Hitoshi's first day back at the house had been strange. After a few days of testing and exams at the hospital they'd discharged him with appointments planned for vision therapy sessions to assist him with relearning and adjusting his hand-eye contact coordination now that he was down an eye.
He was finding it hard to adjust on two fronts: one, not having to be on guard at all times felt odd after a week spent back at the facility around the League members, he kept flinching anytime Shouta or Hizashi approached and found himself jumping at the smallest of sounds; and two, it was much harder to do basic shit with just one eye then he ever could have imagined. He constantly found himself walking into doorways after misjudging the distance, and he'd already knocked over and smashed one of the pros' photo frames accidentally in the living room which he was still mortified about.
As the night ticked on Hitoshi grew evermore nervous.
He knew it sounded pathetic but he wanted Kacchan.
The two of them had grown even closer after their time spent at the facility and only having each other's company meant that their protectiveness of one another had increased tenfold.
He'd only been able to sleep there at all because of being with Kacchan.
Grabbing his phone he opened the messaging app and typed out a message painfully slowly, even the phone device's largest font still proving hard to read.
'Hi'
Almost immediately he got a reply.
'Hey Purple Hair'
'Can't sleep either?'
'No'
So he wasn't the only one.
Hitoshi looked at the time at the top of his phone.
'11:02PM'
There was a soft knock on his door.
"Come in."
It was Hizashi. He gave a soft smile as he entered holding a mug of something.
"I saw your light on and guessed you were still awake."
"Can't sleep." He admitted.
"I made you some herbal tea."
Hitoshi took the mug, annoyingly missing on the first attempt, and closed his hands around the warmth.
"Wanna' talk about it?"
"I…" He shook his head. "Nevermind."
"You sure?"
"I don't think I can sleep without Kacchan." God it sounded even more pathetic to say it out loud. "Is that stupid?"
"It's not stupid at all; I think it's pretty rational. The two of you just went through a traumatic experience, you've spent so much time together in horrible circumstances that it was always going to have an effect on you both, there's no shame in admitting that. There's also no shame in being scared, it's completely natural." Hizashi looked at his watch. "If he wants, Kacchan could come over here for the night?"
Hitoshi wanted to decline, to not be a fuss, but he couldn't and nodded.
"Yes please."
The voice hero grabbed his phone and quickly sent a message, getting a reply as equally quickly as he had a few minutes earlier.
"Drink your tea, I'll go get him."
As he walked towards the door his gaze fell to the ground.
"Good girl, Jelly, go look after Toshi."
Hitoshi smiled.
A few seconds later the fluffball of a cat known as Jelly jumped onto the bed and sat on his chest, padding him a few times on the face before stretching and lying down.
He gently stroked her.
"I won't be long."
It was twenty minutes or so later when Kacchan appeared in the doorway looking a lot like how he felt, tired.
"Hey."
He gently deposited the cat on the floor before sitting upright on top of the covers.
"Hey."
Kacchan walked inside and took a seat also on the bed.
"Sorry for dragging you out."
His cousin shook his head.
"I would never have been able to sleep anyway; I haven't the last few nights. It's… hard."
"I know."
Why did they have to take Kacchan? He didn't deserve to have to go through any of this. Hitoshi couldn't help but feel guilty, he was already fucked up so it didn't matter, but Kacchan, he was so much stronger, so much more talented, it was wrong to see him look so defeated and scared.
"Mom and Dad have barely let me out of their sight since I got discharged, I don't want to be mean but it's only making everything feel worse. Everything feels like it could be a threat. Like Deku and Inko came round yesterday and I spent half the time in my room because it was just too… loud."
It was Cream's turn to jump onto the bed looking for attention. Hitoshi picked him up and plopped him down on Kacchan's lap, his cousin seeming a little against the action at first before he began stroking the cat with a soft smile.
"I know what you mean. That's one of the things I hated about UA when I first started. I'd spent so much time with the League or just being in that room that the noise of so many loud, excitable people with so much energy was overwhelming. I used to sit outside a lot just to get away from it all."
Kacchan took a breath.
"How's your eye?"
"It doesn't hurt, it's just annoying more than anything. It's so embarrassing to fail at something really basic. Signing with Hizashi is the worst though, I'm having to try and move that hand closer to my centre otherwise I can't see it, not that I need to 'cause it's for him anyway, but you know what I mean."
"Shouza doesn't want us to start school again on Monday."
"Do you want to?"
Kacchan shrugged.
"I don't know."
"Me neither." He agreed.
"I heard him talking to Mom earlier, they're gonna' build dorms and have us all live on campus for better security."
"Really?"
Kacchan nodded.
"He and All Might have gotta' go round all the parents and convince them to continue sending their kids to UA, apparently there's a bunch who don't want to, including Inko."
Hitoshi's eyes widened.
"She's really gonna' stop Zuku from going?"
"You didn't hear that from me, and he doesn't know so keep it quiet, it's just what I heard her say to Mom down the phone." He explained. "After what happened to us she's terrified that it might happen to Deku too despite Mom trying to tell her otherwise."
"That'll break him."
"I know, I'm sure All Might and Shouza will talk her round though."
"Are, are your Mom and Dad okay with you going back?" Hitoshi asked.
Kacchan smirked.
"Shouza already came round about me. He looked like he was a teen again and in trouble for something; I've never seen him so nervous. He was real apologetic because of not being able to protect me back at the training camp and all that crap. Anyway, they started gushing about how proud they are of their 'two boys' and it got all mushy."
Hitoshi smirked.
"I always forget that Shouta's their son too."
"Yeah, they were hardly gonna' say no to him, Shouza's their golden child."
"Oh come on."
Kacchan furrowed an eyebrow.
"What?"
"They love you to death, don't take that for granted."
He took a breath.
"Sorry."
Hitoshi shook his head.
"It's fine." He turned to glance at the picture of them all which Zuku took at the pizza place, Hizashi having gotten a copy framed for him. He smiled.
"You've got an amazing family, I couldn't have been luckier."
Kacchan smiled too.
"You wanna' try going to sleep?"
He nodded.
The two teens clambered into the bed before Hitoshi clicked off the lamp leaving the plastic glowing stars he and Zuku had stuck up on the ceiling together one day as the only light.
He huddled closer to his friend, Kacchan's arms coming to wrap comfortingly around him.
"You tell anyone at school that we do this and I will kill you."
Hitoshi smirked.
"I think even they'd understand after everything that's happened. Hizashi told me there's no shame in it; it just makes us feel a little safer."
After a few seconds Kacchan spoke up once again.
"I'm sorry I couldn't protect you better."
"You don't have to apologise for something like that, you had no control over anything that happened."
"Still, I'm sorry."
"Please don't be, we look after each other, right?"
Kacchan nodded.
"We'll get through this."
