Disclaimer: Cover art is done by Horikoshi (or at least I believe so, if anyone knows otherwise please let me know) with slight modifications by me. Characters and settings also belong to the creator of My Hero Academia, Kohei Horikoshi. I only own the plot.
A/N: Hey, all! I'm back! And with a new book!
I've had this idea in my head for a while now. I thought Hanahaki would be perfect for this fic, considering there will be angst. Lots of angst.
As a preface, I want to say that this will be short. It'll be much shorter than my last fic, and may only be about 20k - 25k words. So, technically, this isn't a novel. That's because the novel I will be writing after this will be my own original work (probably, still not totally sure). That means, sadly, I will not be posting on here besides oneshots.
But I also want to say that although I do ship IzuOcha, I kind of see their love as... one-sided. I think Izuku loves Ochako as a friend and respects her, but I don't think he's in love with her like she is with him. We just haven't seen him think about it yet, and he continuously refers to her as "a girl" instead of "Uraraka Ochako." This is why I'm even letting Ochako get Hanahaki in the first place. After all, it can only be caused by unrequited love. There is more about this online, so I won't bore you with my reasoning, but I just wanted to let you all know.
Anyway, enjoy this first chapter. I think it's alright. I'm happy with it except for the wording in some places. Hope you guys like! Reviews are always welcome.
He showed up in her dreams buck naked.
Ochako, stunned into silence, stymied her squeals. Her bed barely had enough room for one, so, when he, without wind of a warning, climbed on top of it and, in consequence, on top of her, she seriously had to wonder how the hell it suddenly had room for two.
Her imagination was running wild.
Ochako only immediately knew it was a dream because the reality of it all was that Izuku would never do this. Never touch her like this, never be so unapologetically bold. And, in that way, it didn't feel real.
But she would revel in it while it did.
His hands were rugged, but his touch was soft. They exchanged no words, as if this was nothing new to them, when on the inside Ochako was panicking. She'd never had a dream like this before! But despite it, she let it all go to the back of her mind, face flushed and heart hammering wildly in and out of her chest.
Huh. She looked down at herself and realized she was undressed, too. Who knew?
He kissed her and ran his hands over her hips and did unholy things to her, unspeakable things. It was when he began to leave hickeys along the nape of her neck and the lobe of her left ear that she suddenly, finally, heard the faintest voice from beyond her fantasy calling her name.
"Ochako?"
That wasn't Izuku.
No.
It was somebody else. Tsuyu.
She sat up, opened her eyes, the feeling of another human being down on top of her, kissing her, doting on her still fresh in her mind, and broke out into a cold sweat. She held her head in her hands, her cheeks rosy red.
"Ochako, you in there, ribbit? You've gotta get ready for school."
And it was then that she totally freaked.
She sighed, screeched, scratched frantically at her face in frustration. So much for keeping her feelings at bay.
Still understandably shaken up, she checked the time. She had forty minutes until class.
She remembered Tsuyu, standing outside her door waiting for an answer. "Yeah, Tsu, I'm here. Be out in a bit!"
Tsuyu said, "Okay."
She laid back down in her bed.
The first thought that occurred to her as she ruminated was how the hell she'd even thought up that image of Izuku naked. She supposed it was something from deep within the depths of her dirty mind, putting the pieces together of her own accord, as he usually stayed considerably conservative with his clothing. The most she'd seen from him was his top half at the pool this summer.
Although, she would admit, it was a damn good top half.
No, Ochako! Stop thinking that! This is pure, innocent Deku, we're talking about! Don't taint him!
Oh well. She already had. Now all of a sudden she was having dreams like this? Poor boy. She was probably making him uncomfortable.
God forbid he even knew about it!
Ochako stressed over it for a few more minutes before getting up to get ready. She headed to class with the girls, and luckily, not once did she run into Izuku.
Although, as soon as she opened those doors, those doors to U.A.'s Hero Course 2-A, hair frazzled and matted and muddled and eyes done over with drowsiness, she immediately realized that sweet serenity she should've savored wasn't going to last for long.
And even though he was totally turned around, writing furiously in his notebook without a care in the world for any and every thing around him, as soon as she saw him she still managed to flush this infuriatingly bright red.
Ashido—the class clown and, in this case, the matchmaker—approached her, this mischievous glint in her eye as she popped up over her shoulder to give her a tease. "Someone's a little embarrassed," she giggled.
Ochako stumbled back, unable to say a word. Ashido's accusations were always so perfectly pinpoint. "What, have a dream or something? I mean, I know you've got a pretty big crush on him, but you don't usually act like this."
Ashido was a minx. A really mean minx. One who made Ochako's whole body flush bright red from head to toe.
