Chapter Eighteen: Revelations

A small, calloused hand steadily outlined the final traces of her commission, making sure that it was void of mistakes, right down to the last detail.

Stamping her watermark on the corner of the painting, the figure gently raised her fingertips, being careful not to smudge any ink. She increased the pressure around it, causing a small breeze to flow towards the painting. While she waited for the paint to dry completely, she went about the rest of her daily routine - combing back the dark-brown bangs which hung in her face intrusively, throwing on her uniform, and giving the contents of her bag one final check.

Morie had been working on this commission for what had felt like ages now. It was a scenery piece, and this painting in particular had been an absolute headache. The colors that had been requested were strange- a sunset over a horizon, to be done with only colder colors, with specifically black, red and blue as accents?

Nevertheless, she wasn't one to turn down a challenge, especially when it came to art. The process of brainstorming and putting everything down onto paper was fun, even though painting such a relatively large and detailed piece had to almost kill her from the effort alone. Through all the years she has been selling off her art, large, complicated commissions like these were uncommon; most people their age who bought art tended to go for simple watercolor paintings or sketches. At least this would earn her fifty dollars - she just hoped that the buyer would like how it turned out.

With that thought, she applied the last layer of protective coating, admiring the way it seemed to give a shiny, reflective feel to the piece and truly made the colors pop. It looked like a sunset over a horizon, definitely, but it was as if the color scheme had been inverted and distorted; oddly, adding a depth and dimension which made her feel like she would be sucked in if she stared for too long.

(A fine line between madness and beauty, perhaps. She liked it.)

The Pressure user took her time, making sure that the painting was in fact completely dry; she took the chance to reorganise the mess that was her table. Then, in what was probably the most important step of all, Morie darted to adjust the lighting in her room, before climbing up her study chair with her phone clumsily in hand. Taking decent pictures came with the job - she made sure to get the entirety of her completed masterpiece from different angles. Dark eyes critically examined her crisp-quality photos as she swiped through the pictures she took, all the while humming in satisfaction.

Man, I can't wait to promote my page with this bad boy. I really hope 'hero' likes it, whoever they are.

Rolling it up the painting as loosely as possible, Morie carefully slid it into storage tube that she grabbed from under her study table, making sure to stick her logo over the additional wrapping she put over it. Gingerly, she then placed it into a waterproof bag before sliding it over her shoulder. Her phone vibrated then, and she checked her notifications on the selling app Care-or-Sell.

'Hi. Are you able to collect your commission today?' She typed, after taking some time to relocate the chat.

To her surprise, her phone vibrated mere minutes later.

'Yes. Is it possible to meet you an hour from now at Yuuei Station?' was the message from the buyer.

Sudden, but very much convenient. What were the odds of 'hero' being one of the Yuuei teachers or even one of the students? Chuckling at the thought, she grabbed the suitcase containing her hero costume, before hastily texting back.

'Yeah. Just a reminder that I collect payment by cash, by the way- sorry for the inconvenience.'

Her phone screen lit up a second later.

'Noted. That's fine with me.'

Stuffing her phone into her pocket, the Minamoto finally made her way downstairs. She beamed at the sight of her mother, dressed in a chic-looking suit with her dark-brown hair pulled back neatly in a ponytail.

"Good morning," Morie called out, before pulling out the chair next to the older woman.

"Morning," Fū responded, smiling. "You have to meet your class at Yuuei Station first, right?"

"Yup. Thanks for the meal," Morie's voice raised itself slightly at the end, so that her father would be able to hear her from the kitchen.

Her mother was peering at the additional bag on her back now, turning to her with a questioning look. "That your new commission, kiddo?"

"Yeah," a grin formed on her face, and she helped herself to some eggs. "Business is booming."

Fū let out a good-natured laugh. "I'm glad that you still have time for your interests."

Morie beamed at that, feeling a sense of warmth settle in her stomach - she was aware that this hobby and 'business' of hers was not exactly time-efficient or profitable, but she was thankful for her parents' support nonetheless. She stuffed more food in her mouth before returning the plate to the kitchen, grinning at her dad as she did so, before backtracking and rushing out of the house.

"I'm off, then," she called out. "See you later! Love you!"

