Written for the BakuTodo Week event on Tumblr. Prompt: Secret.
The students of Class 1-A had a secret.
Well, two secrets, to be more specific. The first one belonged to only two of them - Bakugou Katsuki and Todoroki Shouto. Since the beginning of their third year, they'd been in a steady relationship, finally acknowledged after many fights (both of them had strong tempers and a stubbornness unmatched by most, after all) and months of mutual pining. They hadn't, however, made that relationship public yet, choosing to keep that aspect of their lives to themselves for the time being.
The second secret was shared by everyone else, but remained unknown to the two previously mentioned - which made sense, because the secret was that they all knew about Bakugou and Todoroki's relationship.
The first one to find out was Tooru.
Class 1-A had just finished one of their training classes, in which they'd been pitched against each other to practice one-on-one combat. While everyone else had quickly dragged themselves back to the dorms as soon as All Might dismissed them, Tooru had stayed behind; she'd lost one of her gloves during her fight against Mina, and staying a bit longer to look for it seemed easier than submitting a request for a new one.
It wasn't the first time people failed to notice she was around - it was an unfortunate result of her Quirk. She had been wandering around the battle arena for less than ten minutes when the voices reached her, coming from behind one of the piles of debris to her right. She was preparing to announce her presence when the voices became loud enough for her to recognize who they belonged to, and Tooru found herself frozen in place.
"What are you doing, idiot? Want to get caught?" Bakugou hissed.
"Everybody's left already," came Todoroki's reply.
Tooru started to inch away from the debris. She was no longer trying to get noticed; quite the opposite, actually, because if Bakugou and Todoroki had decided to settle some kind of score after class she definitely didn't want to interfere and become the target of their - or mostly Bakugou's - rage.
"This place is still too e-"
Whatever Bakugou was about to say got suddenly muffled. Tooru waited for the boom of his explosions or the cold of Todoroki's ice, anything that would indicate a fight, but there was only the faint sound of clothes rustling, and then...
Was that a moan?
Certain that she must have heard it wrong, Tooru started moving towards them again, curiosity getting the best of her. As she got closer, more hushed words reached her ears, too low for her to understand. She was incredibly glad for the stealth provided by her Quirk as she peeked around the corner, because the shock of what she saw made her stumble, momentarily staying in plain view of Bakugou and Todoroki.
Not that they would have noticed even if she were visible; both had their eyes closed, their attention solely focused on kissing each other. Bakugou had Todoroki pressed against the wall behind them, apparently not caring about the dust from the debris that covered their hero uniforms - part of which, Tooru saw, were halfway off their bodies already.
As soon as she could move again, Tooru turned around and sprinted away from the arena, completely forgetting about her lost glove.
Tooru had planned to keep it a secret. It was clear Bakugou and Todoroki didn't want anyone to know about their... whatever it was, and she didn't want to get cross with any of them. As soon as she got to the dorms, however, she ran into Yaoyorozu and Tsuyu, and even if they couldn't see her face, her voice betrayed her disturbed state.
"Are you okay, Tooru-chan?" Tsuyu asked.
"I... yeah, I just... I..." Tooru stammered, still trying to make sense of what she had just seen.
"Are you hurt? We can take you to Recovery Girl if you need. You were taking so long to come back, we were about to go search for you," Yaoyorozu said, looking concerned.
"You didn't have to!" Tooru said with a little more force than necessary. She couldn't help but imagine what a disaster it would've been if someone else - someone who couldn't go unnoticed like her - had run into Bakugou and Todoroki at the arena.
Seeing the other girls' confused looks, Tooru sighed.
"Fine, I'll tell you, but let's go to my room first."
In the end, not only Tsuyu and Yaoyorozu followed Tooru to her room; they met Mina and Kyouka along the way, and since almost everyone was there, Tooru thought it was only fair they find Uraraka too. Now that she had decided to share the story with them, she couldn't deny she was feeling a bit giddy, eager to see how their reaction would be to such a surprising secret.
That's how they all ended up sitting on Tooru's bed, listening to her talk about what she'd seen, their expression growing more and more disbelieving the more they heard.
"Bakugou and Todoroki? It's hard to believe," Kyouka said.
"Are you sure it was them, Tooru-chan?" Uraraka asked.
"Yeah! I saw them clearly... a bit more clearly then I would've liked, actually."
Kyouka grimaced as she thought about the scene Tooru had described. Mina, on the other hand, was noticeably excited, a wide grin spread on her face as she rocked back and forth, waiting for a chance to speak.
"You know what this means, right?"
They all turned to look at her and she continued, "We're playing detective! That way we can find out if they're dating or not."
The other girls exchanged glances, taking Mina's suggestion into consideration.
"It wouldn't be right," Yaoyorozu said. "We can't just follow them and invade their privacy like that."
"No, you got me wrong." Mina shook her head. "We won't follow them or anything, nothing creepy like that. Just... be more observant? Those two aren't exactly the most discreet people in the world, so it should be easy to notice if something is going on."
It took some more convincing, but eventually Mina got everyone to agree to her plan. Her excitement was contagious, and they were all at least a little curious to find out more about such an unusual situation.
