The cool breeze hit Sero's face the moment he stepped out of the main buildings of UA. Classes had just finished up for the day, and the students had until curfew to enjoy the nice weather. For Sero's case, the rest of his day was going to include a hammock, some chill music, and maybe a cold smoothie.
Maybe he'll even squeeze in some training with Tsu-chan and Uraraka. If he's really feeling it, he might even hit up Midoriya for some quirkwork.
As he's heading back to the dorms, the prospect of the rest of his day put a smile on Sero's face. It's what he would call "normalcy at its finest", which quite honestly, is something 1-A doesn't get all too often. Sero took a moment to look around him; he recognized some faces here and there, like Setsuna and Yaomomo having a conversation, Kendo dragging Monoma away from Shoji and Ojiro, and surprisingly enough, Honenuki trying to make niceties with Todoroki. From the corner of his eye, he sees Mina and Hagakure smiling and waving at him. Thinking nothing of it, Sero smiles and waves back.
He should've known those two were up to something.
As he exchanges greetings with his two female classmates, Sero collides into something, knocking both him and the object down. Sero grabs the object to avoid it from hitting the ground, then maneuvers himself so that he would take the brunt of the impact. He and the object luckily land on the grass, and it takes a moment for Sero to regain his bearings, but his vision is suddenly obstructed by blue.
A lot of blue, to be precise.
Sero suddenly realizes that said object in his arms is actually a person. Feeling the person wiggle out of his embrace, Sero loosens his hold, only to then see that the person in his arms is none other than Kukisoji herself.
The two are dumbstruck as they make eye contact, like a pair of deer in headlights. 'Do something, dumbnut!' Sero berates himself, suddenly finding that he's unable to function like a normal human being. His focus is stuck on Kukisoji, and Sero is suddenly really aware of the fact that their faces are inches apart. Sero starts to get nervous at the close proximity, and he can vaguely process his surroundings, only able to somewhat make out voices around him, and a pair of faint, yet familiar sounding, squealing.
"Isn't he that tape dude from 1-A?"
"No way, his elbows are massive; they'd be breaking through his uniform if he were him!"
"Wait, didn't Kukisoji approach him in the lunch hall today?"
"Pffft, this is hilarious, did someone get that on video?"
"Umm...you...okay?" Sero manages to spit out, sounding like he's barely capable of stringing along words to form a sentence.
"Mhmm." Kukisoji nods, faintly making a somewhat cute noise to go along with her head movement.
"That's, uh, great to hear! You know, heroes want to protect...and stuff…" Sero replies weakly, realizing how stupid of a response that was.
"I've got to say, that's a pretty bold response to our precious Fuu-chan, Office Supply." barks Kukisoji's friend. "Anyway, you got your eye candy; come on, Fuu, up ya go!" she continues as she helps a flustered Kukisoji to her feet.
"Meiko!" Kukisoji yelps, her blush getting redder by the minute.
"S-Sorry, my bad," Sero mumbles out, slowly getting up and brushing the dirt off his blazer. "I should've been more careful and watched where I was walking."
"Don't w-worry, it's fine, Sero-san!" Kukisoji reassures. "A-Anyway, M-Meiko and I should get going!"
"See ya later, Duct Tape!" Meiko cheerily addresses Sero while waving as she's dragged away by a speed walking Kukisoji.
"HAHAHAHA!"
"NO WAY, you've -haha- got to be -haha- kidding me!"
"I swear! Haha you should've seen it!"
"Actually, I -haha- got it on video, haha!"
"Wow, thanks, I'm glad my misery is for your entertainment. What great friends you are." Sero grumbles at the other residents of the kitchen table. Denki, Mina, and Hagakure are laughing in between their words, watching the wretched video of Sero's mishap over and over again. Sero crosses his arms, glaring at the three. "So, are you guys done?"
"Sorry dude, that's just gold!" Denki says, wiping away actual tears in his eyes.
"Aww come on, cutie, it wasn't that bad!" Mina offers, only to receive an annoyed look from Sero. "Okay fine, that was rough, but it could be worse!"
