Chapter Text
New York City, 1934
[ The city that never slept had become their sanctuary. After the crash of '29, when the Bakugo fortune crumbled like so many others, Katsuki and Izuku had finally found their chance. With nothing left to lose—no empire to inherit, no reputation to protect—they'd boarded a train east, leaving Chicago's ashes behind. ]
Five years had passed since then. Five years of shared rooms in cramped apartments, of working whatever jobs they could find, of living on coffee and dreams and each other's love. They'd built a life in the shadows of Manhattan's towering buildings, in a small walk-up in Greenwich Village where artists and writers turned a blind eye to two men sharing a one-bedroom apartment.
Their first year in New York had been a revelation. They'd found a community of others like them—writers, artists, musicians who lived life on their own terms. Izuku's writing flourished, his articles appearing in increasingly prestigious publications. Katsuki found work as a bookkeeper, his head for numbers finally serving a purpose he chose.
They spent countless evenings at underground jazz clubs, where the music made their blood sing and nobody looked twice at two men dancing close. Weekends were for exploring their new city, finding hidden corners where they could steal kisses without fear. Izuku would drag Katsuki to every museum, every library, his enthusiasm infectious.
"You're such a nerd," Katsuki would grumble, but he'd follow Izuku anywhere, just to see that spark in his eyes.
Those were the golden days. Katsuki would wake to find Izuku already at his typewriter, curls wild, wearing one of Katsuki's old shirts. They'd have breakfast on their fire escape, watching the city wake up below them. Sometimes they'd take the subway to Coney Island, spending their meager savings on hot dogs and carousel rides, acting like the kids they'd never really gotten to be.
Their tiny apartment became a world of its own. On rainy Sundays, they'd push their furniture against the walls and dance to the crackling radio, Izuku stepping on Katsuki's toes and laughing into his shoulder. They created traditions—penny poker on Wednesday nights, where Izuku's terrible poker face always gave him away, and Saturday morning trips to the corner bakery for day-old bread that still tasted like heaven.
Katsuki learned to cook, mostly to stop Izuku from burning their few pots and pans. He'd stand at their small stove, cursing at stubborn vegetables while Izuku sat cross-legged on their counter, reading passages from whatever book had captured his imagination that week. Sometimes they'd stay up late into the night, sharing secrets they'd never told anyone else—about their fears, their dreams, the people they wanted to become.
They marked their love in small ways: Izuku leaving notes in Katsuki's packed lunch, silly little drawings and quotes that made him smile despite himself; Katsuki carefully mending Izuku's worn shirts, pretending not to notice when Izuku caught him being gentle with something. Each morning, before leaving for work, Katsuki would press a kiss to the crown of Izuku's head, and each evening, Izuku would be waiting with a cup of coffee, made exactly the way Katsuki liked it.
Summer nights were spent on the rooftop, where they'd dragged up two mismatched chairs and a small table. They'd watch the sunset paint the city gold, sharing cigarettes and dreams. Izuku would point out shapes in the clouds until the stars appeared, making up stories about each one. His imagination seemed boundless then, his voice carrying them both away to distant worlds and possible futures.
That fall, they adopted a stray cat—a scraggly thing with one eye and a crooked tail that Izuku named Shakespeare.
"We're not keeping it," Katsuki had insisted when Izuku first brought it home, soaking wet from the rain.
"Of course not," Izuku agreed, already drying it with their best towel. "We're just letting it stay until the storm passes."
Three days later, Katsuki was caught whispering to the cat while making breakfast: "You want the fish bits? Don't tell Izuku, he'll never let me live it down."
"I knew you'd love him." Izuku said from the doorway, grinning.
"I tolerate him. There's a difference."
They survived their first real fight that winter—something trivial about money that grew into deeper fears about their future.
"You can't keep pretending everything's fine!"
Katsuki had shouted.
"We're one bad month away from—"
"From what? Going back? Is that what you want?"
"That's not what I—Deku, wait! At least take your damn coat!"
But Izuku had already stormed out into the snow. Katsuki lasted exactly seventeen minutes before running after him, finding him shivering in Washington Square Park.
"You're an idiot," Katsuki said, wrapping his own coat around Izuku's shoulders.
