Touch Starved Boys || My Hero Academia Imagines

~Home~ Dabi x Reader

@_Mizuki_Sama requested: "Can I request a Dabi x reader where he is tired and came home and we play him a song in the piano and he falls asleep on our shoulder?"

Have some soft/slightly domestic Dabi :3.  I have some tea to share with you guys later too.  Also, gender neutral you pronouns here~

Dabi's life as a villain is tough, to say the least.  Being one of the leading members of the League of Villains doesn't allow for much of a personal life.  it definitely wears him out more than he wants to admit himself.  There are even days when he doesn't return home for up to a week.

But, the days when he does come home are the best days.

Home for him isn't really his house or apartment, it belongs to you, his loving sweetheart who he met by chance one rainy day.  He was looking for an empty building to squat in for the night when he met you.  You were on your way back from a friend's house and accidentally bumped into him.  He couldn't place the feeling of why he decided to follow you, but it was a life-changing decision nonetheless.

Dabi managed to sneak onto your floor, picking the lock of the supply closet next door and residing there for the night.  He spread a few sheets onto the cold floor and used a bag of some powdery substance as a makeshift pillow.  While his thoughts were running wild as they do every night, he played with his fire in his hand, flickering on and off in the small room.

And then he heard piano music next door.  The melody flowed slowly, none of the notes too hurried, like a leisurely walk on a Sunday morning.  The minor key implies the underlying dark themes, the song carrying a message of recovery or rebirth.  Dabi drinks the song in, somehow moving the soul he thought was stone cold after certain events in his earlier life.  His eyes grew heavier as the sound lulls him off to sleep.  In the morning, he left a note and slipped in under your door.

"Your music gave me the best sleep I've had in years.  Let's meet tonight."

He thought you would be put off by his half fried appearance, tattered clothes, unkempt hair, and metal piercings, but you weren't.  It was awkward for him to pull off something like a date at a park, but as he spent more time talking to you, the more he felt you two hit it off.  At first, he explained his job as a travelling contractor of sorts, which would explain why he was often absent.  As your relationship grew, he became more and more enamored by you and it filled him with guilt that he was hiding his true nature from him.

One day, he was so badly injured and bleeding, and he was in your area.  Without giving it a second thought, he stumbled through your door with wounds too severe for a construction accident, and he had to come clean.  Dabi thought you would be appalled by his behavior and his lie.  All you did was wordlessly dress his wounds, put your supplies away, before drifting over to the piano on the other side of the room.

"You said my playing gave you the best sleep of your life the first night we met," you said, lifting the cover off and sitting down at the small bench.  "I should play you something else so you can rest again."

The familiar melody caressed his ears, and he hummed along in his head as he pattered over to sit next to you.  As the song drew to a close, you turned to him with a smile of acceptance.  "I like you just the way you are.  I'll be here to take away your weariness, always."

From then on, he found himself coming back to you more often.  The two would talk about the most superficial things as the weather at first, but as the clock ticks down later, Dabi's secrets came out.  You became the only person he would seek out whenever he could.  There's always a part of him that think you hated him for being a villain, but your kind nature reminded him of the warmth of his mother; the child could be the devil himself, but she would always love him.

Now, he would come back to you like it was his dwelling place.  You are his guiding light, his way of unwinding, his safe haven.

Just like each night, Dabi uses his key to unlock your door, but he makes sure to knock three times so you know it's him.  You're already home, in the kitchen finishing up dinner for you two to enjoy.  You smile when he wraps his burned arms around you from behind.

"How did you know I'd be here tonight?"  He moves a stray hair behind your ear.

"Because it's been a week since you were last here, and you usually try to come every week," you answer matter-of-factly.

He pulls you away from the stove and sits you two on the couch, still holding your hand just to keep you tethered to him somehow.  "What would you have done if I didn't come?"

"Eat it for lunch tomorrow.  Or I'd just leave it for you to have tomorrow or whatever next day you would return."  You study the worn creases under his scalded eyes, brushing one of them lightly with your thumb.  "Though you look like you need a talk more than food right now.  Spill."

Dabi lays back on the couch in a huff.  "Shigaraki's being a kid again.  Sometimes I wonder just how this whole thing'll turn out when we have a literal ten year old as our leader.  You should've seen this guy destroying Overhaul..."

You look on as he tells his story, wanting to relieve his exhaustion in any way you can.  Starting small, you massage his fingers in your hand, avoiding his metal staples whenever possible.  "Shigaraki needs one good punch in the face when he goes off like that."

"Yeah, and I'd be the one to do it if it weren't for Kurogiri stopping me."  His aqua eyes bore into yours affectionately.  There's no label on this relationship, and in a way, Dabi preferred it that way.  He's obviously attached to you, but trying to put how he feels into a neat box isn't something he'd want.  He already knows what you mean to him and vice versa, and you two act accordingly.

His eyes flicker to the piano just briefly in passing and you already know what he wants.  You guide him by the hand and sit him at the bench with you.  "Same as usual?"

Both of his arms circle your torso and he rests his chin on your shoulder.  "Play whatever you feel."  Dabi already feels his body relax just being near you.

The music fills his ears as your fingers dance over the keys.  His eyes first try to follow your delicate movements as the soft melody plays.  It sounds airy, light, dreamy almost at first, before it takes structure into keeping the same melody and building on it to become slightly more intense and passionate, holding onto the remnant of its original innocence.

All the sensations around fills him completely: the music stirring the small weightlessness from him, your shortened breathing as you play, the warmth and scent from your skin.  It's something he misses whenever he's not around, but more importantly, it's somewhere he feels he belongs.  Even in his childhood, he felt he wasn't welcome in the house he was born.  Dabi knows there will always be a place for him here, right next to you, as he drifts off with a smile on his face.

Ugh I've been waiting for my first Dabi request, so thank you! And I'm really sorry it took me this long, I have finals this week and I'm just not feeling myself at all.

To make matters worse (this is my tea), one of my oneshots, Red, was plagiarized on Tumblr by another user who didn't even change the name.  I was upset, like come on, seriously?  You're that starved for clout that you had to take it from other people?  Newflash sweetie, you just showed how clout-hungry you are, and using the same name was not your best move, you can't even copy without getting caught, try something else 💅🏼

Anyway, I might post the next request - which is a Todoroki fluff I've been DYING TO WRITE!! - tomorrow before taking a mini break for the rest of the week to study for my finals, so we'll see :)

~Tiny senpai