The following day, operation "Find out if Bakugou and Todoroki are dating" would start.
While the girls conducted their search for answers, the boys of Class 1-A started to get their own suspicions.
They weren't even close to guessing the nature of what was happening between Bakugou and Todoroki - usually, that idea would never cross anyone's mind, and it was only due to Tooru's unfortunate run in with the two that the girls had a better grasp of the situation - but they did know that something was going on. It became a regular thing for both Bakugou and Todoroki to be absent at the same time, and things like "Go on ahead, I'll catch up later", or "I can't today, I'm busy" became regular excuses for whenever any of their friends invited them to hang out. Bakugou's temper, too, while still awful, seemed to be better to some extent; at least he hadn't blown anything up for over a week, which had to be some kind of record.
"Do you think they're fighting outside of class?" Kaminari wondered one day, while they were all sitting in the living room at the dorms. Bakugou and Todoroki had, once again, disappeared to who knows where, and the boys had taken the opportunity to discuss the mystery surrounding the two. "You know, blowing off some steam or something?"
"Don't you think one of them would be dead by now if that was it?" said Kirishima.
"Or at least missing a few limbs," added Sero, laughter barely concealed in his voice.
Kaminari shook his head in agreement, a pensive look on his face; his classmates had a point. So far, they hadn't seen any signs of injuries that hadn't been inflicted during their regular training.
"There must be something," Izuku said. "Kacchan is acting weird. He doesn't yell at me as much anymore."
"That is concerning," Kirishima agreed. "Good, but concerning."
They all fell silent, trying to come up with a plausible possibility. After a few moments, however, Izuku fidgeted, hesitating before finally voicing his thoughts.
"Maybe we could just ask them?"
Eleven pair of eyes turned towards him, all wide in disbelief.
"Do you have a death wish!?" Mineta shrieked.
Izuku shrugged, "I just thought that maybe Todoroki-"
Before he could finish talking, Mina burst into the room, dragging a reluctant Kyouka behind her. From her expression, it was obvious they'd been hearing their conversation for a while, even if the first thing she did was ask,
"Are you talking about Bakugou and Todoroki?"
Ignoring everyone's startled expressions, Mina squeezed herself into one of the last unoccupied corners of the couch, and Kyouka followed suit.
"We think we know what's happening," Mina said, a bright smile on her face. Kyouka could feel her practically vibrating with the excitement of sharing a secret, and had to resist the urge to drag her friend away from there.
"What?" several voices asked.
"Everyone," Iida interrupted, clearing his throat, "I think we should respect our classmates' privacy and not pry-"
"They're dating!"
"-into their... they're what?"
"Dating," Mina repeated, as if her first statement hadn't already left everyone else in the room feeling shocked.
"What do you mean, dating?"
"No way, that'd never happen."
"Bakugou and Todoroki?"
"Nice joke, Ashido-san!"
Their reaction was as Mina expected, similar to what she and the other girls had done when they first heard the story from Tooru. After all, it was easier to believe it was a joke, since the idea of Bakugou and Todoroki dating anyone, let alone each other, was difficult to accept.
"Tooru saw it with her own eyes," she continued, raising her voice over the ruckus. "And we've been doing some observing of our own. They're definitely dating."
More questions followed; even with Kyouka backing up Mina's story, the boys were still reluctant to believe it. Finally, after minutes of trying to convince them with no success - and Kyouka looking like she was close to attacking someone with her Quirk - they gave up.
"Well then, we'll show you," Mina said, already halfway out the room. "And then you can see it for yourselves."
Over the following weeks, the girls pointed out their observations as discreetly as possible to the rest of Class 1-A. They'd found a way to communicate without drawing attention - whenever Bakugou and Todoroki started exchanging glances, they would poke whoever was closer, indicating them with their eyes or a brief nod. It happened more often than one would think, and soon they were all wondering how the two were able to keep up their good grades when they spent half the class staring at each other.
There was also the way Bakugou stopped calling Todoroki mean names. The way they would bump into each other while walking around the school, too often for it to be a coincidence, but it never seemed to bring up a fight. How their return after disappearing for a while was always accompanied by messy hair and somewhat disheveled clothes. And once, while coming back from getting some water in the kitchen in the middle of the night, Sero could've sworn he saw Bakugou sneaking into Todoroki's room.
One day, Uraraka, Tooru and Tsuyu pulled Kaminari and Kirishima to the side during lunch, taking advantage of the fact that Bakugou was nowhere to be seen.
"Bakugou is wearing a scarf today," Tooru started, receiving only blank looks in response. "Don't you think it's a bit too warm for a scarf?"
"Maybe it's, ugh, for the style?" Kirishima guessed, but his voice was uncertain.
Before any of them could respond, Uraraka dissolved into a fit of giggles.
"Sorry, it's just... He... We saw..."
Taking pity on her friend, who was shaking with barely controlled laughter, Tsuyu said, "Bakugou-chan is wearing it to hide a hickey."
The horrified expressions on Kirishima and Kaminari's faces were enough to make Uraraka laugh even harder. Their doubts had quelled enough that they didn't question what Tsuyu had said, but even if they had, they would've gotten the confirmation later that day; after all, Bakugou couldn't wear a scarf while getting changed for training class.
