Three: side streets
"Good morning, Todoroki-kun."
Shoto looks up from the book on his desk, blinking away his sleepiness. "Oh, good morning, Iida."
Iida Tenya is standing at his desk, smiling down at him lightly. "How are you?" he asks, pulling a chair up to his desk. They still have a bit of time before classes begin for the day.
Todoroki sighs, "Fine, nothing unusual at home. You?"
"My brother came home yesterday from the shop with Toya-san," he replies. "They said the bike's almost finished being repaired."
"That's good," Shoto nods lazily. "When will the student council let us submit club forms?" He asks.
Iida frowns. "The beginning of the year is difficult - the budgets are being reworked, and many of the club heads are fighting for the funds they want." He explains. "Until the budgets are settled, we won't be distributing the forms."
"Sounds tough," Todoroki says. "It's taking longer than it did last year, huh."
"Yes," Iida nods. "It's the non-sport clubs that are giving us trouble. As much as I hate to acknowledge it, Yuuei is like many other high schools in that the majority of the funding goes towards the sports teams."
"And your track and field team?"
"That one is settled, thankfully," Iida relaxes into his chair, shoulders dropping. "Kirishima-senpai is giving us a rather hard time for cutting the basketball team's funding, but it's true that they haven't been doing well lately…"
"Student Council work sounds hard."
"But it is also rewarding!" Iida suddenly sits up straight, clenching a fist in front of him in determination. "We are the bridge between the faculty and the stu-"
The first bell of the morning rings, cutting off his incoming speech on the glory of the student council, and Iida sighs.
"You should get to your seat before Sensei comes in. She always comes early," Todoroki points out.
"Yes," Iida sighs. "I'll see you at lunch, then."
"Okay."
Mina sighs as she slides the door to class 1-C open. She's finally returning to her empty classroom after another fruitless day of attempting to hunt down Toga Himiko and talk to her. Ochako has been doing the same.
Not wanting to give them a chance to do so, Toga has shown up to class at the very last second, and left immediately during lunch and directly after school. She is clearly avoiding the two of them.
But why? Mina wonders as she shuffles towards her seat. It's close to the board and near the first door of the classroom, leagues away from Ochako and Toga. Why won't she let us talk to her?
"I feel bad!" Ochako says into her ear. Mina adjusts the phone on her shoulder as she sets a plate of hamburger down on the table in front of her little brother. "I think we overwhelmed her. She looked so upset."
Mina purses her lips in thought. "I don't know Ocha, I think there's something going on with her."
"Well, yeah! Me too. And I get that we're being really weird and nosey with her. But somehow…" Ochako suddenly goes quiet.
As she waits for Ochako to go on, Mina murmurs to her brother, "Do your homework as soon as you're done eating, Mikio."
The brat sticks his tongue out at her. "No way! I'm going outside to play soccer with Akihiko after this!"
Mina smacks him upside the head. "Listen to your Onee-sama!"
"'Sama,' she says," Mikio mimics rudely, stabbing his food and taking a bite.
Mina rolls her eyes and walks away from the dinner table. Her parents aren't home yet, but they called ahead and said that they'd be eating out tonight.
At the silence on the other side of the line, she checks to see if her phone has died or dropped the call. "...Ocha?"
"Yeah, I'm here," comes her voice, and Mina relaxes. "It's just… somehow, when I look at her, I get the feeling she's asking for help."
Mina drops her head onto her desk with another heavy sigh. How are we supposed to help someone that doesn't want to be helped?
One of the classroom doors slides open and Mina looks up.
"Shit."
Mina blinks at the form of Toga Himiko standing in the doorway, before scrambling up and out of her seat. "Shit?!" she echoes, somewhat insulted.
Toga goes to walk back out and close the door, but Mina runs over and catches it with her foot.
"Shit!"
"Is that the only word you know?!" Mina cries, and Toga tugs harder on the door handle in an effort to slide it shut, despite the presence of Mina's foot holding it open. "Ow ow ow! Toga! Come on, we've been trying so hard to talk to you!"
Mina grabs the door with her hands and begins to pull it open as Toga tries to pull it shut. "What're you doing?!" Toga demands as the two girls tug in opposite directions.
"I'm opening the door so I can come and talk to you, duh!" Mina yells. "Hnnnng!" She tugs harder, putting her weight into pulling it open, while Toga screws her eyes shut and tries to do the same.
"Well, I want to close the door, not open it!"
"Oh, there you are! Toga! I have to talk to you!" The two girls flinch at the sound of Ochako's loud voice approaching, surprising them both enough that Toga trips over her own feet and crashes into the door with a small scream.
It pops out of its frame and falls over, catching Mina underneath it.