“You're the idiot," Izuku replied, teeth chattering. "Following me out here."
"Yeah, well, someone has to make sure you don't freeze to death."
They held each other under the arch, apologizing between kisses, snow melting in their hair. That night, they pushed their twin beds together for good, no longer caring what the landlady might think.
Spring brought a promotion for Katsuki and a regular column for Izuku. They celebrated by buying a real bookshelf, filling it slowly with treasured volumes from secondhand shops.
"There's a system," Izuku would protest when Katsuki tried to help organize.
"What system? Chaos?"
"It's arranged by feeling. These books belong together because they have the same soul."
"Books don't have souls, nerd."
"Everything has a soul if you look hard enough," Izuku would say, and Katsuki would just shake his head, wondering how he'd fallen in love with such a romantic fool.
Their second summer in the apartment, they wallpapered one wall themselves, making a mess of it but laughing the whole time. “Stand still!" Katsuki would growl, trying to hold the paper straight. "I am standing still! The ladder's wobbling!" "Because you keep fidgeting!" "I'm not—oh no." A strip of wallpaper would fall, landing on Katsuki's head, and Izuku's laughter would fill the room until Katsuki couldn't help but join in.
*
The neighborhood became an extension of their home. The grocer would save the freshest vegetables for them, claiming Katsuki was the only one who appreciated proper produce.
"Got these tomatoes in this morning," Mr. Romano would say, pulling out a paper bag from under the counter. "Been saving them special."
"What makes you think I want your damn tomatoes?" Katsuki would grumble, even as he reached for his wallet.
"Because you're the only one in this neighborhood who knows what to do with them. How's that boy of yours? Still too skinny."
"Mind your business, old man."
"Tell him to come by tomorrow. My wife's making cannoli."
The librarian would hold new arrivals for Izuku, knowing his tastes perfectly. "Mr. Midoriya, the new Hemingway just came in," Miss Peters would whisper, sliding the book across the desk. "Don't tell anyone I held it for you."
"You're an angel, Miss Peters," Izuku would beam, already opening to the first page.
"Just remember what you told me about the last chapter before you return it."
Even Mrs. O'Malley next door, who they were sure suspected the truth about them, would bring them leftover pie and pretend not to notice when they answered the door in each other's clothes.
"You boys need to eat more," she'd say, pressing another pie into Katsuki's hands. "All work and no food makes for poor health."
"We eat plenty," Katsuki would protest.
"Then explain why I can hear your stomach growling through the walls, Bakugo."
That autumn was particularly beautiful. The trees in the park turned copper and gold, and the air was crisp with possibility. Izuku seemed to draw energy from it, working late into the night on a novel he'd finally found the courage to start.
"Come to bed," Katsuki would say, standing behind Izuku's chair at midnight, then at one, then at two.
"Just one more page," Izuku would promise, fingers flying over the keys. "The words are finally coming right."
"They'll still be right in the morning."
"But Kacchan, listen to this part—"
"If you read it to me now, I'll fall asleep right here."
"Would that be so terrible?"
"Yes, because then my back would hurt, and you'd have to deal with me being even grumpier than usual."
Izuku would laugh, finally letting Katsuki pull him away from the typewriter. "As if that's possible."
Katsuki would bring him tea, massage his shoulders when they grew stiff from hunching over the typewriter. The steady click-clack of keys became the heartbeat of their home.
"You're going to work yourself sick," Katsuki said one night, noticing the shadows under Izuku's eyes.
"Just tired. The story's almost there, I can feel it."
"The story will wait."
"But what if it doesn't? What if this is my only chance to write something real?"
"Everything you write is real, idiot."
But as winter approached, Izuku started taking longer to recover from his late-night writing sessions. Katsuki noticed him napping more during the day, something he'd never done before.
"Did you eat lunch?" Katsuki would ask, finding Izuku asleep on their worn couch, papers scattered around him.
"Mm? Oh, I must have dozed off. What time is it?"
"Past four. You're sleeping more than Shakespeare these days."
"The cat's a terrible influence," Izuku would joke, but his smile didn't quite reach his eyes.
At first, it seemed natural—the shorter days, the colder weather, the long hours he spent writing. Even the slight pallor to his skin could be explained by too much time indoors, bent over his work.