It soon became pretty clear to everyone that Mina hadn't been lying.
February came around, and with it Valentine's Day.
Every year, it was a date that already left the students agitated. This time, however, Class 1-A was making even more of a fuss than usual, all because of a simple chocolate box left on Bakugou Katsuki's desk.
This would be shocking even under normal circumstances, since Bakugou had never received chocolate on Valentine's Day. Before, the identity of the sender would've been a cause for everyone's curiosity, but now that they all knew about his relationship with Todoroki, they were pretty sure who the box was from. While no one would dare reveal their little secret, the chance to tease Bakugou was too good to pass up.
"Bakugou, man, you got a secret admirer!" said Kirishima, patting his friend in the back and ignoring the scowl directed at him.
"I wonder who it is," Kaminari said, and if Bakugou hadn't been so busy fuming he might have noticed the obvious sarcasm in his voice.
"Getting popular, huh, Bakugou?" Mina shouted from across the classroom.
"SHUT UP, FUCKERS!" Bakugou finally exploded, sparks flying from his hands and causing everyone to take a step back in caution. The snickers and teasing remarks, however, continued - after three years, they knew well enough when their hot headed classmate was about to really lose it, and so far they still felt relatively safe from being blown to pieces.
In the meantime, Todoroki had been quiet, sitting on his desk and apparently absorbed in a book. Every once in a while, though, he would sneak glances at where everyone was crowding around Bakugou, betraying his interest.
"That's it, I'm done with your bullshit!"
Bakugou got up, grabbing the chocolate box and shoving it into his bag before storming out of the room, without so much as a glance towards Todoroki. The whole class fell silent, tension heavy in the air as they waited to see what would happen next. To no one's surprise, only minutes later Todoroki got up, mumbling about having forgotten something in his room before leaving.
When the sound of his steps faded, everyone began talking at the same time, excitement barely concealed in their voices.
"Do you think they'll fight?"
"They're not even trying to be subtle anymore!"
"Will they finally admit it today?"
"Todoroki got him chocolate, that's so romantic!"
"Did you see Bakugou's face?"
The students were still agitated when Aizawa finally arrived, but they slowly settled down in their seats, shouts turning to whispers as they shot continuous glances towards the door, trying to guess when Todoroki and Bakugou would be back. Aizawa looked at the two empty seats and shook his head, not making any comments before starting his class.
It was halfway through the lecture when they finally reappeared, and even Aizawa couldn't control the complete chaos that broke out in the classroom when Todoroki and Bakugou crossed the door holding hands. Shouts and catcalls came from all over the place, which seemed to leave Todoroki unfazed but made Bakugou turn a deep shade of red as they both went to their respective seats.
For many months, Class 1-A had kept its secrets, but now that one was out in the open, well - no one saw the need to keep the other anymore.
"Finally, you two!"
"Congrats!"
"Took you long enough to admit it, man!"
"Just please don't start getting all lovey-dovey with each other in front of us."
"And keep... things to your own rooms, please."
"Yeah, I definitely don't need to hear Bakugou moaning again."
Bakugou sputtered, and even Todoroki had his eyes wide as they made sense of what everyone was saying.
"You fuckers knew!?"
"Well, Kacchan, you weren't, uh..." Izuku seemed to shrink under Bakugou's murderous gaze, but continued talking nonetheless. "You two were a bit obvious."
"Deku, you piece of..."
"Katsuki," Todoroki cut him off, leaning to hold Bakugou's wrist, keeping him from swinging his closed fist at Izuku. "It's fine."
Everyone watched in fascination as Bakugou turned to stare at Todoroki.
"This is your fault, idiot, I told you not to leave those hickeys-"
"You weren't complaining-"
"You were the one to always start it when we're outside-
"If you weren't so loud-"
"Shouto, I don't care if I love you, if you don't shut your fucking mouth-"
"Hey, guys, that's way too much information!" Kirishima interrupted them, bringing the two out of their own world and getting hums of approval from the rest of his classmates.
Before anyone could respond, however, they were interrupted by Aizawa's unusually loud voice.
"As interesting as I'm sure Todoroki and Bakugou's love life is, I suggest you all go back to your seats and discuss it after class."
The students startled; for a moment, they'd all but forgotten Aizawa's presence, too excited about finally getting official confirmation for something they'd been talking about for months. Under their homeroom teacher's threatening stare, they all went back to their seats, not wanting to risk getting expelled for pissing Aizawa off when they were so close to graduation.
Needless to say, however, they had a hard time paying attention to class after that.
Later that day, in the teachers' room, Aizawa sighed audibly in both relief and annoyance.
On the one hand, he hoped that now his students would finally go back to focusing on his class, instead of on the two lovestruck idiots as they had been for months.
On the other hand, the teachers' room was just as loud with commotion as the class had been, what with them all having placed a bet on whether Bakugou and Todoroki would announce their relationship to the rest of the students before graduation.
Aizawa sighed again, slipping some bills towards a laughing All Might.
It seemed like they weren't that much different from Class 1-A, after all.