We finally made it to chapter 100! (And the story isn't even half over, lol) Thanks for the support through these first 100, and get ready for at least 100 more! (Don't panic. The ending will be worth it. I promise.) In addition, I dream of making other projects related to Koin, but I've got no idea where to start. So once I do figure it out, you guys will of course be the first to know. I hope you'll keep cheering me on, and we can enjoy this journey together.
"Thank you, All Might. That's exactly what I needed to hear."
He'd been watching the sudden shift of emotions on her face, and also saw how she finally smiled gratefully, like she had finally come to an answer that satisfied her. "No problem, kid. Try not to scare us too often." He's joking a bit, but he also seriously means it.
"Yeah." And with that, she thanks him again and finally leaves for the day. When she arrives back at the dorms, she's a bit surprised to find Bakugo and Todoroki there in the lobby. "Kacchan! Todoroki-kun!" Apparently, their class today was a little shorter than usual, and they'd also just arrived home. Right now the three of them are the only ones there.
She's about to ask them how their class went and if they want to talk over their team move a little more, but before she can, Bakugo blurts, "Hey. Listen up. You…" He's about to say something, but he stops. Staring into her big, round eyes, he suddenly realizes the weight of what he's about to say. Maybe with Kirishima and Todoroki it wasn't so bad, but with her… with her it's…
"What's wrong?" she asks.
Suddenly his stomach plummets, his heart starts to race, his breath shortens, and his face flushes. Suddenly, he's not sure what he was thinking, trying to tell her to—
"Kacchan? Are you okay?" Now she looks serious, seriously concerned. And her eyes look determined to figure out the answer to her question. She raises her hand and attempts to feel his forehead for a fever. But he panics and smacks her hand away, taking a step back. The sting of it isn't that bad to her, but still she stares at him as if she wants to ask what she did wrong. He realizes what he just did and apologizes, turns around and marches away, towards the elevator. "Wha? Wait!"
And from the other elevator, she vaguely registers a ding. "Hey, Midoriya!" Ashido's voice suddenly shouts at her. Instinctively, Midoriya turns to her, allowing Bakugo to pace further away.
Realizing that she's trying to go in two directions at once and keeps looking back and forth, Todoroki steps in. "It's okay. I'll talk to him."
"You will?" Midoriya sounds incredulous, like she's worried that Todoroki talking to him will only make the situation worse (whatever the situation is).
Todoroki simply nods at her and walks off to join Bakugo in the elevator. Before she can understand anything, she's been left alone, worried and dumbfounded by what she could've said wrong in the few seconds they were talking. But this is precisely the perfect moment for Ashido to pounce.
"Midoriya! C'mere!" Midoriya finally turns and watches Ashido walk towards him, holding a cup in her hand for some water. "Could you do me a favor?"
"Sure. What is it?" he replies eagerly without even knowing what it is yet.
"I promised Uraraka I'd help her with the English homework… buuut since you're here, maybe you could help her. Tell her I sent you?" She winks.
"Sure!" He's happy to. He's not so good at English, like most things, but any excuse to talk to Uraraka-san is a good one in his eyes.
Seeing the glee on his face, Ashido is glad her little plan worked. She wanted to give Uraraka as many chances to talk to her (unofficial) boyfriend as much as possible (and drag said boyfriend away from Bakugo as much as possible). Just as Ashido thought, Midoriya really did like Uraraka… But just to be sure, just in case, she pauses for a moment before asking, "Hey, Midoriya, just making sure but, you don't 'like' Bakugo, do you?"
Midoriya freezes. And he stays frozen for maybe a little too long before he averts his eyes and stutters, "N-N-No… Why do you ask?"
Ashido didn't ask because she was expecting a straight answer. She asked just to see the look on Midoriya's face. And it truly spoke volumes. That's when Ashido finally realizes that Midoriya likes Uraraka, but he doesn't like just Uraraka. Against all odds, against anyone's expectations, Midoriya is a two-timer.
All at once, Ashido feels a surge of indignation on behalf of her friend. But her face doesn't show it. Instead she stares at Midoriya for a beat, turns away and says, "I see."
