I found treating the press like a pushy man at the bar worked wonders- give a demure smile, be as aggravatingly vague as possible, then walk away with your complimentary drink in hand, guilt-free considering the audacity of their moves in the first place.
My walk home would always be a slanted one, if only the reporters poured the alcohol like sleazes looking for an easy hook-up did.
Two days ago I endured all the reporter's questions before bowing back into the hospital, legs trembling with each step from the media encounter. A pint-sized, infuriated medic quickly appeared from thin air and guided me out a hidden exit, muttering to herself about hospital discretion proposals and violently expressing her opinions with each knock of her cane against my vulnerable calves.
Recovery Girl led me to the parking garage where I made the rest of the journey solo, only to find Eraserbrain lounging sleepily in the car, as if this was where I should've known he would be. He looked confused by the dragon edges of my face. Then annoyed.
I tried to tell you.
He tried to tell me what life would be like now that I had a quietly-clicking shadow, interested in even my boring, daily life. Warned me, practically.
So was this my punishment? Had I earned this, deserved to be left, alone, in front of a burning spotlight?
A fox face glanced up with my millionth heaving sigh.
"Chi-chan, you can't keep blaming yourself for his attitude. You did a good thing, so why should you feel so bad?"
With the kick-off of summer, Manami seemed even more busy than before; her reading program started a week ago and every day another handful of children sign up, parents eager to have a precious hour of peace and quiet while their kids where safely occupied elsewhere. My sly friend was able to maneuver her schedule to fit in a lunch date with me, but I had a sinking feeling these would become more and more rare.
But I would be seeing her twice a week no matter what, accompanied by a horde of UA students trying to wheedle back into my good graces.
Expulsion on its head would've been fruitless, as Midoriya and the others had acted outside of school's session, went unnoticed by the media, and hadn't engaged in offensive combat with villains. Respecting Toshinori's request, I hadn't actually pursued Midoriya's removal from UA, but I kept a map of every hatchet I buried.
Finding out the near-entirety of Class 1-A knew about Midoriya's scheme rose that hatchet right back from the dead.
Toshinori had the good sense to tell me after I'd left the hospital, when there were too many kilometres between us for me to strangle the life out of his skinny little chicken neck. I'd raged and stomped and shouted until blue in the face. A grim, crossed-armed man had vehemently agreed from the sidelines, Endo and Nasu watching wide-eyed from under the couch.
The disciplinary tirade had been the most amiable conversation Shota and I carried on in days.
Bakugo's rescue squad of teenage fools must have passed along my fury; fifteen students responded to my voluntary assignment email concerning reading to children at The Knook. They were all nervously awaiting my arrival in the park, fidgeting like deer in an open prairie.
Their shame and fear didn't last long- in thirty seconds flat Mineta was commenting on my slimmed figure like a sportscaster, head battered by a volley of attacks once his compliments devolved into obscenities approximately one second later. Iida, meanwhile, kept adjusting his glasses with a mad flush and claiming to have protected my dignity in the face of feline adversity, whatever the hell that meant. Uraraka and Ashido attested to these antics with great enthusiasm, spewing similar unintelligible nonsense, while a recovering Mineta claimed my new look would keep all the ferals away.
My mouth stayed a hard line throughout it all, though it was only a matter of time until Yaoyorozu broke one corner with her heartfelt apologies and admiration of my muscle tone, Sato then buttering me up with a cake decked in piped icing and strawberries.
But it was Tsu, who waited until after the info meeting to personally apologize, tears limning her great, wide eyes, that finally plucked the final heartstring.
And then I was back in all of their small, moronic, sincere hands.
"Are you still okay with so many students showing up?" I glanced around for our waiter. If they put less ice in these damned cups, maybe I wouldn't need so many refills. "I was thinking maybe two each day in a cycle? That way-"
"It isn't overwhelming for the kids, Yeah, that's a good idea. Have you-"
"Made a schedule and paired up the students? Indeed."
