When lunch came around, Shinsou pretended to be busy looking in his bag so no one would notice that he wasn't making his way to the cafeteria. He hated to admit it, but he… hadn't really hated this day. This class was... a lot. But they were nice. Too nice, actually.
After training, they had had a few general classes. They had been mostly uneventful. He wasn't behind on any of these classes at least.
Yaoyorozu handed him a pencil she made when she noticed that his had broken.
After Shinsou let out a particularly loud, 'What the fuck' during Physics, Midoriya had turned around and handed him extremely detailed extra notes he had.
Dark Shadow roamed the room quite a lot with no one even batting an eye. However, when the Shadow spent quite some time curiously staring at Shinsou, Tokoyami berated him until he left him alone with a huff. Tokoyami then handed Shinsou a chocolate bar as an apology, not taking no for an answer.
So yeah, Class 2A really was very nice.
But that didn't mean they were his friends. He was just the new guy, and they were curious. That's all.
Some might call him unnecessarily pessimistic, but he just knew better. He had gotten his hopes up far too many times in the past.
When he was alone in the room, Shinsou finally stood up and made to go to his regular storage closet until the end of the lunch period. Well, he would have if he hadn't ran straight into Present Mic.
"Hitoshi!" the man said, far, far too loudly, "so glad I caught you in time! You wanna grab lunch with me? I made rice!"
Hitoshi blinked, "Your rice sucks."
"That is hurtful, kid. But fine, if you want Lunch Rushes gourmet meal instead of my perfectly edible rice, go ahead." Hitoshi rolled his eyes, and tried to keep walking. But he was stopped by a hand on his shoulder.
"Cafeteria's that way," he mentioned.
"I'm not going to the cafeteria," mumbled Hitoshi.
"Why not?!" Mic shouted, "Your friends are all waiting for you!"
Hitoshi sighed heavily, "How many times do I have to tell you that-"
"Okay but that was before! Class A is-"
"We're not friends," Shinsou all but hissed.
Mic scoffed, "Oh really? Cause I heard that they were all over you at training today. Latching on like cute little leeches." He grinned.
Hitoshi still just glared, and Mic sighed, "You gotta stop assuming people hate you! It's unhealthy! And also untrue."
Hitoshi knew that he was being unnecessarily cold to the loud voice hero, but he knew this was a sore spot. He yanked his arm away from his grip and kept walking.
He knew his parents worried about him. They hated that he didn't have friends and had no human interaction outside them and classes. They hated that even after all this time, even at U.A., he was still discriminated against because of his quirk. He was well aware that all of last year, they had been asking his other teachers to keep tabs on him. Asking Miss. Midnight for updates everyday, and she'd always tell them the same thing. He doesn't talk unless called upon, and no one tries to talk to him. He intimidates his classmates before they can even pick up their own opinion of him.
It wasn't healthy. He knew this. But it was necessary.
Present Mic didn't seem to get that, sometimes.
"Hitoshi-"
"Papa, please!" he hissed, "Just drop it."
Before Mic could say anything else, heavy footsteps sounded around the corner, and immediately, a running green blur appeared.
"Oh Shinsou!" Midoriya grinned as he stopped near them, "Mr. Yamada, hi!"
"How ya doing little listener?" Mic went back to his yelling, "Am I gonna have to scold you both for roaming the halls during lunch hour? Cause that's super lame and you know I hate being super lame!"
Midoriya shook his head rapidly, "No no no Sensei! I just had to talk to All Might for a second, but I'm on the way to the cafeteria right now!"
"Well that's perfect!" Mic all but yelled, "Take Shinsou with ya!"
"But I'm-"
"Writing you up, would be uncool, kid! And I'm totally super cool, right Shinsou?!"
Hitoshi just blinked wearily.
"Alright sir, we'll be going right now!" Midoriya bowed vigorously, before taking Shinsou's elbow and pulling him in the opposite direction of where he had been going. Hitoshi spared his dad a glare as he was dragged away, and Present Mic just grinned his stupid grin and gave him his best finger guns.
"Where were you going Shinsou?" asked Midoriya as they turned another corner and he finally let go of his arm, "Did you need to go see a teacher or something? Am I dragging you away from something important?"
He looked up at him with big worried yes, and Shinsou cleared his throat.
"Uh, no I-"
"Okay good! I'm glad I caught you then! We all wanted to have our first lunch back all together as a class, but then Iida mentioned you might wanna hang out with you friends from your old class. We don't wanna take up all your time if you have other friends and other things to be doing. So how are all your 2C friends anyway? I'd love to meet them if I could! I'm not forcing you to share your friends or anything I just wanted to see what they were like! I honestly think maybe our class doesn't branch out enough. When we're all pros we're gonna be working with all kinds of people, not just each other, don't you think? So what do say, Shinsou?"
