"Okay, are they dating or what? I'm so confused!" Kaminari whined, seeing Bakugou and Kou walking onto school property from the window in the common area.

"Well are they holding hands or kissing or something?" Sero asks, and Kaminari rolls his eyes at his question.

"They're always holding hands! It makes me sick!" He groans, gagging a bit for effect as he looks through the curtains, "And if I have to see them kiss I'm sticking my hand in a blender!"

"How are we supposed to know if they're dating or not then?!" Sero argues, and Kaminari turns back to give him an incredulous look.

"You watch them, then!"

"No fucking way!"

"Guys, guys- why are we even doing this in the first place?" Kirishima asks with a nervous smile, "Shouldn't we just leave them alone?"

"Hell no!" Mina chimes in, "We are way too invested in this! I didn't hype my girl up just for them not to tell me what happened after the carnival!"

Kirishima couldn't help but agree- after that night in the amusement park Kou and Bakugou appeared to go back to normal (so basically a couple), but there had been no confirmation of their relationship at all.

Not that anybody even had the chance to talk to them lately. Those two were in their own world as usual, but in the past 2 weeks it had gotten impossible to catch either one of them alone. They were always hanging out in Bakugou's room.

Kirishima supposed it was good they were friends again, at least.

"They're coming in!" Kaminari yells, "Everybody act cool!"

Kaminari, Sero and Mina dive to the couch, assuming their 'normal' positions. Not even 30 seconds later Bakugou and Kou walked in, chuckling to themselves- Kaminari tried to hide his gagging.

"Hey guys," Kou smiled when she noticed them hanging out in the common room, "...What are you guys doing?"

"Hm?" Mina asks innocently, "What do you mean?"

Kou turned to glance at Bakugou, who looked just as confused at the sight before them: Kaminari was reading a textbook (something they doubted since they were pretty sure he didn't know how to read), Mina was playing a video game, and Sero was doing yoga. The only person who looked normal was Kirishima, and he was staring at the wall and sitting like he had a stick up his ass.

"Whatever," Bakugou gruffs, "You extras can do whatever you want. We're going upstairs."

The two leave hand in hand, and everyone exhales in relief. "Man, that was close!"

"Are you being serious?" Kirishima says, "They're totally onto us!"

"Who cares?!" Mina cries, "We need to follow them! Let's go to Kiri's room!"

"Yeah!" the two boys cheer, Kirishima reluctantly agreeing.

The four of them make their way to the redhead's room, making sure to take the stairs so that the suspected couple wouldn't notice them. When they finally get to his door, they open it as quietly as possible and shuffle in.

"Let's listen!" Kaminari whispers, bringing his ear to the wall and struggling to hear what they're doing.

"Good idea!" Mina agrees, joining the blond and trying to eavesdrop. The other two eventually join in, and they stay silent for about five minutes before giving up.

"I can't hear anything!" Sero groans, making sure not to raise his voice too much, "I think we should just ask them tomorrow at breakfast or something?"

"Like they'd tell us!" Mina whispers back, "I need to know today ! Like right now!"

"Sero's right." Kaminari says solemnly, looking more serious than he ever had. "We need to face this head on, guys."

"What do you mean?" Everyone asks, wondering what could be going through the electric blond's head.

"I'm going in! I'm just going to go into Bakugou's room and confront them!" Kaminari's fists clench in determination, and the two boys cry at his manliness.

"Are you crazy?" Mina chastises, "You're going to die!"

"It's what needs to be done, young one." He says dramatically, "I'm tired of standing idly and not acting! This is what a real hero would do!"

"It's your funeral," she shrugs- the nosy part of her was kind of glad for his stupid plan.

"I'll see you on the other side, kids!" Kaminari stalks off and past the door- the remaining 3 waiting in suspense.

They can hear Kaminari knock on Bakugou's door, calling out to the couple that he wants to talk. A couple seconds go by with no response, and they hear the door opening- had he just decided to go inside himself?

It takes about two seconds for things to turn to utter shit: Mina, Kaminari and Sero jump in surprise when they hear screaming- from both Kou and Kaminari. Bakugou's yelling and swearing is heard, along with Kou's angry threats. Kaminari is heard trying to defend himself, though it's quite muffled. It clearly didn't work, because the sound of Bakugou's explosion going off and a bright light of Kaminari's quirk can be seen from under the door, lighting up the hallway.

"What the fuck?" Sero slaps a hand over his mouth in a mix of confusion and terror. What the hell happened?

The door is heard opening and closing again, and soon enough Kaminari is back- but in 'yay' mode.

"Y-yay..." Kaminari stumbles back into the redhead's room, smiling dopily with both hands in a 'thumbs-up'. The group shivered at the thought of what he could've seen in the next room, or what the couple had done to him.

"I think it's safe to say they're dating," Kirishima laughs nervously.

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Meanwhile in Bakugou's room, the two of them were fuming at the sudden invasion.

"For fuck sake, can we not get privacy in my own fucking room?" The angry blond grumbles, adjusting the covers over him and Kou.

