Auction: Day 25 / Auction 4: Prompt: My Hero Academia
Gift for Gryffindors!
"It was a Quirk," Shouto says somewhat stiffly, as their classmates gather around him, openly gawping. "I bumped into someone on the train, and they activated it accidentally."
"What does it do?" Kaminari asks, grinning widely, even though it's fairly obvious what it does.
Shouto answers him anyway, as deadpan as always. "I can't stop blushing."
The class squeals. Mina and Hagakure clutch each other. Even though it's only a few of them in the common room tonight, the noise is still painfully intrusive.
"How about that, huh?" Shinsou mutters.
Izuku, for once, doesn't jump on the chance to investigate a new Quirk. He's too busy staring. The class erupts into little shrieks and coos when Shouto's blush only deepens at their attention, prodding and poking his cheeks and taking entirely indiscrete pictures.
"This is surreal," Shinsou says, picking at his food. "You're not gonna go over there?"
Izuku purses his lips together, buttoned up tightly. The circle of chaos around Shouto gets tighter and louder. Sero has stopped trying to be subtle and is tilting Shouto's chin this way and that, aiming his phone right at his face.
"Why would I go over there?" Izuku asks innocently, turning back to his meal.
"Adorable," Sero says, patting Shouto's shoulder in a friendly sort of way. "You're going to get all the merch deals, man."
Izuku's chopstick cracks in his grip.
Shinsou lifts an eyebrow. "Right. No reason. Not very heroic of you, Deku, to refuse to check up on a friend."
"He's fine!" Izuku squeaks, remembering to lower his voice at the last moment. "He isn't injured! And Quirks like that usually don't last very long anyway, so I imagine it will be gone by morning. There's no need to get involved."
Shinsou's other eyebrow joins the first, and Izuku winces. That was a stupid thing to say. He's given himself away with one statement. There's nothing he loves more than to poke his nose into everything that goes on in the world, and make it his business; that's what the class says anyway. And Aizawa. And his mum. And All Might. It's possible, at this point, that they might be onto something, but he's hardly going to admit that with Shinsou's piercing, knowing gaze fixed on his face.
"Please look somewhere else, Shinsou-kun," Izuku mumbles, sinking down in his seat and stabbing his rice with broken chopsticks. "There's nothing to see here."
Shinsou's mouth curls into a slow, mean smirk. "Sure there isn't. Nothing to see at all."
"I don't like that tone."
"I don't like liars." Shinsou flashes him a grin, quick and wicked, before sliding away from the counter to get away from the noise. "Hey, Todoroki. Deku wants your help with something."
Izuku stuffs some rice into his mouth so he won't shriek. Kacchan, studying nearby with iron-clad self-control, has yet to look up and engage in all the fuss. But it's like he has a sixth sense for Izuku's distress after years of being tuned into his shenanigans. He glances up once, taking in Izuku's wild eyes, with an unimpressed look. He flicks his gaze over to Shouto-kun, who's heading this way. And then snorts so loudly it's a wonder the whole of Tokyo doesn't tremble.
"It's very unattractive when you do that," Izuku mutters, secure in the knowledge that Kacchan's hearing aids are next to his textbook. But he still aims the words down, just in case.
"Izuku," Shouto says, when he finally escapes the clutches of their classmates, coming to a stop right by his stool. "Shinsou said you wanted to speak to me?"
Izuku looks up into mismatched eyes and nearly faints.
When Izuku blushes, it's a ruddy, blotchy mess. He blushes when he cries, which is often, and he blushes when someone says anything vaguely kind in his direction, and he blushes all the time around people he admires, which turns out to be most of his class. He's a little bit of a mess, in Iida's kind words. A giant, flaming disaster, in Uraraka's slightly more blunt ones. Honest with his emotions, Shouto said once, in that careful way he always says things like that; Izuku proved that honesty immediately by welling up at his words, and Shouto only looked a little alarmed. Progress.
Needless to say, Izuku never really noticed how much he blushes before, not until he noticed the absence of it in someone else.
Todoroki Shouto never blushes. He smiles slightly when he's pleased, and he ducks his head a little when he's flattered, but he never blushes. He's not cold or emotional the way some reporters claim he is. But even when he's angry, his skin stays pale, except for the livid red mark around his eye.
"Izuku?" Shouto prompts, looking concerned.