"Holy shit," Mina mumbled. She tapped her chin, sat back on her desk, pondered over the subject until she was completely lost in thought. "I was only kidding, but did I actually hit it right on the mark?"
Ochako nodded.
She was still a little upset that Mina knew. Not just about the dream, but about her crush in general. She didn't even have to say a word, yet a majority of the girls were acting like they knew all of a sudden, teasing her about it and making faces at her whenever she'd get even the slightest bit too close to Izuku. Which was often, considering he was her best friend. It made her mad.
"Mina, can you, like, not bring this up again, maybe?" She put on persuasion, her most powerful puppy dog eyes, pleading. She just begged Ashido to spare her the embarrassment. "I'm trying to, y'know, push these feelings down?"
Ah, yes. She had only been trying to do so for over a year now.
It was working—to an extent. But, typically out of admiration for his motivation, they'd pop back up every once in a while, hence the mess she'd made today.
Although, she wouldn't exactly say today had much to do with admiration, per se.
Ashido pulled a keychain off of her backpack and spun it around her fingers like a little lasso, like a horse wrangler from out in the Midwest. "Well, clearly it isn't working."
That was right. Ashido had once again broken the bank. Ochako's love for him (yeah, she had begun calling it that now), her romantic feelings, had only grown since the beginning of her enrollment here at U.A., and now, after the end of summer break of her second year, they were exponential, astronomical, undeniable, too hard to handle.
Yet, still, in front of these girls, she would deny it.
Besides, she totally had it under control.
Right?
"What makes you think that?"
Mina scoffed, scowled. "C'mon, Ochako." She looked over in Izuku's direction.
He glanced up for a minute at the feeling of somebody watching him, head still in the clouds as he scribbled down his notes, and, oblivious, dence as Deku was, he waved over to the two girls, finding it odd that they were staring. "Good morning, Uraraka. Morning, Ashido."
Ochako's face burned bright red. She felt her head spinning—like her dream all over again.
"Morning, Midoriya," Mina mused back. She whispered in Ochako's ear, "Now it's your turn."
"M-Morning, Midoriya— I mean Deku!" She coughed in the middle of her spiel, stammering back, her heaving much of a surprise not only to Ashido, but to her. She didn't have a cold, or at least she didn't think so. She couldn't imagine catching one from anywhere, so she quickly chalked it up to nerves and nothing more. "How's it hanging?"
How's it hanging? Seriously, Ochako?
She kept on coughing. God only knew when she would stop.
Her throat felt strangely scratchy. It was an uncomfortable feeling, like she'd swallowed water the wrong way or had a hair stuck back there she couldn't quite reach. She was elated, to say the least, when the feeling went away on its own.
He gave her a look, a nervous look, a worried-about-her-well-being kind of look that got her heart racing.
"I-I'm fine, I think," she sighed. "Must just be a little cold."
Ashido pushed her more toward Izuku. In an instant, one she didn't completely consent, she was standing over his desk.
"In the middle of September?" he asked.
She shrugged her shoulders. "I guess. Maybe. Stranger things have happened. Or maybe this is just some weird one-off thing or something."
She looked down at the page flipped open in his notebook.
"Oh? Whose Quirk are you so vigorously analyzing today?" she asked.
"Endeavor's. My internship with him last year really opened me up to new horizons."
The mere mention of his unfinished work got him back to scribbling in the lines.
Over the years, he'd expressed to her that he'd become quite the good artist, but this—this was incredible. Unbelievable. The details and fine-tuning he'd put into this were so perfectly precise.
"Deku, I don't know how you do it, but"—she began thumbing through the pages—"these are amazing. This is, what, your twenty-first book so far? Put these in a museum, why don't you? You know legitimately everything about everyone's Quirks!"
She leaned in a little over his shoulder, tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear. As soon as she realized what she was doing, she blushed and backed away.
She felt that same itching sensation pop back up in her throat again.
She managed to swallow it down.
What, had one of Mr. Aizawa's cats got loose? There wasn't anything else she could think to explain this nagging nuisance besides a relentless ball of cat fur.
"Thanks, Uraraka. Deep analysis is my thing, I guess."
Mr. Aizawa's deadbeat, debilitated voice rang throughout the classroom at that very moment.
"Alright, students, take your seats. Let's do attendance quickly, please. I need a nap."
As soon as the bell sounded, ending Ectoplasm's painstakingly long lectures on Precalculus and polynomials, the students of Hero Course 2-A were right back where they wanted to be, either hanging out with their friends in the common area or sleeping upstairs in their dorms. For Ochako, that meant a chance to talk to Izuku—and not just Izuku, but all of her other friends as well, Tsuyu and Todoroki and Iida and Ashido. Although, Ashido was a stretch, as she usually hung out with Kirishima and Kaminari more than goody two shoes like them.
