Katsuki Bakugo stood just inside the doorway, one hand still on the doorknob, his jaw set in a scowl that had been permanently etched there since the moment he realized what kind of room he was walking into. The smell of cheap beer and expensive perfume collided in the air.

He was tall, impossibly broader than he'd been at eighteen, with shoulders that filled out his black jacket like he was built from concrete and stubbornness. His red eyes swept the room with the precision of a man who had spent a decade learning exactly where the exits were. His ash-blond hair was shorter now, cropped at the sides and wild on top, and the faint scent of sugar and smoke clung to him despite the cologne.

The woman at his side, Akari Kurosawa, slid her hand into his. She was stunning in a way that made people instinctively straighten their posture—tall, willowy, with that haunting quality to her gaze that had launched a thousand magazine covers.

He turned.

The room kept moving—people laughing, glasses clinking, someone in the kitchen arguing loudly about hero rankings—but Katsuki's focus narrowed to a single point. She was standing near the kitchen, a drink in her hand, angled toward the conversation. Her back was partially to him at first, her hair longer than it had been at eighteen, falling past her shoulders in waves he didn't remember being there.

Then she laughed.

It was the same laugh. Deeper, more practiced, but unmistakably hers. It was the laugh of someone who found the world funny rather than overwhelming. She was mid-conversation with Shoto Todoroki, who stood beside her with his usual unreadable expression, but whatever she said made him huff out a dry laugh.

Then she looked over.

Their eyes met.

It lasted half a second. Maybe longer. Time stretched like taffy in the space between them, the noise of the party dimming to a dull roar.

She was older now. Different in ways that caught him somewhere beneath the ribs. The softness of her features had sharpened into something more defined, more sure. She carried herself differently—like she'd learned how to take up space instead of apologizing for it. He watched her recognize him, the way her expression shifted, the details of her face settling into something familiar.

Just Bakugo.

The word hit him like a brick through glass.