Shinsou blinked at the boy, trying to process all he'd just dumped on him.
"About what?"
"Oh," Midoriya flushed as he scratched at his arms, "Right, yeah sorry. Sometimes I mumble a lot and people find it hard to understand me."
"Oh no, I understood. I just don't know which question you're referring to."
"Oh!" Midoriya brightened up, "Can I meet your class C friends?"
Shinsou didn't know how to respond to that. So he just narrowed his eyes, "No."
"Oh," Midoriya's face fell pitifully, and Shinsou immediately felt bad.
"It's just... they're not my friends." he added. That sounded a lot less pathetic than, 'I don't have any friends. I'm freak and they hate me.'
"Really?" Midoriya looked confused for a second, and then he lit up, "So you can have lunch with us then?"
"Well I... I guess." he muttered.
"Yay!" Midoriya grinned at him. He actually... he actually said 'yay'.
It's then that they reached the cafeteria doors, and the assault of noise was headache inducing.
Midoriya kept talking the entire time they made their way to the cafeteria line. Talked as they waited in said line. Talked the whole time they picked their lunches. He talked so much he didn't even notice that Hitoshi didn't say a word. Didn't reply to any of his questions. Not that he even could. Shinsou wondered if the kid was even taking breaths between sentences.
They finally managed to get their lunches, and it was then that Shinsou realized that in his year of schooling, he had never actually eaten in the cafeteria. How was his life this sad?
Midoriya led him to a table near the window, where there sat Iida, Uraraka, Asui and Todoroki. Todoroki, mouth full of noodles, shifted away from Iida as soon as he saw Midoriya approaching.
"Izuku, you can sit here," he said.
Midoriya beamed, and made to go next to Todoroki, dragging Shinsou along.
"I found Shinsou on the way here," he explained as he all but forced Shinsou between himself and Iida, "turns out he didn't want to sit with class C."
"Should I tell everyone that the class lunch is back on?"
"Yeah!"
Uraraka stood up, "Mina!" she shouted at the top of her lungs.
At the other side of the cafeteria, another yell sounded, "What?!"
"Shinsou's here, come over!"
"Oh cool!"
Shinsou tried his best not to sink into his seat, expecting all eyes to be in them. But hardly anyone blinked. As if this was a normal occurrence.
"Do you guys often shout at each other across the room?" Shinsou murmured.
Across from him, Asui nodded, "You'll get used to it, ribbit."
It was then that the table was bombarded with five more students. Ashido at the forefront, "Shinsou hey! Glad you could come!"
Shinsou just blinked, "Uh-"
"I texted everyone else, they're on their way," Kirishima informed them all as he held his phone with one hand, the other gripping onto a grumpy looking Bakugou.
"You know, you don't have to hold my hand all the time."
"Actually, I really do," Kirishima grinned at him.
"Aw there's no space!" Kaminari pouted at the smallish table. Shinsou himself was squashed a little too tightly between Midoriya and Iida, "Ochako come help me get get our table,."
The girl hopped up and followed Kaminari back to where they had left their empty table. They came back with Kaminari pulling the table in the air while Uraraka kept it weightless. The table landed, and Kirishima and Bakugou pushed it right up to the other one.
"You don't mind us stealing you from your other friends, do you?" asked Ashido, "You can tell us to fuck off anytime!"
"You could, but then you'd really be hurting our feelings." Kirishima said, looking at him with wide eyes. The way Bakugou glared at Shinsou made him think that maybe, hurting Kirishima's feelings was not an option.
"Uh, no, it's cool." He muttered.
"Great!" grinned Kirishima.
"You know what," sighed Sero, "We're not gonna be carrying you people's lunch trays just because you're too busy with all your handholding." It's then that Shinsou noticed that Sero and Ashido were each holding two lunch trays. Seemingly their own, and Bakugou and Kirishima's.
"Well tell him that, he won't let go!" Bakugou scowled.
"I don't see you trying very hard to get free, Bakugou," snickered Asui.
"Shut up you stupid frog face!" the blonde exploded. It was amazing how someone could manage to look so angry while cradling the hand of one of the cutest people Shinsou had ever seen.
The others were settled down, and then from the left, Shinsou saw others approaching. Dark Shadow was out, holding a large table in his hands and followed by what looked to be the rest of Class A.
So… when Midoriya said 'Class lunch' he had actually meant the whole class, huh.
"Shinsou, hey!" Hagakure waved. Well, he assumed that she was waving, The arm of her blazer kept flopping around so…
"Good of you to join us," smiled Ojirou.
"Move!" Dark Shadow screeched, as he made to drop the table. Everyone in the way scrambled as the table dropped.
Tokoyami sighed, "Once again, I apologize for-"
"We know what they're like, you don't have to apologize every time, Fumi," Uraraka grinned. Dark Shadow shoved his beak into her heir and Uraraka giggled as she went to sit back down.
