Incomplete [Chapter 18]

[Previous]

Katsuki groaned when he found the huge box waiting on the doorstep, but he hauled it in with the rest of the mail all the same, sighing as he lifted it onto the dining room table. He’d known his mother would go overboard, of course, but he hadn’t realised how overboard it was about to be. He glanced at the time, then lifted it up again, moving it to the coffee table in the living room with an admittedly-satisfying thud.

“What’s this?” Izuku asked, leaning forward to read the label. “You order something?”

“From my parents,” he explained, sighing. “She’ll want to talk us through everything, so figured I’d just bring it straight in.”

“Oh! The hair stuff! That’s so exciting, Koharu is gonna be so happy.”

Right on cue, Koharu came skipping into the room, her favourite monkey tucked under her arm. Her eyes widened when they both looked up at her, but when Izuku waved her over, the smile quickly made a return. She hopped over to join them, almost tripping over her baggy pink pants, and leaned against Katsuki’s thigh as she peeked at the box.

“This is from my mother,” Katsuki explained. “I assume it’s the stuff she told you she was gonna send us.”

“Fancy hair stuff?!” Koharu gasped. “Can I see?!”

“Yeah, of course. I thought we’d call her a little early so she can explain everything. Inko is usually late to our group calls anyway, she can never make the computer work right on the first try.”

“She does her best,” Izuku said fondly. “But she never thinks to start preparing early.”

Katsuki clicked on his mother’s name on the screen, the ringing quickly piped out through their new speaker system – Katsuki had spent an entire day off getting them set up, and he was still a little proud of himself every time he heard the excellent sound quality, even just for a ringtone.

“You’re early, brat,” Mitsuki greeted him, her tone admittedly fond. “You’re lucky I’m so punctual.”

Katsuki just gestured toward the box in answer, and her face lit up when she saw, grinning from ear to ear as she waved to Koharu.

“Do you want to open it up and take a look together?” she asked. “I hope you like it. I slipped a few things in for Yoshiki too, is he coming?”

“He’s just finishing his book, he’ll be down soon,” Izuku assured her. “Do we need to wait for him?”

“No, that’s okay, all his stuff is wrapped in black and Koharu’s is in pink, so you’ll know which ones are which!”

“You wrapped them?” Katsuki asked. “How damn extra are you?”

“It’s more fun that way!” Mitsuki laughed, glancing off-screen for a moment before Masaru appeared, sitting down beside her with a smile and a wave. “We had a lot of fun picking stuff out.”

“I thought you were just gonna order shit online and send it here, I didn’t know you were gonna be like this.”

“I wanted to see everything in person first!”

With a sigh, Katsuki conceded, reaching over to carefully slit through the tape on the box. He let Koharu take over as soon as it was open, fishing out the first little pink package, as he sat back on the couch to lean against Izuku’s side. The nerd was always so soft and warm, he didn’t understand it.

“I thought that one would help when your dads aren’t around,” Mitsuki explained, when Koharu unwrapped pink tissue paper to find a sparkly, glittery, pink hairbrush. “It’s a special one made for hair like yours, to use when you wash it.”

“It’s so sparkly!”

“Isn’t it great?” Masaru asked fondly. “We picked up a normal pink one first, then ran and swapped it when we saw the glitter one.”

“Thank you so much!”

She hugged it happily, then carefully set it down, reaching for the next piece of pink paper. One by one, she unwrapped a rainbow of shiny scrunchies and clips, bright pink pillowcases and towels, and what felt like a thousand different bottles all with slightly different labels, though Katsuki still wasn’t sure he understood what the difference was between any of them.

“I thought you could take one back with you to use during the week,” Masaru said, when Koharu held up two identical pink spray bottles. “If you remember, you can spray it every morning when you wake up, and it’ll help keep it soft for you.”

“I’ll remember!” she assured him, hugging the bottles tightly. “Thank you! I’m glad I can have nice hair in the week time too.”

“You always have nice hair,” Masaru reminded her. “It’s beautiful no matter what. These will just help you keep it healthy and feeling nice.”

She beamed at him, and Katsuki felt himself soften too, a tiny smile tugging at his lips. His parents were so damn good with the kid, he didn’t know where that shit had come from. Then again, he supposed they’d been pretty decent with him, too. His dad had always been a sap, Katsuki just found it a lot more endearing when it was directed at his kid instead of him. His mother, too, had always been... he hated the word generous, but it was the only one he could think of. She’d never hesitated to buy him shit he needed, even if he didn’t always want or, especially, appreciate it. The number of times she’d conveniently thrown a pile of new underwear or socks at him and demanded he replace his worn-out shit, even after he left for high school and started doing his own laundry so she had no clue what state it was in, was... impressive. And if he ever mentioned needing something for school, even in passing, it had always shown up on his bed or desk the next day. Fuck, apparently he’d learned how to show love from his mother, that wasn’t a fun thought.

