March 20th, 2016 (same day)
Izuku was about a quarter through his set when he caught the beginning of Aya-chan and Kacchan's race.
As no one ever believed him when he said that they could get along, he subtly pulled out his phone and took a video of the pair. He was sitting across from them, so the shot was essentially perfect. He carefully placed it on the table leaning against a book so he could still finish his cannolis.
Kacchan was smirking as he caught up to Aya-chan when they were about halfway through, though she sped up and regained her lead. Soon enough, Izuku stopped working and just watched as they stayed neck and neck. They were both zooming through their piles of cannoli shells until they both reached forward and their hands met empty plates.
They both reacted simultaneously, looking up at Izuku and yelling, "Who finished first?!" Then they turned to each other to glare.
"It was me, 100%." Kacchan was smirking already, probably assuming that Izuku would call him the winner either way.
"No way! Izu, did you see who it was? There's no possible way Katsu-kun beat me on cannolis!" Aya-chan was clearly proud of herself as well, her hands were on her hips and her voice louder than usual.
Watching both of their reactions, Izuku figured that telling them would do more harm than it helped. He shrugged, "I don't know, I was focusing on my own." His mouth spread into a nervous smile when Kacchan looked at his completed pile.
The blonde scoffed, "Damn, you're barely halfway through? That's just pathetic, Deku-"
Suddenly, Katsuki's face was covered in ricotta cannoli filling. His face turned livid.
Ayano immediately pointed at him with the ricotta covered spatula, her weapon of choice, before he could blow up at her, "You can't say you didn't see that coming! And I avoided your uniform so you can't stay mad!"
Izuku watched in utter amazement as Katsuki's rage filled face slowly eased into confusion, then mild annoyance. He used his hand to wipe most of the ricotta off his face and into the sink next to him.
I wouldn't believe it if someone told me… Izuku suddenly remembered his phone on the table. He not-so-subtly checked and it was still recording everything, the pair in perfect shot. Suddenly I'm ten times happier I pushed record!
"Whatever, just means I'm gonna get you back." The smirk on his face could only be matched by the grin on Ayano's.
"Looking forward to watching you try." Her hands found her hips as she laughed.
Izuku noticed that Ayano's American accent had faded over the last five years, but it came through every so often. Especially when she was excited or nervous. At that moment, he heard the deeper tones come through at the end of her words.
After Kacchan joined her laughter, Izuku hesitantly joined in. The three laughed together, none of them sure what the joke was, until a student came in and told them they needed to start up the booth. Izuku picked up his phone as the other two were looking at the door.
"Alright. Hey, do you guys mind helping with the booth?" Ayano grabbed two trays of cannolis along with balancing a tray of the raw castagnoles, "If nothing else, I just can't carry it all by myself."
"Totally!" Izuku reached for the last tray of cannolis in front of himself, along with another tray of the castagnoles, leaving four for Kacchan.
Ayano watched Katsuki pick up the most trays of the three of them with an eye roll.
"You still owe me free samples," The blonde explained, as if that was the only reason he was still helping out. The other two ignored him as their group walked to the booth decorated with the flags of the countries they were representing.
It took less than five minutes to set up under the green, white and red flag, since the students already there had set up most of it already. As Ayano was preparing the first batch of the undeniably snacky fried treat, Katsuki stole a couple. He only showed he liked them by trying to be sneaky while stealing more throughout the day.
Despite dreading the event, she had a lot of fun handing a piece of her heritage to her peers, occasionally saying a few words in Italian. These phrases were very limited however, as she hadn't actually known Italian.
"Grazie!" She said for the thousandth time with a smile and a wave. "Prego." Was offered after people would thank her. "Ciao!" Katsuki definitely didn't believe her when she told him and Izuku it meant both 'hi' and 'bye'. She wasn't sure if any of what she said was pronounced right, but she tried her best. She couldn't tell if her accent was too American or too Japanese, and she couldn't have the thought spiral about her identity right then.
Eventually, the day ended and Katsuki and Izuku had to leave to do their assigned jobs. It went unsaid that they would meet up at the gate before they walked home together.
As soon as they left, Ayano's mind wandered back to that jacket she wanted that morning. She had noticed that she didn't think about it after Katsuki and Izuku had joined her.
She scoffed to herself as she changed back into her comfy T-shirt and jeans. Those damn idiots just distracted me enough to not think about… Her hand went to her neck, fingers ghosting the line imprinted from her jaw to her collarbone. Now that she thought about it, she could remember seeing people looking at it while she was serving them their sweets. But she was so focused on her sloppy attempt at Italian and trying to make sure her idiots didn't burn themselves on the hot oil.
Wait. Rewind. Ayano stopped in the middle of the nearly empty hallway on her way to the exit, My idiots? When did that happen?
She continued walking after she realized it was odd to stand and stare at nothing. Her eyebrows were pinched as she changed into her shoes next to a few more stragglers. Not sure when they became my idiots, She snorted, imagining a picture of Katsuki's face if he found out she called him that.
All right, that settles it, Ayano ran to the gate where the blonde and Izuku were waiting on opposite posts, they're officially my idiots now.
"What took you so long?" Katsuki was clearly annoyed enough to annoy her about it, but not enough to leave her and Izuku behind.
She smiled as she scoffed, "Did you have to change out of a laced up dress? I didn't think so." She sped up and walked backwards ahead of them. "So did you two have fun?"
Izuku grinned, "Yeah! I got to talk to Moeko and Takashi about the countries they were representing, it was really interesti-"
Katsuki interrupted him by shoving him off the sidewalk. Ayano, used to this kind of reaction, stopped Izuku with a yellow bubble. He hit the outside a bit hard, but he told her he preferred it to the ground. After he steadied himself, she dismissed the bubble and trapped Katsuki in a red bubble. He didn't bother to try to run this time, that's good, means he's learning.
He only ran once, he was super fast so she had no chance of catching him, but she punished him by ignoring him until he apologized to Izuku in front of her.
"You know the drill." The good thing about Katsuki testing her patience all the time, she got to practice her quirk without danger. He grunted and crossed his arms. Ayano raised an eyebrow, guess he hasn't learned after all. Instead of trying to convince him to apologize just for him to wait for her time limit to come, Ayano continued walking, Might as well test my distance while we're here.
Izuku stuttered before following Ayano, "Are you sure it'll dismiss itself when you get far enough away?"
Ayano considered it, "Pretty sure, I can already feel the strain getting worse as we get further. And just to make sure, we'll just wait for him to catch up after I feel the connection cut. If he takes too long, we'll go see if he's learned to play nice."
Izuku accepted that hesitantly, and they barely made it 50 meters before Ayano felt the familiar 'pop!' that came with her force fields being dismissed. She stopped walking and Izuku followed a couple steps later. The curly brunette focused on the blonde figure walking towards them.
Izuku turned to her with a grin and his notebook out to the page dedicated to her quirk, "Hey, you learned something new about your quirk! That's exciting!" Most of his next words were muttered to himself as he wrote in the margins.
Katsuki joined them once again, muttering out a barely audible "Sorry Deku," But it worked for Ayano, mostly since Izuku wasn't listening anyway. Soon, they would split up, as Izuku and Katsuki lived closer to each other than Ayano. They said their farewells before heading home. Ayano had dinner with her parents, wrote in her journal, since she hadn't been able to in a while, then went to sleep with a smile on her face.