Man we must've been so annoying to have in class together. Imagine if we'd attended high school together.
I brushed my hair over one shoulder in an act completely not casual, despite my damnedest efforts. Manami's eyes immediately squinted behind their frames.
"There's something I wanted to ask your opinion about."
"Go on."
I attempted a light, totally-not-nervous laugh.
It fell, awkwardly, on the table between our two entrees.
"You might've noticed the headlines after, you know, this weekend-"
"The ones claiming you're carrying All Might's golden-haired lovechild?" Manami smirked. "Congratulations, by the way."
Oh, if only you knew how impossible that actually was, some dark side of my brain answered. A stone of cold ash formed in my throat. Outside of Shota and Recovery Girl, no one knows about my situation.
Mom hadn't seemed stable enough before, and now- now the idea of speaking to her, knowing what I knew about Tomura Shigaraki, felt like walking a tightrope over a valley of needles. I'd already filled Manami in on that familial aspect of my life, so why not this?
But is now the time?
"I have no control over what they write at the end of the day, obviously, but-"
She nodded, continuing my point, "With their eyes on an imagined love affair, they're not researching your background or acts beforehand."
"Yes," I breathed a sigh of relief. Manami, despite her attempts at humility, looked grandly pleased to have figured me out. I flicked a french fry at her grinning face.
"Being a fellow connoisseur in all manners of anxiety and paranoia, I can totally understand your ambiguous moves. How does Aizawa feel, though?"
Ah, another uncomfortable conversation we'd had just yesterday- me explaining my thought process, him grouching about my idiocy in confronting the media to begin with. Like they gave me a fucking choice.
"So long as he's out of the limelight, Shota doesn't seem to give a- to care, much."
Manami hummed. I winced at her unspoken opinion, hearing it through our shared brain frequency.
Before either of us could respond, however, the heat of a gaze drew both of our attention.
A young face quickly went maroon and ducked back into a booth. Manami turned to me, eyebrows raised. I shrugged and picked up my drinking glass, watching as I began to remove the water's sense of gravity.
"I haven't really gone over this with Toshinori yet- he's been busy with the police and meetings, yadda yadda. He'll have a lot of extra time on his hands later, with the end of his ability to perform hero work," Crystalline droplets slowly pranced into the air, heading towards the sun-worn booths across the cafe. It was my turn to squint peevishly at Manami. "I'm sure there are quite a few items he'd like to check out at your bookstore. He has a lot of catching up to do, after all."
I'm not sure which was worse- the submersive pounding of her heart or the sharp kick of the foot that delivered it into my unsuspecting shin.
"Manami, damn it-"
"Did you say something to him? About me? Did he say something? Not that, like, anything happened, but-"
Manami grimaced at my dropped jaw while the kid in the booth let out a squawk of surprise, now surrounded by dozens of my aqueous messengers. I inwardly shared the kid's reaction, though instead to Manami's accidental confession.
"Manami, what? What happened? Where did you guys go after the beach? Which, not going to lie, I'm still a little annoyed about. You completely threw me to the sharks. In an ocean."
My mind struggled to think of romantic red-haired animals to compare her to as her face went moony, clearly reminiscing of a time I hadn't been present for. Maybe a floral analogy would work better? Sunflowers and roses went together, right?
"I neither confirm nor deny any allegations made towards me," Manami spoke to the judging crowd, hand raised in a diplomatic fashion. My eyes rolled out of my head and onto the linoleum.
"Manami. How can you keep this from me? My two best friends- Did he take you out to dinner? No, wait, you were both in swimsuits- Manami. Did he take you to his apartment?"
"Chiyo, enough!" Manami's pallor imitated her hair. Even her hands were pinked, rising to cover the primary source. "I had him take me back to The Nook. He looked around and knocked a bunch of shit over in his manly form, so then he went back to normal and we...talked. It was nice."
"Manly form?" I laughed. "That makes it sound like the other is its opposite." Which- the more I thought about it- the less I liked. "Regardless of his figure, Toshinori is always the same person."