Ochako gasps, slapping a hand to her mouth. For a moment, everything is still. Just inside the threshold of the classroom are the two girls, sandwiching a sliding door between their bodies.
Mina groans and tries to wiggle out, but the weight of both the door and Toga on top of her pins her down. "To-ga…!" She grunts. "Move!"
The blonde hurriedly rolls off the door and sits up on the floor. Mina comes out from under it, letting it plop down onto the floor with a loud slap. She sits up as well.
The girls stare at the fallen door.
"Shit," Ochako whispers. "We broke the door."
"We broke the door…" Toga says numbly, staring absently at it.
Mina's voice is more hysterical. "Oh my gosh, guys we broke a door at Yuuei!"
"None of this would've happened if you hadn't tried to force the door open!" Toga turns an angry stare towards Mina, golden eyes flashing like lightning.
"Wha-?! You didn't have to try and force it closed either!" The teen shoots back.
Ochako makes a calming motion with her hands, "Guys, guys, it's not that big of a deal!"
Toga whirls on her. "You shouldn't have scared us like that either!" She cries, stamping a foot down in frustration.
"I wasn't trying to!" Ochako protests, cheeks reddening. "I'm sorry."
"Let's just try and put the door back before someone comes," Mina says, standing up and dusting her clothing off.
"Before someone comes, you say?"
The three girls freeze. Ochako turns around, shoulders and smile stiff.
Their homeroom teacher stands there, a terrifying smile on his lips and the class notebook on his shoulder. "Hmmm?"
None of the girls speak.
The teacher stares back at them, frowning harshly.
"Ashido, Uraraka, and Toga!" The girls flinch at the sudden yelling. "I don't know what has been going on between you three for the past few days, but enough is enough! Do you think this is behavior fitting of a student at Yuuei? If you have so much time to mess around after school like this instead of studying, then I'll have you three clean the outdoor pool!"
The three of them stare, eyes widened, as their teacher lectures them on their recent behavior.
"You will learn how to tolerate one another and work together, and cleaning the pool is a perfect opportunity."
"B-But…!" Mina stutters. "I thought the outdoor pool wasn't in use?!"
The teacher fixes her with a cool stare. "It's only just now starting to get warm enough to use it. You will clean it in time for the swim team to use it for training in two weeks."
Toga and Mina gape as Ochako respectfully bows her head to their teacher, letting the issue go. He walks away, stopping down the hall and turning back.
"Make sure that door gets put back!"
"Yes!" Ochako answers.
The girls face each other in the awkward silence of the classroom, standing around the sliding door.
"Great," Mina groans, "We got in trouble!"
Ochako runs a hand through her hair and lets out a stress-filled huff. "Our first few weeks here and we're already getting on Sensei's bad side…"
Toga plops to the floor, legs folded, and rests her chin in her hand. "This is the worst."
Mina does the same. "It wouldn't have happened if you weren't being so difficult," she mutters, puffing her hair out of her face.
Just as Toga opens her mouth to retort, Ochako kneels and sits on her shins, hands in her lap. "Why were you avoiding us so much, Toga?"
"Why were you trying so hard to be my friend?" Toga replies, brows angled down in annoyance. She flipped her blonde hair over her shoulder. "Don't you think it's a little creepy?"
"Hey! Ocha's not creepy!" Mina yells, immediately defensive.
Said brunette waves a dismissive hand. "I just… I thought it would be nice. I think you're cool, and I know you don't have any friends here yet because you just transferred, so I thought…" Ochako makes a meek gesture between herself and Mina. "Why not us?"
Toga stares at her, flabbergasted. Confronted with genuine and pure feelings, she doesn't know what to say or how to react. Ochako is nothing like anyone she has ever met befor-
"I don't know," Mina frowns, looking away from them. "The girl's definitely got some issues. I mean, she called our friendship cheap."
Toga clamps her mouth shut and stares at the floor.
"In a way, it is!" Ochako protests. "Because it's so easy! Making friends doesn't have to be so hard!"
"It's not something you've gotta think that deeply about," Kasumi says.
Toga swallows thickly, willing the voice away. "I'm not gonna sit here and listen to you guys debate about making me your friend," she says, standing up. "You aren't considering my feelings at all!"
The girls stare in surprise as Toga walks out on them once more.
After a moment of silence, Ochako sighs, "No good again this time, huh…"
"She totally just left us to fix the door by ourselves." Mina points out.
They stare at the sliding door between them.
The bell above his head rings as Izuku steps into the coffee shop from all those weeks ago. It's his first time here since that incident. At first, he had avoided the place due to the awkward, scratchy feeling crawling over his skin at the thought of coming face-to-face with the owner and employee again, but he's had several sleepless nights in a row and he could really, really use some of that coffee that smelled so good in here before…
He takes his first, proper look at the shop. On his left are the counter and its stools. The center is an empty walking space, and to his right are tables with chairs in sets of four or two. Further down, directly across the room from him, is a bit of wall that extends from where the doorway into the back room is. It stops near the center of the empty walking space, hinting to Izuku that there is more seating available beyond.
