wholeheartedly enjoyed each other’s company?
Those sorts of questions and plenty more would cross Todoroki’s mind every now and then, fully aware that he would never be able to get a proper answer to any of them. Of course, he could ask his parents about it, but… That didn’t seem like a good idea to him. Both Enji and Rei had found the perfect balance for their fractured marriage after so much struggle and suffering, and Todoroki did not want to rehash any bad, triggering memories for either parent. He was fine with not knowing the truth and simply creating suppositions with the little information he had and his own anecdotal experience in the matter.
Either way it went, Todoroki was deadset on not emulating the past and repeating it either in the present or the future. He wasn’t going to make the same mistakes his parents had with their Quirk marriage, even if his marriage to Bakugou was nothing more than a temporary means to a long-term end. He also wasn’t going to allow old-fashioned family traditions that negatively affected others to survive the course of time. As far as he was concerned, the arranged marriage tradition had ended with his parents’ Quirk marriage, and neither he, his siblings, nor any children that might result from his older brother’s marriage would keep it alive. It was set to die with the youngest generation, no matter how much his father insisted on keeping it going.
Well, some could say that there’s little to no difference between a marriage of convenience and an arranged marriage, and they’d be correct. But I still don’t think I’m following that family tradition in any shape or form, let alone in a way that Dad would ever approve, Todoroki noted in the back of his mind. For starters, the only people involved in the making of their marriage of convenience were the two people who had gotten married: Todoroki and Bakugou. Their families had no involvement in it, and a certain faction even opposed the whole marriage. They had discussed at length what their objectives were and why they had picked this route, and delineated a clear timeframe for when it was supposed to end and under what terms. Their fake relationship also didn’t affect anyone else, but them - both sides of their families were being kept at a healthy distance, and no children would ever be involved in it. The only interference their ‘relationship’ had in the world at large was all the scandals and news headlines it had originated so far, but that hardly mattered in the great scheme of things. No matter how I look at it, there’s no similarity to my father’s arranged marriage family tradition aside from the fact that there’s no actual romantic relationship before the marriage happens. So no, it’s definitely not the same, and it will never be the same, if I can help it.
Plus, even if there had never been any romantic relationship between them, Todoroki did quite like Bakugou as a person. They had known each other for so many years and had worked together in so many instances, under all sorts of circumstances and scenarios. He couldn’t call themselves close friends, and there was a certain distance brought about by their professional lives and lack of free time, but they still weren’t complete strangers or mere acquaintances who had gotten married for a specific benefit or goal. They had an entire background story that had been written way before the fake marriage plan had even sprouted in Todoroki’s brain.
Perhaps that and having full control over the entire fake relationship was what made their marriage of convenience so palatable - and even extremely fun and enjoyable - to Todoroki. It just wouldn’t be the same with someone else. It had to be Bakugou. Definitely. Even if Bakugou hadn’t also gained something from it, Todoroki couldn’t imagine himself ever reaching out to anyone else for this unofficial team-up. It was a wonderful coincidence that this crazy plan just so happened to also benefit Bakugou and potentially solve his own set of problems, but Todoroki would still want him to be the other person if that hadn’t been the case, no matter how much he would have had to beg and plead with him.
Fast forward to now, and there were some moments where Todoroki found himself thinking that he didn’t want their marriage of convenience and everything that came with it to end. Today marked one week since they had gotten married, and the timeline he envisioned himself following for the next year or so had unmistakably been thrown for a loop already. Force of habit… couldn’t be used as an explanation, as they had only been living together for a couple of days and, before this, their personal lives were very much separate from one another. Laziness and dependence also didn’t do the trick, as Todoroki could survive perfectly fine without Bakugou and vice versa. That had been how he had lived his entire life so far, after all. Deep down, Todoroki simply didn’t want to go back to that before he had. And not because his life had become so much easier with Bakugou around, mind you!