"I know," Manami's answered quietly. And I realized she did know, had probably known since her first conversation with the lovable sunflower weeks ago at the beach. Warmth tickled my chest- for both my friends.
"Um, excuse me?"
The hat and distance had made it difficult to discern the child from afar; now, standing so close, I realized it was not only a boy, but one a little older than I'd previously thought. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other in either impatience or nervousness.
"You're Chiyonex, right?"
"That's her!" Manami cheered. The boy quickly looked away from her, ears singed.
"I saw you on tv. You have a water quirk, too."
Too, as in he had one, too? "That's right."
"Is it true that you work at UA?"
Only the briefest amount of panic flitted through my brain; UA's faculty was well-known, and none of the personal information- address, number, that sort of thing- was ever made accessible to anyone outside the staff. Besides, it's not like they hire kid reporters...Right?
"Yes, I teach Ethics. Are you interested in attending UA one day?"
The boy shifted again, as if asked a particularly gruesome math question. "I don't know. But a student who goes to UA saved my life. I was wondering if you could tell him something for me?"
A UA student? "Sure. Who was the student?"
The boy's head ducked again, causing the two horns on his hat to gleam in the sunlight. I wondered, absently, if he'd ever head-butted anyone with them. Seems like a UA shenanigan if I've ever heard one.
"Um, his name's Iz- Izuku Midoriya. He risked his life to keep me safe. I wrote him a letter, but could you thank him for me in person the next time you see him?"
The boy's gaze lifted when I didn't answer.
Shota had mentioned Midoriya's severe injuries were due to fighting a dangerous villain. How had he forgotten to mention Midoriya wasn't alone?
"Chiyo," A french fry left a greasy stain on my temple. I forced a smile across my face with a abrupt nod.
"Of course. Who should I say the message is from?"
"My name is Kota. We're here because one of my aunts was recovered from the bad guys. So, um, thank you. For being a part of that rescue."
Aunts? I vaguely remembered a skirted man commenting about rescuing a teammate; did this boy mean her?
Wait a minute.
My eyes located his forgotten booth, finally connecting Iida's earlier word choice: feline adversity.
How had I forgotten?
Lo and behold, there sat the strange-mouthed man cramped in next to a blonde woman. The other side of the booth also appeared full even with Kota absent, two women sitting shoulder-to-shoulder and laughing over something. I lost all control over my motor senses.
"It's- they're-"
"Please don't say their names," Kota interrupted, face as red as his hat. "If you do, they'll come over here and be embarrassing. Just- tell Midoriya thanks, okay? And thank you for saving my aunt."
The boy trudged off, jerking when his family noticed and swooped him into a tight embrace. He seemed to find the whole act terribly annoying, but I hoped he appreciated their love. Manami apparently agreed, cupping her chin with a dreamy sigh.
"That was cool. This is cool. I don't think the little kid fans would bother me, but it probably sucks when crusty old men approach you, huh?"
"Nah. I just pat them on the shoulder and slow their heart rates to the forties. Then they pass out and I quickly run away."
Manami stared. I kept my face a blank canvas.
"You're lying."
"No, yeah, I'm totally kidding. That'd be, like, a felony charge at the least."
She wasn't quick enough to kick me that time.
"You're really good with children, though; I could totally see you having a houseful of ankle biters before we're thirty or I even have a real boyfriend, ha. And hey, now that you're a bona fide hero, why don't you do a show-and-tell in the summer reading program, too? I'm sure they'd love to see you, and I'm very intrigued by how that suit makes your ass look so nice."
"Excuse me," Came my indignant snort, heart trying to hammer out the first sentence she'd spoken, "It makes my ass look great because my ass is great. I've been training for weeks, Mana. Even All Might's buns of steel can't compete now."
My heart failed, fingers trembling against the table. I placed both hands in my lap, hid them between my legs. Calm down, it was just an off-handed remark. I wouldn't- couldn't- allow regulation to calm the upset spike in my system- I needed to learn to do this on my own. Especially if such basic teases about procreation were going to trigger a reaction out of me. You're being pathetic. Just stop thinking about it.
