Hitoshi always struggles to fall asleep in new places, so it's no surprise when he finds himself in the 1A common room at 4am during his first night in the dorm. What is a surprise though, is when Todoroki shuffles into the kitchen, blanket clutched around his shoulders like a cape. Hitoshi stays quiet, silently hoping he just goes back to bed; No reason for them to know about his insomnia on day one.

Instead, Todoroki comes out of the kitchen clutching a steaming mug. He's clearly still half-asleep, since he sits down on the couch next to Hitoshi and somehow still doesn't notice him.

"Um," Hitoshi barely moves in time to catch the mug before it spills, "Shit, sorry, didn't mean to startle you, let me help." He grabs the mug before Todoroki can protest.

"It's fine, I should have seen you sooner."

"Uh-huh," He silently hands back his tea.

"I'm just kinda out of it is all. Had a bit of a rough night." The silent Todoroki? Talking about feelings? Apparently, sleep deprivation does strange things to people. And Todoroki thinks the same thing, if the surprise spreading across his face is any indicator.

"Want to talk about it?" It's not like he was planning on getting any sleep tonight.

He paused for a moment, and Hitoshi could practically hear the debate between his usual stoic demeanor and the sleep deprivation.

"You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to, but I won't share whatever it is, if that's what you're worried about." Hitoshi's pretty good at reading people, if he does say so himself. It's necessary with his quirk.

"It's just nightmares. Figured it was late enough that I'd just get up now. Didn't think you'd be here though."

"I feel you. I'm not exactly that good at sleeping either." He pauses, not wanting to overstep any boundaries, but also wanting to drag on the conversation," You know, it can help to talk about nightmares. No pressure if you don't want to though."

Todoroki stares into his tea for long enough that Hitoshi thinks he might've said something wrong, but," My father isn't the nicest person."

Hitoshi snorts at the understatement, and then quickly realizes he probably shouldn't have done that ," Shit, I just- Endeavor and nice have never been linked in my mind." Welp, there goes any chance he had of becoming friends with-

"Well then, that makes two of us." the slight smile is enough to send Hitoshi's stomach into backflips, and he's so busy trying to stifle a blush, he almost misses the implications of that statement.

"Wait…was your nightmare about your dad?" he immediately feels guilty for ruining the smile when Todoroki tenses up," You don't have to answer that. I just-"

"It's fine. It was, but it's not a big deal." Hitoshi has no idea how to ease the tension, but also desperately wants to.

"So, what do you think we'll be doing in class today? I heard Snipe was going to be there for Heroics." and the two descended into meaningless chatter until people started to trickle down for breakfast.

It was less than a week later when Hitoshi blearily trudged into the common room, surprised to see Todoroki curled under a blanket on the couch," Hey, Todoroki. Didn't think you'd be up."

"Hm? It's not that late."

Hitoshi glances over at the clock glowing in the kitchen," It's 3:30. I'm pretty sure that counts as late." he throws himself on the couch next to Todoroki, and wiggles under the blanket," Ooh, you're warm."

Hitoshi struggles to hold back a giggle at the look of pure confusion on his face," Your feet are cold." the deadpan sends him over and he bursts out laughing. It's a good thing no one's room is on the first floor, or they'd definitely have woken up.

The second his composure is back, Todoroki says," I like your laugh." Hitoshi feels his face burn at the compliment, and he's glad the only light is the little bit streaming from the kitchen.

"You can't just do that, Todoroki, it's not nice."

"Do what?"

"Make me flustered! You're too pretty for me to think straight even without your commentary."

Todoroki lets out a soft," Oh," and then," What's the fun in thinking straight anyway? Thinking gay is much cooler."

"Puns? Really? The first joke I hear you make and it's a pun on being gay. I'm disappointed in you." Hitoshi actually has to put effort into maintaining his sarcastic tone and not just basking in the cuteness that is Todoroki Shoto.

Before long, the late-night-technically early morning, but who's counting-meetups became a regular occurrence. During this time, Hitoshi also managed to piece together the reason Todoroki spends more nights than not staring into space in the common room.

That's why one night, Hitoshi marches downstairs right after he sees Todoroki leave his room. He made sure to only give him just enough time to get comfortable on the couch. Todoroki doesn't seem surprised to see him anymore, but the surprise does return when Hitoshi turns on the TV, a movie already set up to play.

"You ever heard of Disney?"

"Isn't that some sort of pre-quirk thing?"

"Yep! Tonight we're watching Moana" Hitoshi wiggled himself under the blanket, pressing in a close as he dared to Todoroki, holding back a shiver thanks to the cold radiating from Todoroki's right side. Any concern about the human AC next to him was erased when the AC in question draped an arm over his shoulder. He shivered at that, but Todoroki didn't make any move to show he noticed.

Hitoshi knew, logically, that he was touch-starved. Todoroki was his only friend and his parents weren't exactly the hugging sort. Combine that with the definitely-not-crush he had on Todoroki, and, well, cuddling was the only reasonable thing to do. Todoroki may have been watching the movie, but he wasn't. He was too busy basking in the warm feeling spreading through him.

The warm feeling continued until he felt someone poking at his face," Class starts in thirty minutes. You should get up." he blearily blinked at the red and white head in front of him, the sleepy fog delaying any comprehension of what was just said. And then his eyes snapped open, and he ran to his room for his uniform.