“How was the ending?” Izuku asked, making Katsuki look up. “Good?”

“It was kinda yuck,” Yoshiki said, pulling a face. “All about them growing up and having babies to go on adventures next.”

“Oh, ew. I mean, good for them and everything, if that's the life they want, but that’s not very relevant or satisfying for a book. They should be adventuring even as little hunched-over eighty-year-olds, if it’s what they love.”

“Exactly,” Yoshiki agreed. “Oh. Hello.”

“Hi, Yoshiki!” Mitsuki said brightly. “Sorry to hear about your book.”

“It’s okay, the rest was good.”

“You’ll just have to make up your own ending and imagine it’s the real one,” Masaru suggested, and Katsuki stifled a laugh – the number of times Masaru had made up new endings to his bedtime stories as a kid when one of them didn’t like the real one was pretty staggering. “We got you a couple of little things, if you’d like to open them.”

“You did? You didn’t have to.”

“We wanted to,” Mitsuki assured him. “It wouldn’t be very nice to send things to Koharu and not to you, after all.”

“I wouldn’t complain.”

“We know, you’re far too good for that,” Masaru said knowingly. “It still wouldn’t be very nice though. So there’s just a few small things we thought you might like!”

“Thank you very much.”

He tiptoed over to look, and Koharu slid the box toward him with its black-wrapped packages, her own pink collection arranged on the table for her to see it all better. Katsuki actually cackled when he unwrapped the first one, when he gleefully turned around to show Katsuki the box first, full of bath bombs shaped like grenades and bombs.

“Not official merch, but they should be,” Mitsuki said knowingly. “Someone is clearly capitalising on your brand.”

“I don’t even care,” Katsuki said, still laughing to himself. “I can’t make everything, someone’s gotta do the good ideas I haven’t had yet.”

“Nah, you’ve gotta expand your line,” Mitsuki insisted. “There are no Dynamite bath products, it’s insane.”

“Do any heroes have bath products?”

“A lot of them!”

Katsuki huffed, but he didn’t object – he had a meeting planned with his merch team in like a week anyway, he’d add it to the list.

“Speaking of heroes,” Masaru chuckled, when Yoshiki unwrapped the next package. “That was the best one we could find.”

The box Yoshiki held up contained a bunch of little bottles of body wash, each one a different colour, with a different hero stamped on the front – some of them retired even though they were apparently still making merch. He saw a Hawks in there, a Miruko, a Lemillion, even an Endeavour – he wondered what the scent of bad parenting was.

“They’re all so cool-looking,” Yoshiki said, turning the box back and forth to get a good look at all the heroes inside. “Thank you!”

The next package held a collection of little soaps in different shapes – dragons, dinosaurs, rocket ships, a bunch of animals – and a rainbow of colours, Yoshiki smiling fondly as he rummaged through the bag, admiring all the different creatures.

Finally he got to the last package, a much flatter and floppier one, and Katsuki frowned slightly when he saw a flash of red and blue as Yoshiki opened it. Maybe it was childish of him, but he still immediately thought of All Might when he saw those two colours together, side by side. It had been over a decade since his retirement, since he’d stopped wearing that suit, but still it was rooted so deeply in Katsuki’s mind.

“They don’t make Dynamite or Deku ones,” Masaru said softly, and Katsuki looked up, tuning back in. “But Katsuki had one like that when he was your age, so we thought it would be fun for you to have one too.”

“I love it. I love All Might.”

Katsuki blinked at him. Then, the colours really had been...?

Yoshiki unfolded the red and blue fabric, revealing a matching yellow that surely would have tipped Katsuki off anyway, and slipped it over his head with a little smile on his face. It was one of those little hooded towels that Katsuki always saw kids running around in after swimming classes or at the beach, this one emblazoned with All Might’s old suit design, the hood yellow with twin antlers that didn’t quite stay upright properly.

And yeah, he remembered. He hadn’t just had one, he’d had multiple, from a tiny one when he was a toddler, right up until he’d hit Junior High School and decided he was too old and too cool to wear hero merch anymore. Those towels had been the one way to get him in the bathtub as a kid, with promises of his favourite cosy towel lying in wait on the heated rail for him when he got out. He would sit around in that thing for hours some nights, if he wasn’t going to bed right away.

“It looks great,” Katsuki said, when he caught Yoshiki looking at him. “I loved mine, I wore it every day for years.”