"Yeah! You could've, like, said something dumb!" Hagakure chimes in. Sero doesn't respond, nor react, blankly staring at his three dormmates.
"No...You didn't…" Denki says disbelievingly.
"Aww hun, what did you say?" Mina asks in a careful tone.
Sero sighs. "I said, and I quote, heroes want to protect...and stuff."
A moment passes before Denki and Hagakure burst into another round of laughter. Mina pats Sero on the back, a look of empathy on her face.
"Ughhhh!" Sero groans before slamming his face against the table.
"There, there, you're gonna be fine, cutie. Just think, it could still be worse!" Mina says as her patting suddenly turns into back rubbing.
Sero lays down on his bed, exhausted. After the stunt after school today and his friends' entertainment at his expense, Sero went to go train with Tsu-chan and Midoriya for several hours. After venting out his embarrassment through training, and a long shower after building up a good sweat, Sero can gladly say he got it out of his system.
Whatever "it" may be.
It was nighttime for sure, but still too early to really go to bed. Out of boredom, Sero recounts the new techniques and moves he tried out while training, the lesson material from today, and how his lunch tasted like. At the mention of lunch, he suddenly remembered about the pink envelope tucked away in his knapsack, and of the blue-haired girl who gave it to him. The same girl he had knocked over and clumsily had a conversation with.
'Kukisoji Fuu…' Sero thinks, repeating the name in his head as though he was practicing English drills at one of Yaomomo's study sessions. He doesn't know why, but the name sounds right; it doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but the syllables sound like they were always meant to be together in that order.
Sero rolls to his side and thinks of the blue-haired girl. After knocking her over and staring at her face for what felt like a billion years, Sero realizes that the girl was in fact, cute. From the details he could remember, she had a beauty mark at the bottom corner of her right eye. Sometime between lunch and the end of the day, she had also tied up her hair into a bun, with a few strands coming loose to frame her face. The blue of her hair was on the darker side; not as dark as Iida's, but the shade reminded him of the ink of a really nice pen. She was taller than most of the girls in 1-A, but definitely shorter than Midoriya. If Sero really tried hard enough, he could also remember that she had lip gloss that smelt like peaches.
Sero gets up from his bed and makes his way over to his knapsack, fishing out the envelope that started everything. He reads it over, and over, and another couple more times, until Sero really thinks of the way Kukisoji's hands glide across the delicate stationery with her elegant handwriting.
'Man, what do I do…' Sero laments as he takes a seat at his desk while staring at the letter in front of him. Don't get him wrong, he's not frustrated at Kukisoji or anything, Sero's just unsure of this unfamiliar situation he's finding himself in. Admittedly, he wasn't exactly Mr. Popular back in junior high, and he's used to being just average and plain, so Sero finds the attention a little troublesome. He knew the unwanted attention was part of being a hero, but Sero had banked on a few more years before he had to deal with it.
He looks over the contents of the letter again. Sero's eyes trace the way she writes her hiragana makes the word 'nice' look cute, or how she had said he looked 'fun to be with' instead of 'plain'. He picks out a few words and phrases here and there, but none of them really stick out the way the last few lines did.
'Keep up the good work, Mr. Hero!'
He doesn't realize it, but Sero's beaming at the words of encouragement. He barely knew the girl, yet here she was, pouring out her feelings to him and making him feel like he's doing something right. Sero feels a little bad, having not really considered the emotions behind the words until now.
They were pure, honest, and genuine.
Sero tucks away the letter back in its envelope, before placing it in the top drawer of his desk. Checking the time on his phone, Sero is surprised to see that it's almost midnight. 'Geez, I've been reading that letter for an hour?!' Sero rubs his eyes, suddenly feeling the day's exhaustion catch up to him. 'That's enough of that, get some sleep dumbnut…' Sero plugs in his phone to charge, and after checking that his alarm is set up, crawls under his sheets, promptly knocking out with the images of high-speed swinging and inky blue hair in his dreams.