"Um! I really don't! Do you… Do you think I…?" Midoriya wants to ask her but isn't sure how. He remembers Uraraka-san figuring out all on her own that Midoriya had feelings for Bakugo and saying that it was obvious, so now he wants to ask Ashido if she also thought so. But it really is an awkward question to ask.
"Nope. You like Uraraka. Bakugo even told us so." Even as she says so, her tone sounds a bit cold or indifferent.
"…Then… why did you ask?"
Ashido figures she should've seen this coming, that Midoriya wouldn't just let it go. Well, if that's how it's going to be, Ashido isn't about to let it go either. "I don't know," she answers sarcastically, "Maybe because you're always chasing him, and there's always something going on between you guys? Y'know, Midoriya, if you say you like somebody, you could at least pay more attention to her than some guy who just barely sees you as a friend."
Midoriya has no retort to that. After all, Ashido is right. It took a lot of work, but he finally got Kacchan to acknowledge him. Meanwhile, has he ever really tried that hard for Uraraka-san? Midoriya slowly drops his head in shame, looking for something to say.
Seeing that Midoriya has no reply, Ashido continues, "And you could at least try to tell me I'm wrong! If you like Bakugo so much, then go be with him! But leave Uraraka out of it!"
"I'm not…!" Midoriya blurts, "You make it sound like I don't love Uraraka-san at all! Like I'm just using her! But I'm not! I love her! I love her so much I can't stand it!" Yelling it like this is less embarrassing than he thought it would be, and Ashido can see from the look in his eyes that he means it. He's serious about her.
Then… Then why are you…? "Then why are you always making an excuse to hang out with Bakugo?! Why don't you even think about spending time with Uraraka unless somebody else gives you a reason to?!"
"I do think about it! I want to talk to her but…" As much as he doesn't want to, he knows he might as well come clean if people already suspect it. "But I don't deserve to. I… I know it's not okay to like more than one person and still expect everything to work out. That's why I wanted to wait."
"…So you admit it…"
"I… I don't want to feel this way. If I could control it, I would. And there's no point in telling Kacchan. It's not like I would do anything differently if he knew, and he wouldn't take me seriously anyways. That's why it doesn't matter. I want to be with Uraraka-san."
"…Then go be with her already."
Midoriya looks up at Ashido's face, then back down again. "I… I can't… I don't deserve to yet. I promised her I'd choose once and for all. And then…"
"…What's with you? You're saying you can't choose now? Doesn't that mean you're still hoping for something with Bakugo?"
"N… No…" I don't know. He really doesn't.
"Hmph!" She turns around without getting the chance to fill her cup and stomps back to the elevator. "Whatever. I won't ask anymore. And nobody's gonna tell Bakugo. We all know how you feel, and we agreed not to say anything." When she gets to there and presses the button, she looks back one last time and says, "But I'm warning you. If Uraraka gets hurt 'cuz you can't decide, she might not hold a grudge, but I will." Ashido decides right then and there that even if Midoriya is physically a girl now, he's definitely still just a boy. And she's not going to let a boy hurt her friends. Not again.
Looking back at it, no matter how much Ashido and the girls had congratulated Uraraka for finally getting her crush to admit he liked her, the brunette still didn't look very excited. Ashido could see there was something she wasn't telling them. But when they asked her why she still seemed worried, she seemed to make up a bunch of excuses.
One of them was that even if they both liked each other, they couldn't officially date, or they'd get in trouble. And that was another matter altogether. The school used to have a pretty open policy on dating before they enacted the dorm system. But since it would obviously be unacceptable to let students date while living in such close quarters, they ended up having to ban it outright. The only reason why no one seemed to object to Rose and Taka dating was because they lived in separate dorms, and as long as nobody crossed any major lines, the teachers were willing to overlook a few couples who had been dating long before the dorms were built, lived separately, and had historically been responsible. So far, they haven't had any major issues, but it would only take one incident for the school to certainly crack down on this rule that everyone agreed was disappointing but fair.
Perhaps for Midoriya and Uraraka, the problems were mitigated by the fact that they're currently both girls (and the school is entirely unprepared to deal with those kinds of relationships), but still, it's better not to press their luck, and they're all hoping Midoriya can become a boy again soon.