Ochako, waving a quick hello to her horned friend before joining the newly named "Dekusquad" (Bakugou had come up with it in a moment of rage and it just sort of stuck), sat surrounding the coffee table in the center of the living room huddled up near the TV. All eyes were on Izuku, frantically taking down notes on the Hero on screen, recently reaching her debut and breaking the top 20. He hardly even noticed when Ochako took a seat beside him.
"Midoriya, don't you think you're going a bit overboard, ribbit?"
He didn't even take one glance at Tsuyu, hurriedly flipping the page. "Nope."
Todoroki looked at Tsuyu with cold and candid eyes. "I don't think he cares."
Iida began waving his arms around like a robot, like a pesky, pimple-faced teenager with not nearly enough pizzazz trying to learn how to dance, Izuku's best interests in mind. "Midoriya, you're going to tire out your hands. I know you're focused on becoming a Hero, but please take care of yourself! And save your stamina for later! We still have to go to the gym!"
Izuku finished his last note. Before he could even get the chance to find another potential victim for his ruthless writing rampage, Iida ripped the book right out of his hands.
Izuku, angry, reached up over Todoroki's head, who was seemingly completely unbothered by all this, clasping his hands together to try and grab the book back but not being nearly tall enough to get a grip on the cold-hearted thing. Ochako giggled. "Hey, Iida! I need that back! Crust is about to come on!"
Iida, now dead set on his mission, began passing the book around as far away from Izuku as physically possible. Todoroki was up next, who passed it to Tsuyu, who passed it to Ochako.
Ochako looked down at the book for a bit. It was beaten-up, broken, as if it'd eventually given in and grown tired of Izuku putting pencil to paper a total of 25 times a day (no, she hadn't counted, she just had to take an estimated guess), pages frayed and burnt at the edges as if it somebody had taken it and dipped it into a fiery flame. She guessed it was all that taking it out and putting it away during class he did to hide it from Mr. Aizawa. Either that, or Bakugou.
All that writing he'd done—didn't it ever hurt his hands? But then again, he did have a multitude of not only scars, but also mysterious calluses.
In all honesty, it was the most motivation she'd seen in a person.
It was amazing, inspiring.
"Uraraka, please," he prayed. "Can I have my book back? Crust is doing his interview right now!"
She weighed out her options.
That cute little face—how could she resist?
"Sorry, guys," she said. "Deku's right. He's motivated. Maybe a little too motivated, but why put him down for that?" She instinctually inched the notebook toward him, his needy hands trying to grab it out of her grasp before she could pull some sort of dirty prank on him and pull it away, but before he could get anywhere close, she made it known to him that his gut feeling was right by hurriedly holding the book back to her heart. "But don't, whatever you do, tire yourself out."
Izuku nodded, surprised that she'd so easily handed him the book back. The rest of her friends gave her looks as he sat back down at the table, pencil like a weapon in his hand.
She watched him write, lose his mind over these Heroes, learn the intricacies of their moves and mumble about how he planned on making them his own.
Iida's words replayed in her head. I know you're focused on becoming a Hero, but please take care of yourself!
She laughed a little internally. He was a total spaz. What about him had captured her heart?
Oh well. For now, at least, it wouldn't matter for practically forever—not for a long, long time. His attention wasn't on girls, anyway. And hers wasn't on boys. At least, it wasn't supposed to be.
She coughed.
Dammit! What was that? That pain-in-the-neck hairball? Hadn't it disappeared by now?
She coughed again.
People were looking now, but despite her best attempts to hide it, she still continued to cough.
Izuku and Tsuyu were the first to turn around, and then Iida and Todoroki. "Uraraka, are you okay?" he asked, concern in his deep green eyes. Just for a mere moment, his mind was off those notes.
"Yeah, I'm fine," she choked out between breaths, the itching less of a hindrance and more of a miserable matter as whatever was in there was rousing the feeling of knives scratching away at her throat. "Just swallowed water the wrong way."
"Ochako," Tsuyu said. "That's the third time today."
"Tsu, I'm fine," she reiterated, an utter sense of frustration leaking out between her gritted teeth, yet the tingling feeling didn't go away, like a foreign object was traveling up her trachea and tickling her tonsils just begging to break free.
"No, you're not. I think you need to go upstairs and rest, ribbit."
Izuku stammered, stood up. "U-Uraraka, I'll go get you a glass of water!"