"Maybe we should go for more walks," Izuku suggested one evening, looking up from his typewriter. "Like we used to."
"In this weather?"
"Remember how we used to walk for hours? All the way to the Battery and back?"
"That's because we couldn't afford the subway fare," Katsuki said, but he was already reaching for their coats.
They only made it a few blocks before Izuku needed to rest, leaning against a building to catch his breath.
"Just the cold," he said quickly, seeing Katsuki's expression. "Makes my chest tight."
"Maybe you should see—"
"I'm fine, Kacchan. Really."
In the winter of 1933, the changes became harder to ignore. His normally boundless energy—the same energy that had kept him working late into the night at his typewriter—began to fade by evening.
"You barely touched your dinner," Katsuki said one night, watching Izuku push food around his plate.
"Not very hungry lately. Must be coming down with something."
"You've been 'coming down with something' for weeks now."
"You worry too much," Izuku smiled, but it was a pale echo of his usual brightness. "It's just winter blues."
"Winter's never made you sleep twelve hours before."
"Are you counting my hours now?"
"Someone has to."
But winter turned to spring, and the fatigue didn't lift. Izuku developed a slight cough—nothing serious at first, just a tickle in his throat that he blamed on the city's pollution. He started carrying peppermint candies, sucking on them during interviews to keep from coughing.
"These help," he'd say, offering one to Katsuki. "Want to try?"
"I'm not the one who sounds like a Model T engine."
"It's just the air. Everyone's coughing these days."
"Not like you are."
"Maybe we should move somewhere with cleaner air," Katsuki suggested one evening, watching Izuku stifle another cough over their dinner of beans and bread.
"And leave all this?" Izuku gestured to their cramped apartment with its peeling wallpaper and creaky floors, but his eyes were full of love. "This is our home, Kacchan. Our first real home together."
"We could make another one. Somewhere quieter. By the sea maybe."
"But the stories are here. All my best ones come from these streets."
"Your stories come from inside you, idiot. They'd follow you anywhere."
"I'll adjust," Izuku insisted, reaching for Katsuki's hand across the table. "Besides, Shakespeare would hate moving."
Summer brought humidity that seemed to settle in Izuku's chest. His cough deepened, becoming a regular accompaniment to their morning coffee. He started losing weight, though he insisted he was eating normally.
"That shirt used to fit you," Katsuki said one morning, watching Izuku button it with trembling fingers.
"Maybe you're just getting better at washing clothes."
"Deku..."
"It's nothing. I've just been busy with the novel."
"You're thinking too loud again," Izuku murmured one morning, watching Katsuki stare out their window at the street below. His voice was rougher than it used to be, sandpaper where there had once been silk.
"Just wondering what Chicago's like now."
"Do you miss it?"
"Not the city. Just... when things were simpler."
"When were things ever simple with us?"
Katsuki turned from the window, taking in the sight of Izuku wrapped in their threadbare blanket, curls wild from sleep. He didn't mention how the blanket seemed to swallow him these days, how his collarbone cast shadows where it hadn't before.
"Do you regret it?" Izuku asked, and there was that old uncertainty in his voice, the one that still surfaced sometimes despite everything they'd been through.
Katsuki crossed the room in three strides, pulling Izuku into his arms, feeling the heat of fever that seemed to come and go like an unwelcome guest. “Never," he said fiercely. "Not for a second."
"Even now?"
"Especially now."
By fall, even Izuku couldn't deny something was wrong. The cough had become a constant companion, worse at night. He'd wake up gasping, sheets damp with sweat, Katsuki already there with a glass of water and fear in his eyes.
"I can't catch my breath," Izuku whispered one night, fingers clutching Katsuki's sleeve. "It feels like..."
"Like what?"
"Like I'm drowning. Standing still and drowning."
"Maybe it's time to see someone," Izuku admitted after a particularly bad spell left him trembling in Katsuki's arms.
"I'll find the money," Katsuki said immediately. "Don't worry about that."
"But your mother—"
"Isn't important right now. You are."
Katsuki had been waiting for those words, saving every extra penny he could from his bookkeeping job. He'd even started selling their books, one by one, though it broke his heart to see their library shrink.
"Where's Keats gone?" Izuku asked one evening, running his fingers along the shelf.