A familiar grey cat suddenly slips between his legs, making Izuku jump. He then crouches, staring at it in surprise. Its soft, wispy fur is a mix of dark stone and pale storm clouds in color. It looks a little too well-groomed to be an alley cat after all…
"Oh, it's you again."
Izuku raises his head, looking up from his crouched position at Aizawa, who came out of the back room at the sound of the bell. Izuku glances back down at the cat and scratches the side of its face, watching for a moment as it closes its shining green eyes in content. He then stands and faces Aizawa properly.
"I came as a customer this time."
Aizawa says nothing, then moves to stand behind the counter. Izuku slides into a stool, feeling the smooth wood under his fingertips. The cat jumps into his lap with a graceful leap, and Izuku nearly pushes it off in his shock, but then rests a hand on its body. After a moment, he starts looking around. There are a few customers at the tables against the wall behind him, across the walking aisle, but…
"Is Yamada-san not here?"
Aizawa shakes his head. "He owns an arcade and karaoke place closer to the main roads. He just comes here some days to help out."
"I see…"
"What kind of coffee do you want, kid?"
Izuku looks up above Aizawa's head to the menu, and rattles off one of the names under the espresso category, hoping to jumpstart himself so that he can crank out a paper for school.
He refrains himself from anxiously bouncing his knee due to the cat's presence, so he reaches back and takes his notebooks out of his bag instead. Izuku spreads one of the books on Adolescence Syndrome open and runs a hand over the filled pages, immediately feeling calmer. Meanwhile, Aizawa works the machines behind the counter with hisses and bangs.
The bell above the entrance jingles cheerfully again, and Izuku looks up to see a young man with Yuuei's uniform and purple hair rush in.
"Aizawa, I'm here," he calls as he walks through the doorway to the back room. He comes out a few moments later, tying one of the cafe's aprons around his waist over his dress shirt, having left behind his blazer.
"Shinsou, you're late!" Aizawa barks. "You missed the first rush!"
"Sorry, I got held up after class," the young man explains simply, and Izuku watches the pair of them interact from under his lashes. "What are we doing now?"
"It's slow," Aizawa acknowledges. "These people are the stragglers from the first rush this afternoon, and this kid here," Aizawa nods his head towards Izuku, who looks up at having been caught listening, "just came in. I'm finishing his right now."
Izuku reddens as he nods to the other student in greeting. "You go to Yuuei too?"
"Yeah, I do," he says. "My name's Shinsou Hitoshi. I'm a third year."
With the two of them now speaking directly to each other, Izuku can see his face more clearly. His hair stands up in a messy, bedhead kind of way, and the purple locks are such a vibrant color and that he mentally questions why so many people around him are dying their hair lately. He has bags under his eyes - same as Izuku - but he's paler, so they look darker and more pronounced. He's taller and bigger than him, but that's a given due to their age difference.
"You work here part-time? I thought Yuuei didn't allow its students to work?" Izuku asks, one brow raising slightly in confusion.
"My employer is Mic," Shinsou replies. "I work at the arcade but I come here to help Aizawa sometimes." He leans on his forearms on the counter. "And Yuuei doesn't allow a student to work without special permission."
Mic…? Izuku wonders mentally, but he doesn't question it.
He is silent for a long moment, wondering if he should say his name as well, but then decides it's only the right thing to do now that Shinsou has said so much. "I'm, uh… I'm Midoriya Izuku, class 1-C."
Shinsou's eyes light up in recognition and Izuku immediately regrets opening his stupid mouth. "Oh, I've heard about you."
Don't say it!
"You're the delinquent."
Aizawa nearly drops Izuku's coffee as he's handing it to him. "What?" He stares at Shinsou in confusion. "Are you kidding me? This guy right here? He can't throw a punch right enough to scare the cat, let alone live the lifestyle of a delinquent."
Izuku reddens and opens his mouth to protest, but Shinsou shrugs. "That's what I heard is the big rumor for the first years right now." He turns back to Izuku, handing him some napkins. "You showed up to the first day of classes with bandages?"
Izuku wants to cry in relief. So he doesn't know about AS. He takes a sip of his coffee to collect himself before speaking. "I did. Aizawa-san patched me up at that time."
The owner frowns. "You've got yourself mixed up in something nasty, kid. Doesn't anybody know about those bullies that were chasing you?" He asks, and then goes on, "Are they still bothering you?"
"Bullies?" Shinsou echoes.