In any case, despite that perfectly reasonable excuse, something still felt off about the brunette, but since Ashido had no other guesses, she'd had no choice but to leave it alone. Now, she stands in front of Uraraka's door, knocks on it, waits for it to open, and asks point blank, "Hey, Uraraka, are you holding off on you and Midoriya because you know he still likes Bakugo?"
She asks bluntly on purpose so that the brunette's knee-jerk reaction shows first. Sure enough, Uraraka stares wide-eyed at her with a look that says, "How did you know?"
She sighs. "Can I come in?"
Realizing there's no running away from this one, Uraraka looks a little frustrated as her fist clenches, and she replies, "Yeah."
As Ashido sits down on one of the seat pillows on the floor, she puts her notebook on the table in the center, next to Uraraka's homework (which Ashido must've interrupted). But she ignores that, because this is definitely more important. She groans, "Geeez, how long have you known? Since before we all talked about it?"
"Yeah. Ummm…" She has to think hard to remember. "Ah! Um, since about a week ago," when Rose Omoda pointed it out, "but Deku-kun told me himself on Saturday."
She scoffs. "Isn't he awful? Why do you even like him anyways? Sure he's nice, but there are lots of other nice guys who aren't two-timers!"
Uraraka can't imagine how angry Ashido would be if she found out about the other people Deku-kun supposedly liked. "I-It's not just that! It's… I mean…" Feeling put on the spot, she starts to blush as she remembers how she feels and how she can't stop liking him even if she tries.
Ashido sighs. "…Hey, Uraraka, I'm not trying to be mean, and I don't hate Midoriya, but… I've seen this before. I still have friends from middle school. Some of them used to have crushes on guys who didn't like them back, and when the guy ended up with someone else, my friends would be really broken up about it… I just don't wanna see that happen to you."
"…Yeah, I understand." She understands that Mina is a very good friend.
"No, you don't understand! If there's one thing I learned back then it's that a boy who doesn't love you the way you love him isn't worth your time! Midoriya says he likes you, but if he likes someone else too, then what's the real difference between you and the other guy? Are you special to Midoriya at all?"
She tightly clutches her fists in her lap, not wanting to admit that her friend is probably right. "I… I don't know."
"I knew it… Then you gotta find out. I don't wanna sound like Kirishima, but if he's a real man, he'll tell you upfront."
She nods. "Yeah. Thanks, Mina-chan."
She sighs again. "Ugh, I'm so tired of all these boys! They're so clueless! Especially Bakugo. Even he doesn't know he likes Midoriya! At least Midoriya figured out his own feelings, but Bakugo's hopeless. Even Kirishima figured it out first!"
"Heh heh. But Deku-kun hasn't realized how Bakugo-kun feels either. Does Kirishima-kun know about Deku-kun's feelings too?"
"Hmm, don't think so. We all thought Midoriya liked Bakugo until he said Midoriya liked you. Anyway, he's still pretty clueless about a lot of stuff, but at least he knows it, and he owns up to it. Bakugo could learn a thing or two."
Uraraka giggles a bit. "Come to think of it, you and Kirishima-kun went to the same middle school, right? Has he always been like that? Y'know, 'manly'?" She raises her arms and makes a muscle-flexing gesture.
"Yeah! Yeah! He really hasn't changed at all!" Ah. But she realizes that he has gotten a lot stronger and more capable with his quirk. "…Well, I guess he's changed a tiiiiiny bit. But believe it or not, I knew some girls who liked him, and he never figured it out."
"Huh…" Uraraka imagines it. "Yeah, I can see that."
"I totally didn't get it! I mean, what did they see in him? …Wait, you're saying you get it?"
"Yeah! Kirishima-kun is… how do I put it…? Fiery! Passionate, y'know? It's kind of energizing!" She makes the muscle gesture again.
"Huh. I guess so." Ashido still isn't sold, but she'll take the brunette's word for it.
Then a thought comes to her mind that she selectively chooses not to say out loud, not for any big reason, but simply because it's too ridiculous to even consider. But still, the thought comes on its own:
If Midoriya's no good, then why not Kirishima instead? She almost laughs out loud at the absurdity. Like that would ever happen.