"Must have misplaced it," Katsuki lied, remembering how the bookseller had given him three dollars for the leather-bound volume.
Izuku pretended not to notice, but he'd trace the empty spaces on their shelves with gentle fingers, as if apologizing to the absent stories.
"It's okay," he'd whisper when he thought Katsuki couldn't hear. "They're just books."
He pawned his father's gold watch, the last remnant of his old life. Finally, he swallowed his pride and wrote to his mother, asking for help.
"Dear Mother," he wrote, then crossed it out. "Mother," he tried again. "I know I have no right to ask..."
The reply came two weeks later, containing enough money for a proper doctor and a note in his mother's elegant hand: "Take care of him."
The diagnosis was like a bullet to the chest: tuberculosis, advanced. The doctor's words blurred together—sanitarium, rest cure, limited chances.
"How long?" Katsuki demanded, gripping Izuku's hand as they sat in the sterile office.
"With proper treatment... perhaps six months. Without it..." The doctor's pause said everything.
"How much time?" Katsuki demanded, gripping Izuku's hand as they sat in the sterile office.
"That depends on many factors," the doctor said carefully. "The disease progresses differently in each patient. With immediate treatment at a sanitarium, we could significantly slow its progress."
They spent their savings on a private room at a sanitarium in the Adirondacks, where the air was supposed to be better for the lungs. Every Friday evening, Katsuki would board the train north, his heart beating faster with each mile that brought him closer to Izuku. The weekly journey became a ritual of love and fear—watching the city's grime give way to green mountains and clean air that came too late to save the person who made his world turn.
During the long train rides, he started to write letters he'd never show anyone:
"My Deku,
The space beside me on this train feels like a physical wound. An elderly woman asked if the seat was taken, and I nearly shouted yes. Because it is taken—it's yours, it will always be yours, even when you're not here to claim it. I keep turning to share observations with you, keep saving funny stories from work to tell you later. How do I stop living in plurals when the world insists on making me singular?
-K"
In the sanitarium, Izuku tried to keep writing, propped up against pillows that seemed to swallow him more each week. His stories took on an otherworldly quality, full of hope and magic his failing body could no longer contain. Katsuki kept every word, even the ones Izuku discarded as too fanciful, because each one was precious—each word might be the last.
"Read to me?" Izuku asked one autumn afternoon, his voice barely a whisper. The mountain air was crisp through the open window, carrying the scent of pine and approaching winter. His freckles stood out like constellations against his too-pale skin, and Katsuki wanted to memorize each one, to map them like stars to guide him home.
Katsuki picked up one of Izuku's old penny dreadfuls, the kind they used to read together in the hayloft when the world was younger and kinder. His voice shook as he read about impossible adventures and happy endings they'd never have. Each word felt like a memory of better days—of shared laughter and stolen kisses and dreams that seemed possible in the golden light of youth.
"Remember the gazebo?" Izuku asked suddenly, his green eyes distant but still holding that spark that had first made Katsuki fall in love. "How the lake looked at sunset?"
"Like liquid gold," Katsuki said, his throat tight with unshed tears. He could see it perfectly—Izuku silhouetted against the dying light, laughing as he tried to name every shade in the sky. How many sunsets had they watched together? Not enough. Never enough. "And you'd always try to count the colors in the sky."
"Seven," Izuku smiled, and for a moment he looked like that boy from Chicago again, full of dreams and determination. "There were always seven colors, just like a rainbow." He reached for Katsuki's hand, his fingers cold and thin where they had once been warm and strong. "I'm sorry, Kacchan."
"Don't." Katsuki's voice cracked like ice in spring. "Don't you dare apologize."
"I promised we'd face everything together." Tears slipped down Izuku's cheeks, and Katsuki wanted to catch each one, to preserve them like amber, proof that their love had been real and true and worth every sacrifice. "But this time... this time you'll have to go on alone."
"I can't." The words tore from Katsuki's chest like shrapnel. "Deku, I can't—" How could he explain that being without Izuku would be like trying to write without ink, like trying to breathe without air?
"You can. You will." Izuku's grip tightened briefly, a ghost of his former strength. "Promise me something?"
"Anything." Everything. The moon and stars and all seven colors in every sunset.