He hurried to the kitchen and filled up a cup from the tap, the once-small scene she'd caused turning into a much bigger commotion as classmates crowded around her asking her questions. As he ran back to her, helping to push them away, she decided to work in tandem with him by letting them all know she was fine.
But, in all honesty, Izuku had no idea if she was fine. He didn't know what to think.
Classmates calmed down as soon as she gulped down the water and stopped her coughing.
"Ah, sorry," she said, breathing heavily. "I just needed to catch my breath again. I'm all good now, so you guys don't have to worry. Thanks, though!"
In reality, she wanted to scream at them all to screw off and get the hell out of her face. They were ravaging up her space.
Finally, some peace and quiet.
She still felt the strange need to cough, though. Miserably, she swallowed it down.
As soon as her classmates wiped the worried looks off of their faces and went back to whatever it was they were so busy burying their heads in before, Ochako smiled at Izuku. She was glad she could give him this grin, honestly this time, without some stupid dream getting in the way. "Thank you, Deku. Really. I don't know what's up with me today. Must just be a cold."
"Ochako," Tsuyu started, "I think you should go lie down. It does seem to me like you've come down with something, ribbit. If you want, I can go with you."
Ochako nodded. She thought that was what she needed right now.
She stood up with Tsuyu, and together, the two walked toward the elevator doors. Tsuyu was careful not to get too close.
Izuku looked back at her, worry running wild in his mind and emerald eyes. Today, Ochako hadn't been herself. This morning she couldn't speak a single sentence without stuttering, and now she was hacking up a lung. Again.
He shot her a text. Hey. Are you doing alright? You've seemed kinda off today. I just want to make sure you're okay.
Of course he did. Ochako was his best friend. And, if worse came to worst, he would happily admit his first. His respect for her was unprecedented.
He decided it was about time he got his homework and daily dose of training done to get her off of his mind. Heroism in general had become his outlet. When it came to Ochako—when it came to any of his friends, really, or anything he ever fretted. He did double-check his phone one last time before heading out, though, just to make sure she hadn't yet texted him back.
"Tsu, you really didn't need to do this for me, you know."
Tsuyu, now by Ochako's side, gave the slightest sign of a sigh. "Yes, I did, ribbit. Ochako, you've been struggling all day. I don't know what's going on, but you can talk to me."
Ochako fixed her bureau and sat back down. She turned toward Tsuyu, looked her in the eye. "I don't know, Tsu. Today's just... been bad, I guess. I promised myself I'd bury these feelings for Deku, swallow them down, but they keep resurfacing, each time stronger than before. What kind of Hero am I if I can't even handle some silly little feelings?"
Tsuyu grabbed hold of her hands. "Ochako, do you know how hard that is? To just up and out of the blue forget about love, ribbit?"
Ochako smiled. Tsuyu was really the only one she was okay with knowing all this, the only one she truly entrusted. "I know," she sighed. "I just wish I could at least be a little bit better at it. I mean, the whole world knows at this point."
"But Midoriya doesn't."
Ochako looked down in defeat. "Got to give it to you—that's true."
"Anyway, Ochako, point is, you're 16. Let yourself feel things. Let yourself feel first love. Don't beat yourself up over something you can't control. You can try to bottle it up, ribbit, but in the end it takes real willpower to do so. So, please, give yourself a break, ribbit. You don't need all that on your mind while you're trying to get over a cold."
Ochako went in for a hug, but Tsuyu backed away.
"I would, ribbit, but I don't want to get sick."
"Oh, God. Sorry, Tsu! I totally forgot." Ochako knocked her knuckles hurriedly against her head, a Zero-Gravity-type facepalm, Tsuyu seeing she couldn't be any more of a dunce.
She croaked. "It's okay."
With her pinkie finger off of the bed sheets, she gently laid herself down, bundling her body up in the blankets. She got considerably nervous upon realizing her breathing was raspy, her throat drier than high noon on a hot summer day. Was that a normal cold symptom? Certainly not one she had heard of.
"Knew it," Tsuyu said. Ochako looked over at her, standing by the balcony window. She had her face pressed up against the glass, one finger resting analytically on her chin. "Midoriya's training."
Ochako rolled her eyes. "Who would have guessed?"
"Honestly, 'Chako, you fell for the right guy, ribbit. If only he'd get his mind off of this whole Hero thing for just one second."
"Why? It's motivational."
"He comes off as a bit nutty sometimes, ribbit."
She wasn't going to lie. Every once in a while she could see it in him, Izuku Midoriya's pursuit of becoming a Hero really crossing the line. He definitely had the potential, but he couldn't seem to move his mind onto anything else, training and working and writing down notes every single second of every day. He spent time with his friends, sure, and even hung out with them on the weekends, but never did he give himself more than a couple of hours off.