"Has Kaminari not heard of knocking?" Kou groans, face down in her pillow from embarrassment. "Now I'm going to have to live with the knowledge that he knows what I look like without a shirt on."

She'd managed to slip on Bakugou's black skull shirt in the chaos, but the damage had already been done unfortunately.

Bakugou flicks the back of her head in annoyance, "Don't fucking remind me, Kou-mi. Why the fuck would he even barge in here all of a sudden? Has he finally lost all brain function or something?"

Kou frowns into the pillow, wondering what could've possessed their friend to enter such dangerous territory.

"Hm, now that I think about it I don't think we ever mentioned we started dating." She turns her head to the side to face Katsuki, who's only centimetres away from her face and laying on his stomach too.

"Tch," he scoffs, draping an arm over her body, "Like it's any of those extras' business; those nosy fucks."

"You just want me to yourself," Kou teases, nudging his cheek with her nose playfully.

"Yeah, and ?" He huffs, kissing her cheek with a surprising amount of aggression behind it, "You got a problem with that?"

"No, sir!" She says sarcastically, "Now turn over so I can rest on your chest."

"Fucking pervert," he grumbles, but complies anyways. Kou shuffles over to his side of the bed, snuggling into his chest and sighing contently.

Honestly, not much had changed since they'd started dating. Besides being able to kiss each other and do...other stuff without it being horribly awkward, their relationship had stayed basically the same. Not that Kou was complaining- she happened to like their dynamic quite a lot already.

Kou is drawing random patterns into his bare chest with her fingers, listening to the steady beat of his heart. Bakugou suppresses a shiver, trying to control his heart rate in an attempt to avoid getting mad fun of by the girl.

"I love you," she says softly, giggling quietly when she hears his heart literally skip a beat.

"Hmph, whatever— OW!" Bakugou tries to act cool, but is quickly put into place when Kou slaps his arm.

"...Love you too..." he mutters under his breath, but it seems to satisfy her since she goes back to tracing along his chest and up his neck.

"I guess it would've been nice to have a couple more days together without everyone knowing about us," Kou admits, dreading the moment they'd be forced to leave his room and confront their friends. "But I have a feeling that's not gonna last very long."

"We could just never leave," Bakugou ponders, weaving his hands through her hair and massaging her scalp unconsciously, "Or we could just ignore them- they're annoying anyways."

"You're such an idiot," Kou chuckles, propping her head up and looking at Katsuki with a smile on her lips. She kisses his chin softly, peppering a bunch of small kisses along his face and making him blush slightly at how affectionate she was being.

"Since when did you get so damn touchy?" Bakugou groans, though secretly he's loving all the affection he's receiving. It's about damn time it was reciprocated!

"Shut up, you ungrateful brat! If you don't like it then too bad!" She bites his cheek, and he yanks his face away from her with a grunt.

"What the hell kind of monster did I agree to date?" He whines, pinching her cheek with his free hand.

Kou snuggles into him more, draping a leg over his leg and practically laying on top of him. She buries herself into his neck, sighing when the familiar scent of caramel hits her nostrils. Bakugou doesn't complain, only adjusting their position to be more comfortable under the covers.

"Wanna take a nap?" She asks him, knowing it was their favorite pastime (besides making fun of people) to do together.

"You're gonna have to get the fuck off of me first so I don't die in my sleep," He clucks, placing his hands on her hips and swiftly flipping them around so they were on their sides.

Bakugou brushes the hair out of her face, kissing her forehead and hugging her close. "Now stop bothering me, Kou-mi. I'm tired."

Kou hums in acknowledgment, happy to just lay in silence for a bit.

"I love you," he whispers into her hair, a bit muffled but still audible.

She still couldn't believe how good it felt to be together with him. Why the hell had she waited so long? This was the happiest she'd ever been, and it seemed foolish that she'd delayed it when it had been right in her grasp.

Bakugou had helped her through so much; he lifted her up, he believed in her, he inspired her. He always pushed her to do better, to be better- and she loved him for that.

She still struggled with feeling like she didn't deserve someone so amazing, but she wasn't going to push him away anymore because she was scared. Kou wanted to be happy- she spent so much of her life being fucking miserable and angry already. She'd been through so much shit, she deserved this little sliver of happiness.

Katsuki certainly didn't solve all her problems; she still had to deal with her stepdad and mom, and the shitty city she came from, and the grief she felt for her brother- but that didn't matter. She didn't need someone to give her all the solutions.

Kou finally had someone she could trust; someone she knew would stick by her side no matter what- she wasn't alone anymore. Even if her life wasn't exactly ideal and she had a long way to go before she could say she made it, she knew she finally had someone to lean on.

And that was good enough.

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A/N: And that's a wrap! I've had so much fun writing this story, and I'm so happy that so many of you guys enjoyed this story too! I just want to say thank you to everyone who voted, left comments, or even just read Lean on Me- I wrote this just for fun and did not expect so much positive feedback.

Big thank you's to everyone who commented regularly and showed so much support I really really appreciate it and I hope that you guys enjoy my future stories as well!!

I hope this epilogue was a good end to the story, and there will definitely be bonus chapters at some point too!