"Be happy again. Not right away, but... someday." Izuku's eyes were intense despite the fever brightness, holding Katsuki's gaze like they had that first time in the gazebo, when love was new and frightening and wonderful. "Find something that makes you smile. Fall in love with the world again."
"There is no world without you in it," Katsuki whispered, and it wasn't hyperbole—it was mathematics, simple as addition. Izuku plus Katsuki equals the world. Remove one variable, and the equation falls apart.
Izuku's laugh turned into a cough, the sound like broken glass in Katsuki's ears. "The world's too big and beautiful for that to be true. Promise me, Kacchan. Promise you'll live." His voice carried echoes of every time he'd believed in Katsuki, every moment he'd seen beauty where others saw only darkness.
Katsuki pressed his forehead to their joined hands, breathing in the familiar scent of ink and paper that still clung to Izuku's skin despite weeks in the sanitarium. "I promise," he whispered, though the words felt like betrayal. How could he promise to live when his reason for living was slipping away?
The end came quietly on a Thursday morning in November. Katsuki had been reading from their favorite book, the one about stars and second chances, when he noticed Izuku had stopped breathing. Just like that—between one paragraph and the next, between one heartbeat and eternal silence. The world didn't stop. The clock kept ticking. Outside, birds continued singing. How dare they, when Izuku would never hear them again?
He sat there for hours, holding Izuku's hand as it grew cold, memorizing every detail of his face—the scatter of freckles like a private constellation, the curve of his lips that had smiled through every hardship, the dark lashes resting against too-pale cheeks. Even in death, he looked like he was simply dreaming of their next adventure.
The funeral was small, attended by a few friends they'd made in New York and, surprisingly, Katsuki's mother. She held her son as he shook with silent tears, her own grief evident in the lines around her eyes. "He made you shine," she whispered, and the simple truth of it nearly brought Katsuki to his knees.
That night, back in their empty apartment, Shakespeare curled up on Izuku's pillow, still warm with his scent. The cat's single eye watched Katsuki as he sat on the floor, surrounded by Izuku's papers and half-finished stories. The silence hit him like a physical blow—no typewriter keys clicking, no quiet humming as Izuku made coffee, no soft breathing from the other side of their bed. Izuku's typewriter sat silent on the desk, a half-finished story still loaded in its carriage. The last words he'd typed read: "In the end, love is all that remains."
Katsuki traced the letters with trembling fingers, feeling the indentations in the paper where Izuku had pressed too hard, always too eager to get his thoughts down. How many times had he complained about that habit? What he wouldn't give now to hear that too-loud typing just once more.
He didn't leave the apartment for a week. He read every story Izuku had ever written, every note he'd ever scribbled in margins or on napkins or in the little notebook he kept by their bed. He found shopping lists with love notes hidden between "bread" and "coffee," discovered doodles of their initials in the corners of draft papers, uncovered half-finished poems about golden eyes and explosive tempers that made him laugh through his tears.
When he finally emerged, the city had changed—or perhaps he had. Colors seemed muted, sounds distant, as if the world itself was grieving. He walked the streets they'd walked together, each step an exercise in memory. Past the cafe where Izuku had first told him about getting a permanent position at the paper, his eyes shining brighter than their cheap coffee. Past the bookstore where they'd spent countless Sunday afternoons, Izuku reading aloud in whispers while they huddled in the back corner. Past the park bench where they'd sat in comfortable silence, shoulders touching, watching pigeons fight over breadcrumbs.
For months, Shakespeare would sleep on Izuku’s pillow, guarding that space as if keeping it ready for his return. The cat became Katsuki's sole companion in grief, the only other creature who seemed to understand the magnitude of what they'd lost.
He’d feed him fish bits, part of him hoping Izuku would emerge from the doorway to mock him, “I knew you’d love him”, Izuku’s voice echoed in his mind.
One year later, Shakespeare followed Izuku, dying quietly in his sleep on the same pillow he'd claimed that first night. The only one left dear to him and Izuku was gone. Left him the same way Izuku had.
Katsuki buried him beneath the maple tree in Washington Square Park, where he and Izuku had once stood in the snow, young and foolish and desperately in love. He didn't cry—hadn't cried since that Thursday in November—but he sat there until midnight, counting the stars and imagining the clouds as anything Izuku might have stretched it out to be.