"I know, Tsu, but it's all in good heart. He's dead set on his goal, and, honestly, I think that's kind of inspiring. I mean, I wanna be a Hero, too, but not that bad."
"I don't think there's ever gonna be anyone with anywhere near as much resolve as him, ribbit."
"Right?" Ochako uttered. It was a rhetorical question.
Izuku might as well be in love with his dream at this point. She didn't even stand a chance.
It was fine, though. No harm, no foul. She honestly saw it as a good thing, that way she couldn't get distracted by him. Boyfriends were only a hindrance.
Ochako instinctively reached for her phone. She was surprised when she saw it. A text. From him.
He wanted to know if she was doing okay. And, suddenly, as if taking Tsuyu's advice and finally giving into temptation, her heart started hammering. And fast.
She texted back, Yeah, I'm fine. Feeling better now. Just a minor cold, I think. I'll be in class tomorrow. Thanks for checking in on me!
Tsuyu said something. "Oh? He's running over to his phone."
Ochako's eyes widened.
"Now he's typing. Don't know what he's saying, though."
Her phone buzzed.
Of course. You know I'm always here for you if you need anything.
She felt her head start to spin.
I know.
Seriously, how could she have not fallen in love with this boy? He was exceptional, incredible, everything she'd ever wanted all wrapped up into one person. If she had received him on Christmas morning as the only offering under the tree, she'd be happy. He was all she needed, the perfect present.
Besides, despite her love likely being unrequited, it made her happy.
Just being in love made her happy.
And even though it wasn't conventional, and she really wished she could have him, she was also so fine with not having him that it sometimes managed to not be that big of a deal.
Although, she would say—if she could take this all back, she would. She'd take back these fuzzy feelings in a heartbeat. Because they got in the way of her dreams. They left her losing focus, mind on things she definitely shouldn't have been thinking about during battle.
She needed to make money.
She needed to support her parents and let them live their best lives.
She needed to be a Hero for them, not let some silly little impossible romance get in the way.
But she also loved the feeling of, well, love so much that she didn't want to let go. And so she wouldn't. She'd sit here with these feelings ruminating in the back of her mind until her heart hurt so much it was practically being ripped out of her chest. She really did care for him that much. Over the course of the past year, he'd become not only her best friend, but also her inspiration. Without him, her ambitious aspirations would never be the same, and she would no longer be rambunctious at heart. No longer hopeful. By then, it would just be about the money. Izuku had taught her that there was something more.
Saving people. She wanted to save people. He had taught her that—taught her to tap into her innermost self and figure out what it was she really wanted and why exactly she yearned so badly to become a Hero. "Dig deeper," he'd said. And if he wasn't there alongside her, would she have nearly the same resolve?
No, she thought. She wouldn't have the same resolve, but she'd also told herself time and time again that she needed to push these feelings down. Stop being so selfish! she'd say.
She smiled at Tsuyu. "Tsu, you can go now. I'm fine. I'll just sleep it off and see you in class tomorrow."
And, with daylight turning to nighttime, Tsuyu, still slightly skeptical, gave her a glassy-eyed glance over and an incredibly wary goodbye and left. But not without letting her know she was always there for her whenever she needed her, no matter what.
Ochako smiled, waved. She really did love Tsu.
Izuku had read her text, sent a smiley face back. She, her boredom getting the best of her, sent a bunch of random emojis.
And, as soon as Tsuyu was out the door, she began coughing again.
God, no. She thought she was over this! What wonderful timing.
Completely out of the blue, she started to feel sick, like she was going to puke and hack her lungs out all at the same time. She hurried over to the bathroom and, reluctantly, kneeled down by the base of the toilet.
This wasn't the kind of sickness she was used to. It didn't come from her stomach, but more riled up in the back of her throat. Her lips were chapped, her mouth dry.
It took three coughs for even the slightest bit of relief to wash over her, the feeling of something escaping her throat throwing Ochako off guard.
A flower petal.
Floating.
It fell down into her hands.
She stared at it, delicate and poised and cream-colored, pulling a piece of a dark green leaf off of the tip of her tongue. Her throat felt clear all of a sudden, like the thing that was bothering her all day was that, and now that it was gone she was finally set free.
Although, Ochako knew better than that. She was hit hard upon coming to the realization.
Deep down, she knew—this was only the beginning of her misfortune.
And this petal was only a harbinger of what was to come.
A/N: Hope you all liked! Sadly, my school might be starting online classes, meaning updates may be slower. I apologize if that is the case. But, anyway, I wish you all the best during the pandemic! Stay safe!