Fū waved from the dining table, her almond eyes crinkling in a amused smile. Chika emerged then from the kitchen then, sandy hair tousled and a pink apron tied around his neck.

The man brushed his hair away from his eyes, his face scrunching up a little, before setting down a tray on the table with a soft clunk. "Mori's going to your office, eh?"

His eyes met those of his wife, and they shared a smile and a knowing glance.

He grinned. "So, I heard that you're awfully picky with your sidekicks nowadays."

"Really? I did recruit one new sidekick lately though - Nakamura Daiki." Fū, taking a sip of her tea.

Chika's eyes widened in surprise. "You mean that kid from the orphanage?"

"Yeah," she hummed in response. "He asked me years ago if he could be a hero - and I couldn't turn him down. He's been stuck with me ever since, though he's more than ready to start up his own agency. His quirk is like yours actually, one of a kind."

A deep rumble erupted from Chika's chest as he chuckled with mirth- Fū always did have a soft spot for kids and it really showed with how lax she always was with Morie. Then he straightened up and sighed, clearly lost in memories.

"I'm glad that you have more sidekicks now - makes me feel better about you going off to work."

"Yeah." Fū responded, a smile gracing her lips, though a twinge of old, familiar guilt twisted within her insides. She brushed it off, sweeping her brown ponytail behind her shoulder as she brought a cup of tea to her lips. Then with a practised ease, she bundled her hair together in a neat bun. Chika decided then to plop down on the seat next to her. He helped himself to some tea before leaning in closer to Fū.

"You didn't tell her about the surprise?"

"Soon," was all the Wind user said in reply, a mysterious curl to her lips. This week of internships, she thought, was certainly going to very interesting.

.

/( ゚ペ ) /( ゚ペ ) /( ゚ペ )

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'Hi, are you here yet?'

'Reaching soon,' came the response. Morie sighed and stood by the side of the train station entrance, taking the utmost care that no harm came to the painting.

The class was only supposed to gather at the station at 7.30 in the morning, but in order to meet her buyer, she had left the house way earlier. Currently, it was only seven, and she felt inexplicably bored as she watched the commuters pass in and out of the train station, their faces blurring into one another - there was always a special kind of chaos which came with the morning crowd which she did not particularly enjoy.

'I'm here.' Her phone screen lit up, and immediately she peered up and craned her neck over the sea of commuters. Her fingers flew over her keyboard as she fumbled to message back.

'I'm standing at the side of the train station in a Yuuei uniform. Brown hair.'

"... Minamoto."

Her thoughts were disrupted at the sudden voice behind her, and she whirled around, eyes widening owlishly at the person behind her. She gaped in silence for a few seconds, before remembering to close her mouth. Then she swallowed as an all-too-familiar apprehension befell her.

The first thing she had noticed was the Yuuei uniform. Then it was the stoic expression, the heterochromatic eyes, and the dual-coloured hair - a bright, recognisable splash of red and white.

Don't tell me -

She let out a sputter in disbelief. "Todoroki, you were the buyer?"

"Yeah," he responded, an unreadable expression on his features. Like her, he did not seem to know what to say to break the palpable tension between them.

Morie sighed, running her hand through her short, brown hair- has there been some sort of mistake? Of all the people who could have found her art page and asked for a commission- not to mention one of the largest commissions she's had so far, it was the one guy that she hardly got along with. At this point Fate was the only explanation she had for the string of strange coincidences, and she was pretty sure it loved pulling her leg.

Get it together, you're still on business! A voice chided her. The thought of Todoroki leaving negative comments on her commission page was an honest nightmare, and immediately Morie straightened up.

"Alright, so," she managed to sound normal, sliding back into a state of calm as she cleared her throat. "That would be fifty dollars. If you have any issues with the commission, you may deliver the painting back to me for corrections, or if there is something you would like to see added for an additional charge, you may also similarly return the painting to me; assuming that the additions are reasonable, of course."

Beneath her calm exterior, she was purely mortified. The lengths that I go for the sake of professionalism...

Todoroki blinked at the sudden recital before nodding curtly. She accepted the fifty dollar bill from his hand, before gingerly handing over the painting. One would think that she would be glad to see the source of her blood, sweat and tears go, but she actually felt a tad bit sad to part with it.