Bakugou could stop cooking and doing half of the house chores, and Todoroki would still want to keep their cohabitation. They could pay twice or thrice as much for their new apartment as before, and Todoroki would still want to continue living where they currently were. Bakugou could deny him kisses, physical affection and sex from this day onward and forevermore, and Todoroki would still want to remain in their fake marriage. Even if Todoroki had absolutely nothing to gain and would have to spend the rest of his life giving or compromising, he’d still choose to keep the current status quo.
Of course, all of that was nothing more than a very exaggerated example. Todoroki highly doubted that Bakugou would radically change the dynamic they had created so far, mainly because it worked so well for both of them. There was space for growth and time to create a day-to-day lifestyle that accounted for their busy pro-hero schedules, but he couldn’t see things becoming much different from how they currently were even once they returned to work.
There was also the fact of how much of a softie Bakugou truly was on the inside, despite looking like a demonic overlord most of the time. How else could Todoroki explain how easily he had folded about the cooking after just a little bit of pestering? He could still remember vividly how many times Kaminari and company had begged and implored for Bakugou to share some of the food he cooked at the dorm’s communal area; back then, he always told them to go take a hike (though with more colourful language), save for the few times he had been forced to give them a small portion by outside intervention (read: Aizawa or All Might).
Hm… Maybe Katsuki does like cooking for other people, but is just very particular about who those other people are? Todoroki marvelled to himself, that topic coming to mind as he went about the requested grocery shopping, the second-to-last task before he could finally go back home. That was the only credible supposition that Todoroki could come up with to explain why Bakugou had folded to his pestering, but not his friends’. I wonder why he has no problem cooking for me, though? I always tell him it’s good and thank him for it, but it’s not like I excessively praise him and accommodate his self-centred ego. I’ve also been told quite a lot of times that I remain completely expressionless even when eating stuff that I really like, so it’s not like the way I eat his food is very commendatory either…
“I kinda wanna ask him why, but that would probably backfire on me, wouldn’t it?” chuckled Todoroki, his voice but a whisper as he mumbled those words under his breath while picking up one of the items on the shopping list from the shelf. He would have to be left in the unknown for the time being, but maybe one day, he’d be able to find the solution to this Bakugou-related mystery. Time and patience did tend to work on getting Bakugou to eventually spill the beans, after all. Not to mention, Todoroki had plenty of both.
Yeah, that’s right. I can just take my time figuring all of this out, Todoroki noted in the back of his mind while nodding outwardly at that conclusion. There was no need to rush or twist himself into knots trying to come up with an answer. They were but at the start of their unofficial mission. Todoroki had all the time in the world to figure out why he was so obsessed with Bakugou’s cooking or why he already wished for their fake marriage to never end or even why his ‘husband’ always looked so darn cute and adorable and sexy and seductive and a million other descriptors that Todoroki never actually used for anyone else in the world.
With such complicated but entertaining things constantly in his mind, his time out and about taking care of a myriad of errands went by in the blink of an eye. Now that the grocery shopping was completed according to Bakugou’s shopping list (plus a few additional items that Todoroki just had to buy, no matter how much his ‘spouse’ nagged him for it later on), the only thing left in his mental task list was grabbing some late breakfast for both of them.
“What should I buy this time as my peace-keeping food offering to Katsuki?” mumbled Todoroki to his own buttons, his sunglasses-covered heterochromatic eyes being greeted by the intense summer sun the moment he stepped a foot outside of the grocery store. Rather than going to the shopping district near their new apartment, he had picked a bigger store right next to the last location he had visited to update his personal information. It was a popular commercial area, so the number of choices he had for their breakfast menu was conveniently that much bigger.
Todoroki looked around left and right down the bustling street, trying to decide which direction he should take in his final quest for the perfect offering to his ‘husband’. Either side had several restaurants and food-related establishments that he could pick and choose from.
He had just made up his mind to start exploring the west side first when a certain voice suddenly reached his ears.
“Ah! Todoroki-kun! What a coincidence!”
“Oh.” Todoroki halted and turned back around to look in the same direction where his name had just come from. There, he spotted two very familiar faces.
Todoroki had also unknowingly found a way to redirect Bakugou’s future anger to somewhere else far away from him, but that was a story for a later time.