The phone buzzed once. Then again. Then a third time, insistent against the wood of the nightstand.

Katsuki didn't move. He'd been sitting on the edge of the bed for the past hour, elbows on his knees, staring at the floor like it owed him something. The apartment was too quiet now. No humming from the kitchen. No stupid little sing-alongs in the shower. Just the buzz of a phone he didn't want to touch.

It buzzed again.

The voice on the other end was clinical. Calm. The kind of calm that meant something had already gone wrong before the call was even made.

They asked if this was Bakugou Katsuki. Asked if he was the emergency contact listed for Y/n.

He said yes.

The next few seconds came apart in fragments. A hospital name. A time. Words like unresponsive and too late and we did everything we could. But the one that hit hardest, the one that would rattle around his skull for the rest of his life, was simple.

Passed away.

The phone slipped from his hand and hit the floor.

But the line was already dead.

He sat there, hollowed out, the last text still glowing on the screen where the phone lay face-up on the carpet. The one from yesterday. The one he'd ignored.

Katsuki, please. I need help. I think something's really wrong.

He'd hung up.

Now there was nothing left to hang up on.