That night, he slept on Izuku's side of the bed, face pressed into a pillow that still held traces of his and the cat’s scent. During those long, dark nights, he could almost pretend that Izuku was just at his desk, working late on a story and Shakespeare was sitting idle on his bed. The illusion would shatter every morning when he woke to cold sheets and silence, remembering the warmth the two of them gave him.
Every corner of New York held echoes of Izuku. The newsstand where he'd bought his morning paper. The deli where he'd charmed the owner into giving them day-old bread for half price. The fire escape where they'd sat on summer nights, dreaming of futures they'd never have.
At night, he wrote letters he'd never send, pouring his grief onto paper because it was the only way he knew to keep breathing:
"Dear Deku,
The sun still rises every morning, though I don't know why. The world keeps turning without you in it, which seems impossible. I keep finding your pencils everywhere—tucked into books, behind your ear in photographs, rolling under the furniture. Each one feels like a message from you, telling me to keep writing our story.
But how do I write without my heart? You took all my best words with you when you left. Remember how you used to tease me about my vocabulary? 'Such fancy words from a banker's son,' you'd say. But you were wrong—you were always my best word, my favorite story, the only poem I ever wanted to write.
I made coffee for two this morning. Didn't realize until I'd already poured your cup. I sat and watched it grow cold, remembering how you'd drink it even hours later, too caught up in your writing to care about temperature. God, I even miss the way you'd forget to wash your cups, leaving coffee rings on every surface like secret messages.
The typewriter misses you. I swear it sounds different when I try to use it—sullen, like it knows I'm not you. Maybe it's right to reject me. My fingers were made for ledgers and bank notes, not for spinning stories like you did.
I dream about you every night. Sometimes you're healthy again, laughing in our gazebo back in Chicago. Sometimes you and Shakespeare are here in New York, waiting for me in the safe, cozy haven we call home. Last night, I dreamed you were trying to teach me to count colors in the sunset again. I kept losing count at six, and you just laughed and said we had all the time in the world to get it right.
We didn't have enough time, Deku. We had years, but it feels like seconds now. How do I measure the rest of my life without you in it? How many sunsets until I see you again?
Love always,
Kacchan"
Years passed. Katsuki kept his promise—he lived. But living wasn't the same as forgetting. He took over the publishing house where he'd once kept books, turning it into a success by publishing the kind of stories Izuku would have loved. He developed an uncanny eye for undiscovered talent, particularly drawn to writers who, like Izuku, saw magic in the ordinary world.
He published Izuku's stories under the pen name they'd chosen together—"M.K. Deku"—watching them touch lives they'd never know. Each time a letter arrived from a reader, describing how a story had given them hope or courage, Katsuki would add it to a special box he kept on Izuku's old desk.
"See?" he'd whisper to the empty room. "You're still changing the world, just like you always wanted."
He never returned to Chicago, never reconciled with his father. Some bridges, once burned, leave only ashes. His mother visited sometimes, bringing news from home that he pretended not to care about. But she also brought stories about the gazebo—how the garden had grown wild, how local teenagers now used it as their own secret meeting place. Somehow, that felt right. Love finding its way, generation after generation.
Their apartment became both sanctuary and museum. He preserved Izuku's desk exactly as he'd left it, dust gathering on the typewriter keys that would never again feel his touch. But he kept the rest of the apartment living, changing, growing—filling it with books and art and life, the way Izuku would have wanted.
On Izuku's birthday each year, Katsuki would buy a new notebook, the kind with green covers that Izuku had favored. He'd write down everything that had happened, everything Izuku had missed:
"Dear Deku,
They're making movies in color now. Real color, not just tinted. I watched one yesterday and thought about how you would have counted the shades in every scene. The world's getting brighter, but somehow it still feels dimmer without you here to notice all its colors.
Remember how we used to joke about flying cars in the future? Well, they're talking about sending men to the moon instead. To the actual moon, Deku. You would have written a dozen stories about it already. Would have had them building libraries up there, filling the Sea of Tranquility with words.