Now, though. Now, his cheeks are flushed a bright, pastel pink. It's almost comical. Rosy and painted on, it should look ridiculous, except there's something altogether quite appealing about it, something natural and glowing. Izuku presses the backs of his hands to his own cheeks, trying to stop them from heating up, but it's no good.
Kacchan's foot collides with the counter. It's loud, like everything else he does, and violently sudden enough that Izuku snaps out of it.
"Ah, yes!" He coughs, shooting Kacchan a grateful look; he tries not to be too personally insulted when Kacchan mimes vomiting all over his book. "I'm fine, Shouto-kun. I was going to ask if you… if you still wanted help with that English homework!"
Shouto looks a little confused, but nods readily. He waits patiently for Izuku to finish his meal, although most of it ends up in a tub for later. He and Kacchan have some kind of weird staring contest while Izuku gathers their things, and it only ends when Kacchan flips him off, and Shouto waves back demurely. Kacchan makes a move as though he's going to rise, palms raised and crackling, and Izuku grabs Shouto by the shoulder, hauling him out of the kitchen.
"Bye Kacchan!" He calls, before wheeling around and lowering his voice to a whisper. "I don't understand your relationship."
"You are the last person in the world that can play that card."
Izuku almost stumbles, shooting Shouto a betrayed look. There is a tiny smile at the corner of his mouth, rare and subtle, but certainly there. Izuku stumbles again, colliding with Sero.
"Easy there, Midori," Sero says, hauling him upright and patting him on the forearm. "Wouldn't want to end up back in Recovery Girl's office."
There's no use in arguing that it's been a whole week since he's had to visit the nurse, since that in itself isn't a very good argument. Most people don't end up going at all. He accepts it with ill grace, following Shouto over to the elevator and primly ignoring Sero's pointed wink. The ride up is quiet, with only Izuku's fidgeting to fill the silence. They fetch their books and agree to study in Shouto's room, where it's quieter and calmer than Izuku's cluttered Hero Merch Haven.
The windows are open, letting in fresh air. They sit opposite each other on the tatami, opening their textbooks to work in semi-silence. Only the scratching of pens fills the room. And usually, this is the highlight of Izuku's day. The peace and calm he needs after a rough day of training. But right now, he's the most distracted he's ever been, and it's hard not to vibrate out of his skin.
Every time Izuku peeks over, Shouto's got that same pink blush written all over his cheeks. It's so distracting that Izuku writes the wrong heading three times in his workbook. He's rubbing it out for the upteenth time, nearly tearing a hole in the paper, when Shouto breaks the silence.
"I'm surprised," Shouto says. "I thought you'd have more questions."
"About the Quirk?"
Shouto dips his head. "Mm. Quirk-related things normally… well, I just thought you might want to talk. That's all."
"It's not that I don't want to know!" Izuku waves his hands to dispel the notion. "You just already seemed overwhelmed with all our classmates poking you, so I was going to leave you alone. Plus, you said you weren't harmed, and I know you can take care of yourself. And these Quirks don't usually last very long, so you'll be back to normal tomorrow!"
It's a very long-winded way of saying that if he gives himself permission to look, stare, touch, ask, he won't be able to stop himself from collapsing into a puddle of lovestruck hopeless goo.
"Ah," Shouto says.
He seems a little disappointed. And maybe flustered? And not just because of the Quirk. Izuku squints at him, trying to dissect the reaction, but Shouto turns diligently back to his homework, correcting something. A thought occurs to him, and Izuku almost dismisses it automatically, citing it as insane. Shouto wouldn't… but then, he really does look disappointed.
"Shouto-kun," Izuku says softly, fidgeting anxiously with his pencil. He really doesn't want to be wrong. "You know you don't need a reason to come and talk to me, don't you?"
"Ah," Shouto says again, but much more surprised this time. He leaves a little pencil line on his workbook, fumbling his grip. When he glances up through his lashes, unsure but hopeful, Izuku feels giddy.
"I'm happy to spend time with you whenever you want!" Izuku says, feeling much more bold now that he's not the only one in a flustered state. "Please don't bump into Quirks on purpose just to talk to me."
"It wasn't—Midoriya!"
Izuku dissolves into laughter; he is fairly sure that it isn't the Quirk making Shouto blush this brightly.
[Word Count: 1,617]