"Handle it with care," she cautioned softly. "In that bag, it shouldn't be easily damaged, but still..."

He accepted the bag containing the painting, mirroring her and placing it over his shoulder.

"That won't be a problem," Todoroki stated, and she distantly got the impression that he did not want to be in her company.

(Not that she blamed him at all for that.)

Morie took a step back and bowed.

"Pleasure doing business with you, and thank you very much for supporting my works," she told him sincerely.

With that said, Morie was dying inside to ask Todoroki more about the commission- was he always interested in old-fashioned art? What was up with the unconventional color scheme? She could not bring herself to engage in small talk as she normally would with her buyers.

Well, this is hands-down the most awkward meeting with a buyer that I've ever had before.

The dual-haired boy merely gave a nod. As silence descended over them, Morie was hit with the realisation that the others wouldn't be showing up for at least fifteen minutes.

A true disaster.

(Admittedly, she was surprised that he wasn't walking away from her yet. Even Todoroki wasn't that rude, it seemed.)

Her feelings toward the son of Endeavour were complicated, to say the least. On one hand, he had been an asshole about the whole Coriolis-slash-Endeavour revelation, but on the other, he didn't actually seem to be a bad person. He got along with everyone else fairly well, and he didn't seem to have had issues with anyone except for Midoriya - but even that seemed to have settled since the Sports Festival ended.

How was she supposed to feel about this guy, anyway?

"Thank you for helping me the other day. Y'know, the stuff with your dad. And thanks for not telling anyone about my mom too," Morie stated out loud. The incident that day was something that had been dwelling on her lately, and voicing it out was a weight off her shoulders.

Todoroki's mismatched eyes landed on her in muted surprise.

"If you were wondering, I didn't tell him who you are," he stated, and relief crashed into her immediately. Morie had not been under the impression that Todoroki would expose her after all that had happened, but hearing it from him directly did make her feel at ease.

"Thank you for that," she responded, managing a tiny smile. "I feel like I've really misjudged you."

The Pressure user paused for a moment, wondering if she should continue. Then she let out a nervous laugh, suddenly recalling the mild spitfire that they had exchanged after the battle trials on the very first day of school.

"Uh, so," she began, fumbling around for the best words to convey what she meant to say properly. "I'm not sorry for standing up for my mom, but there were better ways to go about it than insulting your dad - I may have overreacted and I'm sorry for being disrespectful."

Todoroki was not rushing her to finish what she needed to say, and in this instance she appreciated his silence.

"I understand if you don't want to, but I wish to put this behind us at least. We'll be classmates until we graduate, after all," Morie took a deep breath. "Could we be friends or something?"

The second the question left her mouth, it crossed her that the request may be overly-bold - really, asking to be friends out of the blue when they had never gotten along was the most awkward thing she could do in this situation.

Are you actually a dumbass? Morie mentally facepalmed at herself, already bracing herself for the imminent rejection.

The seconds were ticking by achingly slowly. She could not even bring herself to look at him.

"Too soon," Todoroki raised his head moments later, glancing at her from the corner of his eyes. "But - acquaintances is fine."

The dark-haired girl got the impression that he was not done talking, so she responded to that with a slow nod.

"Besides, I would like to apologise as well," the boy continued, bowing his head. "For my rudeness towards you and your mom - I was out of line."

There was a few moments of stunned silence - she had not expected the dual-colored boy to return her sentiments at all. Morie blinked.

"I accept your apology," she stated amiably, and Morie abruptly realised that she was normally not on the receiving end of apologies. Perhaps this was why at the moment, she felt awkward (yet touched) beyond measure.

It dawned on her then that Todoroki really did seem to have changed for the better. The downright callous attitude he had held in the beginning of the term was unlike the person standing before her now. She was certain that Yuuei had sparked a major part of his growth, and for some reason she thought that Midoriya might have had a part to play too.

To say the least, it was intriguing. At the beginning, where he had persisted in using only his Ice, he had been cold and aloof. Yet after he opened up to his fire, he had warmed up as well, both figuratively and literally.