“He would have lived in that thing if we’d let him,” Mitsuki said, her tone caught somewhere between teasing and wistful. “Do you guys have a heated towel rail?”

“We do,” Katsuki said, smiling to himself softly. “I always turn it on at night.”

“For cosy towels!” Koharu agreed brightly. “It’s so nice!”

“I love a good cosy towel,” Mitsuki agreed. “I’m glad he’s sharing my infinite wisdom with you both.”

Katsuki wanted to object, but with Koharu giggling to herself and Yoshiki smiling shyly, he couldn’t bring himself to break the peace.

Thankfully, Inko distracted them all for him, the screen splitting in two to show her far-too-close face. She waved happily, then seemed to catch herself, sitting back a little so they could see her whole self, this time, in the frame.

“Sorry I’m late! This silly camera kept blinking at me instead of working!”

“I’m glad you got it sorted,” Izuku said, smiling knowingly when Koharu giggled again. “It’s good to see you!”

“You as well! All of you! You all seem happy and healthy, I’m so glad!”

Inko and Izuku had talked on the phone just the night prior, so there was no major catching up to do, but she always seemed so delighted to see their faces on a screen instead of just hearing his voice. She also seemed inexplicably happy to see Katsuki every time, let alone the kids. Her grandkids. That was still such a weird thing to think about.

“There’s actually something we wanted to ask you guys,” Izuku began – impatient nerd always had to get straight to the point, when he got excited about something. “We all had a good talk last night, and we were wondering if you guys want to come visit. Maybe this weekend?”

For a moment, no one spoke. Inko’s eyes went wide, her lips moving a little like she was scared to actually speaka Mitsuki went straight for her phone, scrolling through her calendar and mumbling to Masaru; and Masaru just stared at them all, like he couldn’t believe it was happening, even though he’d already met most of them.

“We’ll reschedule,” he whispered, apparently unaware of the microphone’s sensitivity, when Mitsuki leaned over to show him something on her phone. “They’ll just have to make it work.”

“Another week is fine too,” Katsuki assured them. “If you’ve got plans, we’ll do it a different week.”

“We can change them,” Masaru insisted, despite Mitsuki’s little frown. “We’ll figure it out.”

“No, really, please don’t,” Izuku chimed in, smiling awkwardly. “We know it’s such short notice, and any weekend is fine, really. It sounds like you’ve got something important to do, you don’t need to change that!”

“It’s a work thing,” Mitsuki said apologetically. “We’ve been trying to line up dates for months. Are you sure a different week is okay?”

“Of course! We only have one spare room, so it might even be better! I can come pick Mom up this weekend to come stay for a few days, and next weekend, or whenever it suits you, the two of you can come together! I promise it’s fine, please don’t make your work lives difficult!”

“Okay,” Masaru sighed, face falling. “We’ll be there next weekend, just wait one more week for us.”

“That sounds great,” Izuku said with a grin. “Sorry to make things stressful!”

For a little longer the group chatted, but when dinner time drew near and stomachs started to protest, they began to wrap it up. The Bakugous said goodbye, with last thanks from the kids, and dropped out of the call, and then Katsuki excused himself to start cooking, while Izuku and his mother debated logistics – Izuku wanted to drive down and pick her up, but Inko insisted she’d be fine on the train and not to waste his time on the drive, that she could catch up on some reading and have a nice, peaceful trip. Katsuki was already booking her a first-class seat from his phone even as they debated, and he smiled to himself in the kitchen when he heard the little chime of Inko’s phone, as the ticket appeared in her emails.

“Katsuki!” she protested, loudly. “Stop spending your money on me!”

“Too late,” he said, dropping back in briefly just to smirk at her. “Have a comfy trip, the nerd will pick you up from the station.”

The pair of them sighed at him, but Katsuki knew there was some fondness in it. The two of them would have argued for days about it, Katsuki’s job as husband and son-in-law was to end their ridiculous debates.

Finally they hung up, and then Katsuki was shoving bowls on the table, with his go-to quick omurice that never failed to please people. Sure enough, Izuku practically drooled when he saw it, and the kids grinned when they saw the little ketchup smiley faces he’d drawn on the top in a moment of silly fondness.

“Thanks for dinner,” Yoshiki said quietly, when Katsuki sat down opposite him. “It’s always so good.”

“I’m glad. I like to cook, especially for the people I care about.”

Yoshiki cracked a little smile, and Katsuki knew he’d gotten the point.

“The food at the old home is so bad,” Koharu lamented, digging into her rice like her life depended on it. “I always miss your food.”