Tell her. Tell her and you'll feel better, the more sensitive side of my brain responded.
Saying it out loud would be admitting your failures. Do you want those pity eyes again? The other part returned, bringing forth images of brainwashed Chiyo and her sad, sympathetic little existence of before.
A cool hand found its way onto my arm, hardly dispelling the turmoil.
"Hey, are you okay? You look like that time we found an anatomy book and discovered what copulating both meant and how it was done...In the most textbookish language possible, obviously."
Tell her.
Tell her.
"I've been thinking the best way to get people off the Allonex rumors is to prove myself an actual hero, rather than some love interest. What do you think?"
Any moment white feathers would sprout from my arms, turn them into flightless wings to carry me nowhere.
"Oh," Manami sat a little straighter- a fox's keen senses picking up the fleeing coward. "Um. Well firstly, I didn't know we were referring to the false relationship as Allonex. I think Chiyomight should've at least been considered-"
"Will you be Managi? Or Toshinami? Both are actually kind of great," My throat began to reopen, whatever panic-crybaby moment of before fading the farther we moved from the subject. Manami's glasses fell down her nose with her clearly-frazzled twitch. Her eyes pinched closed in annoyance, one lone finger pushing the frames back into place- a very specific finger.
"We're talking about you, not- Anyway. I don't think it's a terrible idea; it is summer, so you won't have to worry about a conflict of schedules. Plus, asserting yourself as a hero in your own right would be pretty bad ass; there aren't nearly enough female heroes out there."
"Would it be unethical of me to use this fifteen seconds of fame to boost myself like that, though?"
Manami rolled her eyes. "Only you would ask that kind of question. It's not like you'd be followed around with camera crews. Do you think Gang Dolphin would let you work with him, maybe?"
"It's Gang Orca, and I don't know. Maybe."
"I bet he would, especially with all the extra time you spent training. Each day out here was nearly six in there, right? So you got like eighteen extra days-"
Eighteen extra days? Manami could dance circles around me when it came to math; there's no way she was referring to extra time because of the Paradox.
"What're you talking about?"
Manami looked like Nasu when I caught him murdering an unsuspecting houseplant.
"Um-"
"What do you mean eighteen extra days? As opposed to what?"
"Just, you know, because he didn't go and tell you about Bakugo-"
"Who didn't tell me about Bakugo?"
Manami fidgeted, gaze anywhere but on me. Understanding slowly tingled my scalp.
"How- Had Bakugo been abducted much earlier than the rescue date? And how do you even know about-"
Toshinori.
Use your brain, Chiyo.
I was struck all over again- that the people I knew, living in different worlds for me, now knew each other without me translating on the sidelines. That there were conversations between Aizawa and Manami and Toshinori I had no part in.
At least this gross caress of panicked insecurity was well-known. Manageable.
My friend watched the gears of my brain at work, piecing together the picture. If I were a dragon, dark clouds of smoke would be streaming from my nose.
"So let me get this straight: Bakugo was abducted several days earlier-"
"Two. Just two days earlier-"
"-and the question of whether or not my training should be interrupted to let me know? In case I wanted to help, or stand with the UA instructors?" Shota wouldn't have even had to go on television; we could've lied, said I'd been part of the training camp, and maybe then he wouldn't still be in such a shitty mood.
An incredulous laugh shot from my simmering belly. "And they even asked you what should be done? Let me guess- Once again, Toshinori thought it best I stay out of the picture, somewhere safe from harm because I need constant protection due to being a weak little-"
"Toshinori wanted to tell you immediately."
What?
I could see the easiness of turning Manami into a cruel, beautiful figure of memory; Mom wouldn't have had to make up her sharp angles, the shivering cold when no joy lived in her features.
"He and Aizawa had a disagreement about it; apparently, Aizawa thought you wouldn't be able to handle the news. Toshinori felt you had a right to know and confided in me about it. No one asked me what should be done. I'm not a hero," She said. "Just your friend."