Was she thinking too deeply into this? Probably. But she appreciated the fact that Todoroki no longer had that hard, cold look in his eyes - hopefully that meant that whatever he had been going through, he was feeling better now.

Lost in thought and wracking her brains for something else to say, Morie ran a hand through her hair and let out a sigh.

"By the way, I've been thinking... h-how?" She inwardly chided herself for the return of the Stutter. Dark eyes meeting his with a significantly more unabashed curiosity, she continued to question. "How did you figure out who my mom was so quickly?"

The dual-haired boy was silent once more; he looked mildly conflicted as if pondering on how he should respond to that question.

"You look like her. And our parents have... history." He said at last, before nodding towards the opposite direction where she could faintly make out Iida stepping out of the station gantries and marching their way. "That's the gist of it. I'll tell you some other time."

Excusing himself, he inched past her to talk to Yaoyorozu, who had just alighted from a luxurious-looking car. She blinked at his sudden disappearance, before turning away and silently wondering about how she had gotten herself into such a weird situation - it was beginning to seem like that was her one talent in life.

I got that commission request the day before school started, Morie recalled, before shuddering at how utterly coincidental this whole situation was.

Surveying the train station, Morie realised that none of her usual buddies were here yet. As she greeted Iida, she vaguely wondered if she should pretend to be busy on her phone or try to talk to him despite their lack of common ground. Or maybe she could go over to where Yaoyorozu and Todoroki were and they could all try to join in the conversation, somehow. That suggestion was shot down almost instantly - it was way too soon and she did not want to impose on them.

After all, it was going to take a while to fully warm up to Todoroki.

Or so she thought.

Her phone vibrated all of a sudden, startling her slightly. Sending an apologetic look towards Iida, Morie stood flabbergasted as she stared at the new Care-Or-Sell notification that had popped up on her screen.

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hero has left you a review: 5 stars.

The seller was kind, punctual, and took great care in packaging my painting. I have followed their works for a while now and look forward to seeing my commission. Thank you for your hard work.

.

Then, came the direct messages in the app itself:

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hero: 090-0111-2004

hero: ^ My number

hero: I look forward to becoming friends with you, Minamoto.

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In her pure disbelief, Morie glanced up over at Todoroki. Almost as if he could read her mind, he looked up, caught her eye and nodded curtly, as if in silent confirmation.

... she kind of felt like crying, now.

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ー( ´ ▽ ` )ノ ー( ´ ▽ ` )ノー( ´ ▽ ` )ノ

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A/N:

So hey! It's been a while.

I honestly have no excuses, but I do feel like I owe you guys an explanation. I just finished A-levels the end of last year, and will be entering university this year. Needless to say, it was really intense. My mental health has never been the best, so I do feel like I've just come out after a very long, stressful battle. The whole covid situation wasn't very helpful either, I found myself relapsing into an unhealthy state of mind. I stopped reading manga or following anime of any sort for very long, until I recently just caught up with the BNHA manga. It got me thinking about Selling Daylight again. Coming back to and seeing all your reviews on my stories really made me realise how much I missed writing, and it made me think that I wanted to come back to this.

By all means, I don't think that I'm a good writer. I haven't written anything non-academic in 2 years and it really shows. I don't really feel confident about anything anymore. But I do want to at least try this out again. I couldn't stand most of the drafts I had written for future arcs so I deleted them, which means most future chapters are going to be written from scratch. I can't promise that I can keep updating at all, but I'll try to make the most of what motivation I have now, as well as the free time I have now before school starts again in August.

If you've read until here - thank you. I really appreciate all the love and support you guys have shown for this story.

TLDR of this chapter; Fū sips tea, Todoroki and Rie don't hate each other anymore (mostly), Rie is a Mess and Todoroki is now precious/awkward dork #2 in her books - she seriously didn't think he was going to be this kind of a person (she's a sucker for phone numbers and good reviews). I wanted it to be kind of hilariously mushy, keeping in mind that Todoroki regrets venting his anger towards Endeavour at Rie. I don't think anyone guessed Todoroki to be the mystery buyer, so let me know what you think of this chapter!

Take care, stay healthy and stay safe! And thanks again for sticking around!

- C