“That bad? I guess it’s probably aimed at toddlers, huh?”

“Lots of mushy frozen vegetables,” Koharu told him, biting into a chunk of carrot that Katsuki was relieved to know was freshly cut and cooked. “Everything is squishy.”

“What about your school lunches?”

“They’re okay but boring.”

“That’s a shame. And breakfast? Mushy as well?”

“Uh-huh.”

“They only make porridge for breakfast,” Yoshiki said with a grimace. “The smell is gross.”

“And it’s mushy,” Koharu reiterated.

“Oh no, that’s a shame. Every day, too? That must be hard.”

“We just don’t eat breakfast,” Koharu said, shrugging. “The teachers get mad sometimes but they gave up when Yokkun threw up on the table.”

“Koharu!”

“What? They did.”

Yoshiki burned bright red, and Katsuki did his best to look sympathetic.

“Take some of your snacks with you, tomorrow,” Izuku suggested. “They’re not ideal for breakfast, but they’re better than nothing.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki agreed. “I’ll buy some muesli bars or something for next week, but for this week, snacks will do.”

“It’s okay, you don’t have to,” Yoshiki mumbled.

“We know,” Izuku assured him. “But we want to. Please, take your snacks with you – all of them, if you want. We’ll get some more for the weekend.”

Yoshiki still hesitated, Koharu’s eyes burning into him as she waited for approval, and finally he conceded a nod.

“Thank you,” he said softly. “It’s really nice of you.”

“Anything we can do to help,” Katsuki assured him. “You know that.”

Koharu nodded, but Yoshiki still paused, hesitating before he managed a single, short one of his own.

“Yeah,” he admitted quietly. “I know.”

———

“Bye Angel, have a good week. I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too!” Koharu hugged him tightly, arms wrapped around his neck like she might never let him go. “I’ll send you emails!”

“I’ll send you emails too,” Katsuki assured her. “I love you. Have fun at preschool.”

“I love you too!”

She finally detached herself, running off to join the line of kids at the doors, but to Katsuki’s surprise, the teacher didn’t follow her. He was used to being the last parent to leave, used to Koharu struggling to drag herself away – honestly he struggled just as much – but usually, whichever teacher supervised the drop-off period was quick to follow the last stragglers indoors.

“Do you have a few minutes?” Miss Oyazaki asked, with a soft smile. “I know you have a busy work schedule.”

“I’m good.” He nodded faintly. “My partner is working this week, we alternate. Is everything okay?”

“Everything is fine, I assure you. I just wanted to... Have a chat with you. Without the kids around, I mean. Is that okay?”

“Yeah, of course. I’m more than happy to stay.”

“Fantastic. Come with me, we can use the staffroom.”

With a little churning feeling in his stomach, he followed her into the small building, his brain running a mile a minute as it dreamed up everything that could possibly have gone wrong. She was all smiles, and Koharu had always seemed to like her, but Katsuki just couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off about it all.

Fuck, she'd better not be a villain. He’d hate to have to kick his daughter’s teacher’s ass.

“I’m sure you know by now that a lot of the kids from the Home come to preschool here, since we’re the most local. Koharu is the oldest, but there’s a pretty significant group of them.”

“Yeah, I’m sure there must be.”

“So whenever one of those kids is in a potential adoption or foster placement, the caregivers tend to ask us what we think of it. We hear the kids talk about their potential new parents, they confide in us a lot of the time, and we see how they look and act and just their general well-being after they’ve been with their new parents. So as I’m sure you can imagine, I’ve been asked about you and your partner, and how Koharu is doing.”

“Is there something wrong?” he asked, frowning slightly. “Is she meant to be doing homework I don’t know about? Or is she missing school supplies? Is it because she doesn’t want to let go and go to class on Mondays? I can talk to her about that, I swear, it’s just still kind of new right now, and-”

“Mister Bakugou,” she cut him off, smiling fondly. “I think you’ve been doing a fantastic job. Koharu adores you, and she always seems very well taken care of.”

“O-Oh. Well... Good.”

“What I want is to learn about you. Why you chose her, if you’re equipped for her, if you even want it to be a long-term process, or just a temporary foster placement.”

“She’s my daughter,” Katsuki said firmly. “I don’t care what that place says, she’s been my daughter since the moment we decided to adopt her. I will never stop fighting for her.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“I don’t know what they told you, if anything, but we never planned to find a kid that day. We were just checking up on people after work in the area, but then we met her and Yoshiki, and we just... Couldn’t leave without them. My partner saw it first, he got attached instantly, and when I saw it in him, I talked to them more, and... I felt it too. I know that makes us sound unprepared and out of our depth or whatever, but I promise you, we’ve been working really hard. We bought a house, set up two kids’ rooms so they’d have somewhere to feel safe at our place, I’m learning how to do her hair and pick out clothes and all that stuff since I’ve never had sisters or girlfriends or whatever, and yeah it’s gonna take us some time to get it perfect, but we will.”