Izuku shakes his head, feeling a little overwhelmed by the attention. Maybe next time he'll sit far away from the bar so that he won't have to talk so much. "They haven't come back, and no, no one knows about them. They wouldn't believe me even if I said anything, so…"
Shinsou and Aizawa are silent for a long moment, watching him. He fidgets under their combined stares and considers taking his leave now that he has his coffee, but that would be a little rude…
A pair of customers walk over to the counter and say their thanks and goodbyes to Aizawa before leaving. Aizawa busies himself with a bit of cleaning, wiping down the stations. Meanwhile, Shinsou looks around the shop and sees that it's mostly empty now, so he comes around the counter to seat himself next to Izuku. Nonchalantly, he leans his back and forearms against the wood, facing his body towards the open cafe.
"Is it true about the Adolescence Syndrome?"
Izuku feels his breath leave his lungs and not return.
He slowly turns to face the elder, who isn't looking at him but instead has his head tilted lazily to the side, away from Izuku. He stares without interest at the low, square tables against the wall across from them, and their sets of chairs, and the mature black and beige decor of the shop. Izuku takes in the relaxed state of his shoulders and the languid slope of his neck, wondering if he should deny everything right here, right now.
He opens his mouth to speak.
"It… is," he admits with a heavy sigh. "The rumors you've probably heard about me are true." He runs a hand over the cat's spine, petting its fur just to have something to do with his hands.
"Even the one where you took down an entire gang single-handedly from your rival junior high school?" Shinsou asks, raising his brows.
Izuku sputters. "What?! No!"
Shinsou flashes a small smile at him and slides off the stool in one fluid motion. "Don't assume that all the rumors about you are true. People will say whatever they want to sound important."
Izuku gapes at him as he goes back around the counter, speaking to Aizawa about checking inventory. Feeling awkwardness climb over his tense shoulders and up to his neck, Izuku gulps down the rest of his coffee and quickly throws his stuff into his bag, scaring the cat off his lap. He sends it an apologetic look, then turns to the pair behind the counter and stutters out a quick goodbye.
They watch as he hugs his bag to his chest and nearly dashes for the door, ears red.
Aizawa takes the cup and saucer left behind on the counter and begins to wash it in the sink.
"Weird kid, that one."
Hitoshi stares at the door as if he can see beyond it. "He reminds me of Naofumi."
"Your little brother?"
"Yeah," but then he gives Aizawa a small, sly smirk. "And Eraserhead likes him more than she likes you."
Immediately, his face twists into an expression of annoyance. "Oi oi," Aizawa growls. "That cat's just weird, don't use her as a reference!"
Shinsou fakes an expression of innocence. "But it's been said many times that animals and children are excellent judges of character."
Aizawa glares at the cheeky teen, and then at the cat, who just meowed with such perfect timing that if he didn't know any better, he'd think she was agreeing with the student.
Izuku runs through familiar side streets, clutching his brown school bag to his chest. His heart is beating wildly, drumming past his rib cage and against the flat surface of the bag.
He knows the pace of his heartbeat isn't just because of his running.
What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck. Izuku chants mentally. Someone actually listened to me. Me! Even though he knows everything!
His thoughts are in an endless loop. The interaction plays through his mind repeatedly, and he goes over it carefully, wondering how it is possible for someone to ask him a simple question without malicious intent. Wondering how it's possible for someone to hear him without accusing him of lying...
"Izuku…" Hizashi holds his shoulders gently, bowing his head down low to fight back tears, but they're heard in his voice. "What happened to you?"
Izuku sniffles harshly, and a lump forms in his throat at the sight of his heartbroken father. "Tou-san… I'm not hurting myself, I swear, but the doctors don't believe me."
Hizashi hugs him tenderly, and Inko lets out a choked sob into a handkerchief. "Izuku, how can we help you? How is this happening? Is someone hurting you?!"
Izuku shakes his head frantically. "No! It's just… when they yell at me for believing, these things," Izuku tugs up the bottom of his shirt to reveal a large, ugly black bruise on his abdomen. His parents gasp at the sight. "These things show up. It's not anyone's fault!"
"Izuku…" Inko sinks to her knees, hands fluttering over his body, as if they could heal him. She locks gazes with him. "Please! Please tell us the truth!"
At those words, Izuku's ears start ringing. He feels like he can't hear a thing anymore. The boy stares at his mother in shock, then looks to the dark expression on his father's face. Izuku steps back from them, betrayed, and speaks in a broken, half-whisper.
"You… you don't believe me either?"
Izuku slows to a stop in the street, staring at the asphalt and catching his breath. His heart is so overwhelmed that he could fall to his knees right here, and cry and cry and cry until he can't squeeze another tear from his eye.
He could scream.