The friend of a shitty human being with shitty, selfish reactions.
"Manami, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to sound- I'm sorry." I hid behind my fingers, rubbed hard circles into the roots of my brows. "Everything has been such garbage since I came out of the Paradox and I only keep making things worse."
"I disagree."
My shoulders slumped. "Thanks for trying to make me feel better, but-"
"Would you just shut up and listen to me?"
Despite herself, a devious little curl pulled her lips at my jumpy surprise.
"You're getting a lot of media attention and that kind of sucks, sure. Do I like how every daytime talk show is speculating when you and All Might are going to get married? Not in the slightest. But you risked your life to save a friend. You were there to make sure Toshinori lived to see another day. And- I'm glad that he is. Here. With us."
She reached across the distance for my hand. I laced our fingers together on instinct.
"Even if this sounds insanely presumptuous considering, you know, the finite amount of time we've known each other- anyway- You stood in front of the world and declared yourself on the side of good. You're a hero to me, Chiyo." A little electric wave crossed from her ankle to mine, flinched up my hands in surprise. She caught them both with her own in a fierce hold. "We'll find Tomura. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but one day we'll save him from the path he's been led down. You have to trust in us. We can help. Because you can't do everything on your own, Chi-chan. No one can."
What had I ever done to deserve her? "Mana, I'm a jackass. Please forgive me and every foolish word or act I've done and will probably continue to do because of my sheer stupidity."
"I already forgave you." She grinned, but a little sly peeked through with her loving punch. "Come on, you know I can't hold a grudge."
Unlike me, who held a false one for fifteen-plus years.
Gang Orca's training didn't hold wind when I was with Manami; she read my expression like an open book, laughed when color rose from the realization of my thoughts being obvious.
Even as the world changed and reporters continued to write and film my presumed life, it was nice to know there were those who really did know me.
And seemed to love me anyway.
The great thing about the kitchen was the lack of escape routes- get cornered while warming a cup of instant noodles and you were nothing more than a rabbit caught in a hunter's snare.
As Shota Aizawa quickly found out, warily noting me in the entryway through his periphery.
"When did the attack on the training camp happen?" I asked conversationally.
"It was a night attack, during a paired training exercise."
A clear sidestep. I pressed further, "But what day, I mean? Friday night?"
"Wednesday."
Breathe, Chiyo, breathe. My tone remained neutral. "So you knew Bakugo had been abducted three days before anyone ever told me?"
He didn't even glance away from the microwave's neon countdown. "You were in the middle of training, Chiyo. There would've been no point-"
"There wouldn't have been a point in informing me of a student abduction? Of an attack on not only the students but you, too, while I was just miles away from the school and hospital?"
"You knowing wouldn't have changed anything. The police didn't discover Bakugo's location until Friday night."
Our squabbles as of late held a cool, indifferent tone- one Shota still aligned with at the present, body lithe, arms crossed as he finally turned to fix his gaze on me. Red branches grew around his tired eyes; the only indicator of his exhaustion, both from the week as well as this conversation.
My own placidness drained like a tub of bathwater, plug ripped from the socket with such force the undertow nearly carried me off.
Because now, recalling the events of last Saturday, I realized: No one ever intended to tell me about Katsuki Bakugo's abduction. A clueless worker had shown up to relay information to Gang Orca; I was only invited by an accidental proxy.
I was never meant to be involved.
Every hair follicle stood at attention as ice slid down my spine.
"You...didn't plan on ever telling me, did you?" My chest forcibly expanded with an inhale, trying to slow the stampede. "Didn't- you didn't think I'd find out one way or another?"
"Not until school started. By then I figured you would be a little more rational over the situation."
I visibly stuttered. Dark eyes watched, unblinking in their seriousness. I felt like a doll gifted a voice box only to find all the recorded phrases useless in reality, mind trying to maintain civility in the face of shock.