“She’s a special kid, I’m glad she has someone like you.”

“Wait, you...”

“Of course I’m going to tell them I approve,” she chuckled quietly. “I’m sorry if I made you think otherwise. If it were up to me, she’d move in with you tomorrow. And I’ll tell them that, too, given the chance. But I needed to hear it from you, too. That you wanted it. I’d hate for her to get her hopes up and find out you just wanted to foster them for a few months.”

“I can’t imagine ever losing her. I hate it every time I have to give her back to them. Every week I just have to live on emails they send me on their lunch breaks or when they can convince someone at the Home to let them use a staff computer, waiting for the day I can pick them up again. It’s torture.”

“I suspect they feel the same,” she said with a smile. “Koharu regularly asks to use one of the class tablets to send you pictures.”

“You have tablets in class?”

“Oh yes, of course. Mostly for taking photos and a few educational games, but Koharu often uses one to transfer the photos she’s taken on her own camera, too. They’re great for fine motor skills, and much more engaging than some typical educational resources are. Not to mention they reduce the amount of paper we waste. We also have a parents app, where the kids can post their photos or the work they’ve been doing, and the parents can see it from their own phones. You don’t have it?”

“No, no one mentioned it.”

“I imagine Yoshiki’s school has one, too. You’re more than welcome to join ours, and I’m sure they’d say the same. Here, take this.”

She handed over a pamphlet with a QR code on the front, and Katsuki nodded gratefully as he accepted. There was a list of instructions inside for how to set it all up, and Katsuki knew he’d be reading it the moment he got home.

“Do most of the kids have computers and stuff at home, too?”

“I’d say so, yes. Many of them have their own tablet, and the ones who don’t mostly have a shared computer they can use, even if they’re not very well-versed in how yet. Sometimes we give them homework projects to research things they’re interested in, but there’s always the option to use the library instead.”

“But you think they’re beneficial?”

“Where possible, of course. Kids are curious, and adults don’t have all the answers. It’s a lot easier to say ‘let’s go look it up’ than just ‘I don’t know’, don’t you think?”

“Yeah,” he nodded slowly. “Thanks, you’ve given me a lot to think about.”

“My pleasure,” she smiled warmly, a knowing look in her eyes. “I know it can be hard to go through the adoption process, with all the waiting and the silly rules. Koharu mentioned there were complaints about gifts.”

“Yeah,” he grimaced. “They said it wasn’t fair or whatever. And I get it, I do, but like... They’ve already missed out on so much, you know? Those other kids get moved to bigger Homes when they get their quirks, with more supplies, more funding, more everything. But because Koharu and Yoshiki lost some stupid cosmic lottery, they’re just doomed to live with one pair of socks for their entire childhood? It’s ridiculous. I gave them clothes. Clothes we got for free, mind you. I guarantee no other kid there has been told off for having too many clothes.”

“May I be so bold as to give you a little word of advice?”

“Of course. Anything. I just want to do right by these kids.”

“The caregivers don’t count their socks, they only know what their socks look like.”

Katsuki’s eyebrows lowered, contemplating, but when Miss Oyazaki smiled again it all clicked into place.

“So if I bought them five pairs that are all the same, and they brought them home on weekends for laundry, they’d never notice?”

“I’m not telling you to do anything, of course, but I’ve seen... many kids from that Home come through here.”

“Thank you, I’ll keep that in mind.”

“It was nice to see her with a real bag to carry her things in, too. I don’t know if you’ve seen it, but when those kids get fostered or adopted, they often carry their belongings to their new home in trash bags. The first time Koharu brought that little suitcase to school, with her things for the week, it made me very happy.”

“That’s awful.” Katsuki’s face fell, eyebrows knitting together. “Those poor kids.”

“The caregivers mean well, they do what they can with the funds they have, even if sometimes it's not enough. If you’re sending them back with enough socks and underwear to get through a week, you have my full support.”

“Thank you. I’m glad I’m not somehow insane for thinking they should have more socks.”

“Not at all. Unfortunately I’d better get to the class now, but thank you for stopping to talk with me. I’m very glad to have confirmed that you have her best interests at heart. She really thinks a lot of you.”

“I think a lot of her, too.”

“Well then, have a good day, Mister Bakugou. I hope to see you again very soon.”

“Fingers crossed.”