I hired a young writer today who reminds me of you. Not in looks—in spirit. She writes about impossible things as if they're inevitable. Believes in happy endings even though the world's given her every reason not to. She asked why I became a publisher. I almost told her the truth—that I'm just keeping your chair warm, maintaining this little corner of the literary world until we meet again.
Missing you is different now. Less like drowning, more like carrying an ocean inside me. Everything that reminds me of you—green eyes, freckles, the smell of fresh ink—it hurts less than it used to. Or maybe I've just grown stronger, the way you always said I would.
Love always,
Kacchan"
Sometimes, on clear nights, he'd climb to the roof of their apartment building (he never could bring himself to move, despite offers to buy the aging structure). He'd look at the stars, New York's lights dimming them but never quite managing to extinguish them completely. He could always find the morning star—the one that had watched over them that day in 1929 when they'd chosen each other despite everything.
"Seven colors in every sunset," he'd whisper to the night sky, a prayer and a promise wrapped in memory. "You were right about that, Deku. You were right about so many things."
He'd learned to count them all now, though it had taken years of practice. Purple at the horizon, deep blue above, pink clouds stretching like cotton candy—Izuku would have loved the metaphor.
In 1954, twenty years after Izuku's death, Katsuki finally found the courage to publish their story under a pseudonym. He called it "Seven Colors at Sunset," and it became a quiet sensation in certain circles, passed hand to hand like a secret. Those who knew where to look could find their own stories in its pages, their own hopes for love that dared not speak its name.
The letters began arriving within weeks of publication. They came from all over—small towns, big cities, even overseas.
Each one told a similar story: "I thought I was alone." "You gave me hope." "I finally feel seen." Katsuki kept every letter in a box next to Izuku's stories. Sometimes, late at night, he'd read them both together, letting past and present mingle like watercolors.
As the world changed around him, Katsuki remained a quiet constant in the publishing world, known for his unfailing support of unconventional love stories and magical realism.
Young editors whispered about the mysterious publisher who lived alone, surrounded by books and memories. Some said he'd never smiled, though that wasn't true—he smiled often, usually while reading manuscripts that reminded him of Izuku's way of seeing the world.
He lived to see the first glimmers of change, to witness the world slowly opening its arms to loves like theirs. Each small victory—a court case won, a law changed, a couple walking openly hand in hand—felt like a message from Izuku: "See? The world's getting better, just like I said it would."
But he never loved again—not like that. How could he, when half his soul had gone ahead to light the way? Other opportunities came and went, but his heart remained in a sanitarium room in the Adirondacks, holding a cold hand and counting colors in the sky.
He died in his sleep in 1969, in the same apartment where they'd built their brief heaven. The doctors called it heart failure, but those who knew him best understood that his heart had simply finished its long journey home. On his desk, they found a final letter, the paper still warm from his hands:
"My Dearest Izuku,
The doctor says I don't have long now, and for once, I'm not angry about it. I've kept my promise—I lived. I published your stories. I tried to make the world a little better, a little more like the one you always believed in.
But I never stopped missing you. Not for a single day. Not for a single breath. Every sunset had seven colors, just like you said, but they were never as bright without you here to count them with me.
You were wrong about one thing, though. The world isn't too big to disappear when you love someone enough. It's just the right size to hold in your heart until you can give it back to them.
I think I understand now why you loved stories so much. They're not just escapes—they're bridges. Between people, between worlds, between hearts. Our story has been told and retold, hidden in the pages of every book I've published, whispered in the spaces between other people's words. It will live on, Deku, in every love that refuses to be denied.
I'll see you soon. Save me a place by the lake—we have so many stories to tell. And this time, we'll have all of eternity to count the colors in the sky.
Forever yours,
Katsuki"
They buried him next to Izuku in a small cemetery overlooking the Hudson River. The headstone, simple and elegant, reads only:
"Two stars, one sky
1903-1969
1903-1934
'Love is all that remains'"
Some say that on clear nights, when the stars shine brightest over New York City, you can still feel them there—in the rustle of pages in old bookstores, in the quiet corners where lovers meet, in the spaces between heartbeats where love writes its own stories.
And perhaps, somewhere beyond the morning star, two boys are skipping stones across an endless lake, counting colors in an eternal sunset, their love finally free to burn as bright as they always dreamed it could.