"Rational? This isn't one of your little deceptive antics- I'm not your fucking student, Aizawa. And don't you dare insinuate I'm being irrational. You purposely tried to keep me in the dark, where I would've stayed if Kugo hadn't been asked to help in the operation-"
The first sign of emotion other than indifference highlighted his brow. "Kugo?"
"Gang Orca. Whatever." I threw my hands in the air. His confusion slowly froze back over, voidless in expression. "The point is I had a right to know- I could've helped in some way-"
"I think you helped enough."
A stillness fell over me.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Shota sighed, took his microwaved meal and tried to brush past my adamant figure blocking the doorway.
"You don't care about anything I have to say, so it hardly matters."
I caught his retreating arm, careful not to let my heartbeat drown into him, reveal the deluge of emotions unsettling my core. "No, please. Enlighten me."
The steeled eyes that found me burnt my hand from his arm in surprise. When he was so close, posture like a willow, all I could do was fit in his shadow.
"I was afraid of you coming out of training overeager and reckless. We had few leads on where Bakugo had been taken. With your newfound powers, what if you had wanted to charge ahead anyway? And just like I predicted- one taste of sterilized combat and suddenly you're in the midst of the fight, standing alongside the world's most photographed hero and facing All for One, for shit's sake-"
"The world's most photographed hero? Really? Is that what this is boiling down to again?"
He sighed, made weary by my overwhelming ignorance.
"For someone who claims to possess such wells of empathy, you certainly didn't consider how your novice actions would impact those around you."
I followed him into the living room where he wandered the space, looking for the remote or his sanity or both. My head felt filled with static, caught between radio channels; one of anger, the other of guilt. I licked my lips, tried to settle on the mutual ground between the two.
"Look- I'm sorry our lives have been disrupted; I'm sorry you don't feel comfortable being seen with me in public right now. It hasn't been easy for me, either. But I will not apologize for protecting my friend-"
"Is that all he is?"
And suddenly the static disappeared.
In fact, everything had.
Everything but the pale curve of his neck, the coldness of his shoulders, blocking me out.
Protecting himself.
From me.
Did this- was all of this bred from jealousy? After everything we'd been through; the USJ, the dates, my mom. My abduction.
Finding my way back not to my life, but to him.
Submersion's regulation yearned so desperately to control the fracturing inside my ribs I nearly succumbed.
Instead my feet moved autonomously, until I could feel the heat of his skin, even through his dark clothing. Still he didn't turn.
"Manami said you didn't want to inform me about Bakugo because you thought I couldn't handle it. But you know what? I don't think that's what you were afraid of."
When his face found mine, all the guilt I'd felt had vanished, leaving only the sharp edges to cut him with.
"You feared that I could."
"You don't know anything," He breathed back. My neck lengthened, available for whatever venom he selected with the angling of my head.
"So then, what? What are you afraid of, Shota?"
"I'm afraid you've aligned yourself with the person you believe will make you the most palatable to society, without ever catching wind of the decay festering underneath. I'm afraid you've grown too attached to kids who don't belong to you. And now with your self-inflicted spotlight, it will only become glaringly obvious to the whole world how ill-equipped you are to protect anyone, least of all yourself."
A glimmer of regret highlighted his features, shifted into motion as soon as the words left his lips.
When his hand reached for me, I was already halfway out the door.
Author's Note: Only Americans spell it kilometer, apparently. Kilometre is how the rest of the world spells it, so that's what I'll probably go with from here on out. Because this is all set in Japan, I spend a copious amount of time trying to perfectly figure out the conversions to make the story feel more authentic.
The students trying to explain the Wild Wild Pussycat situation is great because it's such a teenager thing to do. No context clues, actual explanations, nada.
I can relate to Aizawa because I'm also an introverted, defensive little turtle who has no idea how to tell someone when I'm scared, or troubled, or generally relay any large emotional feeling. The sentiment doesn't mesh well with a woman who's trying to learn to handle her own emotions for virtually the first time.
Thank you for the favorites, follows, and reviews!
