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Blinking awake to the pitch dark of the bedroom, awareness comes on quickly, as if it never left. There's been a dip in the mattress from a weight that shuffles closer. It's unsteady, all limbs and bumbling knees and it pulls back the sheets from Toshinori's shoulders along with the curtain of sleep.
He scoots himself over to make room without much thought, an innate response to the warm press of palms that turn to fists around the back of his sleep shirt. He peers into the dark, just over his shoulder. There's only the suggestion of shapes from the nearby digital clock, not that he needs it. He doesn't need sight or sound to know whose forehead is pressed right up against him.
"Nightmare?" He asks, though it comes out more mumbled than he means, the sound of it quickly swallowed by the near silence of the pitch black room. His mouth is thick with the dry taste of sleep and his pillow might just be singing a siren's song to lure his head back into place, but he waits. Waits until the smaller body behind him presses impossibly close—nose to his spine close. So close he can feel as it juts up and down with a nod. But he still waits. Until he can feel certain that no words will be said, no tears are being shed, and that the only thing needed is a solid teether to the present. He reaches a hand back, with a slightly uncomfortable stretch, until he finds a shoulder and gives it a squeeze. The nose at Toshinori's spine squishes itself flat in reply allowing him to sink back into the plush beneath him, to wait until the heaviness of sleep covers itself across his senses. Not that it's particularly difficult. Their bed is almost sinfully comfortable, his body bears the extra weight of a busy day, and there's always a lull of ease that comes with the nearby warmth of his son.
But such a thing goes cold, just as his head has begun drifting through the pillow and into a world of rest, when the balance of the mattress shifts and a gentle yet commanding voice speaks.
"...He's crying, Toshi."
A hitched, broken, poorly stifled sob enters the room as if finally given permission, and suddenly, Toshinori is wide awake.
He's flipping onto his back, wincing as the hands there—trembling hands he realizes now—hang on until the very last second. Nearly crushed against the mattress in their desperate attempt to cling. He makes up for it though, as quickly as he can, reaching around to gather up what's close—what rushes to slot against him—what's guided forward, by the soft, experienced hands of his mother.
"Izuku…" He murmurs to the dark, to his boy, who's shaking so violently with built up sobs that he can only whimper in reply. "Oh…kiddo…"
The wetness growing just beneath Toshinori's collar, the fingers twisting and twisting the fabric of his shirt, the way Izuku tries so desperately to bury himself even closer against Toshinori's chest and whines as Inko runs a gentle, comforting hand along his scarred up arm—it's clear now, the kind of nightmare that has visited tonight.
"Bad?" He asks, though he already knows. Knows, even before Izuku's attempt at an answer is broken by a heartbreaking sound.
Dreams smeared with reality always were the hardest to break free from.
"It's okay," he promises, "Whatever it was, it's okay now."
Izuku nuzzles against him, hiccupping, before he mouths so quietly against Toshinori's dampening shirt, "H-He—"
It's like a pop.
"He got you."
The power of giving a monster a name, the relief of speaking the intangible to the tangible, the realization that such a horrific unreality was not one he'd ever have to live—whatever the reason, Izuku sags into the comfort Toshinori offers once the admission is out and cries even harder than before.
"He didn't," Toshinori swears to him, despite knowing that such a reminder won't be enough. Not when the shadows of tonight's torture have followed the poor boy from his bedroom. Chased him from where he'd woken up all alone, soaked with sweat and fear, and suffocating, choking, with a terrible what if created from memories that Toshinori wishes every day he could simply erase away.
But he can't.
All he can do is wrap Izuku up, as carefully and as close to his chest as he can, as if the boy were the weeping red faced newborn Toshinori has only ever seen in photos. He isn't one to question the natural flow of moments and meetings, not when they've all drawn a clear path that brings him here, to this life, to this family. Yet he wonders, not for the first time, if with every hug, every shush, every gentle rock back and forth, if he's perhaps, making up for lost time.
I'm here. It's over. We're safe. You're here. He tries to say it all with the practiced pattern he draws up and down Izuku's spine, which swells and shrinks painfully with so much distress. His own throat grows tight. He tries to swallow down his helplessness. Tries and fails to ignore the sharp throbbing pain that curls in his sternum as he's forced once again to watch as ghosts of the past come crawling from their grave to continually haunt his poor trembling child in the present.
It's then, just as he begins to drown with it, that the bedside light flicks on.
Spots of white blink in and out of his vision but he doesn't need to see to know. Inko fills the small vulnerable space with her very presence and her soothing whispers of which he can never replicate. Warm and well used, her words are somehow made all the more sincere as her lovely voice wobbles.
"It was just a dream," Inko says, as only she can. Toshinori sits up a bit, bringing Izuku with him, who sniffles, not at all relinquishing his hold, even after he's settled safely into the crook of Toshinori's arm. Inko shifts closer and Toshinori lets his long limb stretch out, making it a little easier for her to mold around them.
These nights, the ones when Izuku can barely form a response—can barely breathe without shaking from the strength of his spasming chest—are the worst. It usually takes the warm yellow embrace from their bedside table casting away any hint of darkness around the three of them, as they press together. Izuku in the middle, a parent on each side. No monster could get to him even if they tried.
"'M s'rry," a small weepy voice says. "Woke you both up again."
"None of that," Toshinori scolds unharshly, searing it into soft curls, hoping it will get through that thick selfless skull. Inko agrees, hugging herself around their son, though always her baby, even at eighteen, even before he'd ever been Toshinori's boy. "We want you to wake us up, sweetie. Especially when it's this bad."
And because it's not the first time, not the first night, not their first run through—simply a well worn routine embedded with warmth in the steps in-between, Izuku relents with only, "...I know."
He doesn't add "but still." Doesn't even ask a timid, "can I stay?"
The warmth that exists here, in this moment, is in the security, in the knowledge that after so many moments and nights of the same kind, Izuku does in fact know.
He throws an arm round Toshinori's chest, worming close, letting himself be snuggled by his mother, by Toshinori—who lets himself indulge in the title of 'father' as he cradles fluffy curls beneath his chin. Izuku lets himself breathe—though it's shuddery and wet upon inhale—but by the end, as he exhales, the tremors have died down. The fingers that had clawed into Toshinori's shirt, no longer hang on for dear life—they simply hold. Like a child's fist around a treasured blanket. Izuku melts into his clinginess and Toshinori accepts it, almost greedily. Gone are the nights of their boy sobbing and suffering in silence all alone. No matter how big or how old, no matter how late or how tired, Izuku knows now. They will always make space for him.
Eventually the heavy curtain of sleep begins to pull across green, and still slightly damp, eyes. Though it's helped along as Inko hums something soft without words. Toshinori follows its rhythm, absentmindedly smoothing his palm across no longer trembling shoulders, like the back and forth of a metronome. He doesn't stop, neither of them do, even when it's certain that Izuku has drifted into a peaceful—and well-deserved—sleep.
Even after Inko reaches over to return the room to black and Toshinori has shifted back against his pillows, Izuku stays secured against his chest. Stays safe, surrounded by two sets of arms, whose hands find each other and lace together, adding what is nothing less than another layer of protection and love atop their now snoring son.
Toshinori joins him not long after, eyes fluttering closed, surrendering to sweet dreams that can stray no further—do no better—than what he already has, right at his side.