The music shifted. The last of the rowdy guests had stumbled back to their lodgings, carried away by the night and the alcohol, leaving only the gentle hum of the venue staff clearing plates in the distance. A single, soft light was left on over the now-empty dance floor, the Twister mat rolled away, the sand scattered with forgotten confetti.

Then, a new song began to drift through the speakers, a quiet, soulful piano melody, raw and intimate. The voice of Montell Fish, tender and aching, filled the space.

"Cause I think I'm fallin' in love with you..."

Katsuki stood in the center of the wooden floor, hand extended towards Izuku, who was still sitting on the steps leading to the beach. No words were needed. Izuku took the offered hand, letting Katsuki pull him up and into the circle of his arms.

They began to sway, a simple, slow rocking motion. Izuku’s forehead came to rest against Katsuki’s shoulder, his arms looping around his neck. Katsuki’s hands were firm and warm on his back, one sliding up to cradle the base of his skull, fingers tangling gently in the soft green strands of his mullet.

The lyrics wove around them, a gentle tide.

"...And I don't know what to do..."

And in the quiet intimacy, surrounded by the ghosts of their joyous celebration, the truth of the moment washed over Izuku with a force that stole his breath. He tightened his hold, his face pressing into the familiar, solid column of Katsuki’s neck.

He was here.

The thought wasn’t just a happy realization; it was a seismic shift in his reality. He had truly, in his darkest, most secret heart, never believed he would make it this far. Not with *him*. Not with Kacchan.

The fights echoed in the spaces between the piano notes—vicious, cutting arguments that left them both bleeding in ways no villain ever could. The times Katsuki’s words had been like shrapnel, and Izuku’s silence had been a void. The breakups, brief but catastrophic, where the world lost all its color and gravity.

All those nights after. The promises he’d made to himself, shattered like glass. The familiar, cold comfort of a different kind of pain, a secret rebellion against a heart that felt too bruised to keep beating. The hollow ache in his stomach that had nothing to do with hunger, the days where food tasted like ash, and the only thing he could seem to control was denying himself.

He had been a collection of broken pieces held together by sheer will and a desperate, fragile hope.

And yet.

And yet, Katsuki had picked up the pieces. Not always gently, not always with the right words, but with a stubborn, relentless persistence that mirrored Izuku’s own. He’d learned to read the silence, to see the shadows under Izuku’s eyes for what they were. He’d learned to say “Stay” instead of “Go away.” He’d learned to cook simple, hearty meals and place them in front of Izuku with a grunt, a silent command to eat. He’d traced the faint, silvered lines on Izuku’s skin with a touch so reverent it had made Izuku cry, not from shame, but from a bewildering sense of being cherished.

A warm droplet fell onto Katsuki’s collarbone, followed by another. Izuku wasn’t sobbing; he was simply overflowing, the dam of his past finally giving way to the immense, quiet pressure of his present joy.

Katsuki felt it. He didn’t pull back to look. He just held him closer, his own cheek coming to rest against Izuku’s hair. His grip was an anchor.

“I’m here,” Katsuki murmured into his hair, his voice a low, rough vibration against Izuku’s skin. He didn’t say “It’s okay,” or “Don’t cry.” He stated the only fact that mattered in this suspended moment. “I’m here.”

"I think I'm fallin' in love with you..."

Izuku believed him. He believed in the arms holding him, in the ring on his finger that felt like a promise of a future he’d once thought was a fairy tale, in the steady heartbeat against his own.

He wasn’t the boy under someone’s bed anymore, a forgotten cardigan. He was worn, cherished, a favorite. He was married.

He lifted his head finally, his face tear-streaked and radiant. Katsuki’s crimson eyes were soft, watching him, seeing every scar, every memory, every tear, and loving him *because* of them, not in spite of them.

“I made it,” Izuku whispered, the words a revelation.

A slow, genuine smile spread across Katsuki’s face, the kind that was reserved for Izuku alone—unburdened by ego, full of a fierce, proud tenderness. “Damn right you did.” He leaned in, his forehead touching Izuku’s. “We made it.”

And as the final, lingering notes of the song faded into the sound of the ocean, they kept dancing in the quiet light, two heroes who had fought their hardest battle not against any villain, but for each other, and had finally, gloriously, won.