"This isn't gonna be a regular thing right?" Jirou spoke up. The rest of the class settled down on the other table, while everyone else shifted in their benches, squeezing together to make space, "Cause I hate eating in here, and this year I got permission to use the school studio during lunch."
"No it's just for today, don't worry Kyouka." Assured Ashido, "We just wanted to have a lunch together on the first day. And also to welcome Shinsou of course!"
Shinsou, who had been trying so hard to stay invisible at this point, was suddenly the center of attention.
Damn it.
"Oh!" Ashido threw her hands up suddenly, "we should have a class party tonight!"
"Mina it is Monday!" Iida glared.
"Yeah but we gotta!" she insisted, "We have a new class mate. Plus, Mineta's gone! Ooh, ooh! We should have two! One for Shinsou tonight, and one for Mineta tomorrow!"
"You have got to chill with all these parties," sighed Shouji.
"But this is necessary!" Ashido looked determined, "It'll be a welcome back to school party, you know?"
"We had one the day we returned to the dorms," Tokoyami sighed.
"Yeah but Shinsou wasn't there so I don't think it should count," Ashido shrugged.
"I don't think that's how it works," frowned Satou.
The class started arguing amongst themselves, some for all the various parties Ashido was planning, and others strongly against them. Shinsou sat staring at his lunch. It didn't help that as Ashido mentioned more and more reasons to have a party, his name just kept coming up.
This was not ideal.
He had already let this get too far. First with coming to the cafeteria. Now everyone showing up for lunch because of him. And now this?
God no. No, this had to stop before he started getting his hopes up.
He waited for a lull in the conversation, and then, binging up all the courage he could muster, Shinsou spoke up.
"This is all very unnecessary," he mumbled. Loud enough to be heard, apparently, because everyone turned to him immediately. He took another internal breath.
"You guys are nice and everything, but before you start planning anything in my honour, you should know that that's not why I'm here. Eyes blinked at him, and Shinsou prepared himself to leave, "I get you guys are close and stuff. But I'm not here to be friends with you people, so leave me out of whatever is it you do, got it?"
"But-"
Shinsou stopped Uraraka with a look, "Seriously. I'm not here to make friends."
The words were thick coming out. He had to admit, he didn't actually want to be saying them, but this was necessary. Now better than later right? He kinda hated that his main instinct was 'reject them before they reject me', but years of conditioning was bound to have it's impact, right?
Right.
Shinsou then made to grab his bag and leave, but was stopped by the most surprising thing he had heard all day.
Todoroki laughed.
It was more of a small snicker, but still. More than Shinsou ever thought he would hear from the boy.
"Not here to make friends," He shook his head, eyes not moving from his bowl, "bold of you to assume you have a choice," he said simply.
Shinsou blinked. Wha-
On the other side of the table, there was a snort, "More than anything, I hate to agree with Icyhot, but yeah. It's too late for you, man," shrugged Bakugou.
Shinsou frowned again. Wha-
"Don't listen to them, Shinsou," Yaoyorozu spoke up, "We are not here to force our friendship onto you. We would never dream of making you a part of something you don't want." She smiled sweetly at him.
"However, she continued. And Shinsou sighed, "Some of the people in this class refuse to let anyone be left out, so if that happens, I'm sorry but I can't help you."
"You are literally one of those people, Yaomomo," Todoroki narrowed his eyes at her.
The girl shook her head, "I have no idea what you're talking about," she insisted.
"You can't get out, eyebags," Bakugou growled from the other side of his table, "They'll never leave you alone, and the next thing you know you're stuck and can't do anything about it."
"Stop pretending you don't love us, Kacchan!" Kaminari yelled back at him.
"Don't fucking call me that!" The angry blonde yelled.
"It's a term of endearment!" Kaminari threw his hands up, "Why won't you let me endear you, Kacchan!" Bakugou tried to stand, but his hand, still in Kirishima's wouldn't let him.
"Only Izuku can call him that, Denki, ribbit," said Asui, "You know that."
Kaminari pouted into his stew, "Yeah yeah, I know."
"Yeah," giggled Hagakure, "Because they're the best of friends."
"No we're not, shut up!"
"Kacchan stop yelling at everyone! They already know we're friends, there's no point in hiding it."
"I'm not your damn friend, Deku," Bakugou growled, with hardly any malice.
"Oh shut up, Bakugou, no one takes you seriously anymore. Not since you issued that public apology." murmured Uraraka.
"Shut the fuck up, round face! We're not supposed to talk about that!" he screamed across at her, "And it wasn't public, it was in the common room!"
"Well we were all there," shrugged Tokoyami.
"Well it's not my fault you damn extra's are all damn eavesdroppers!" he stabbed angrily at his food, turning his rice balls to mush.
"There was a public apology?" Shinsou blinked, not expecting anything like that from Bakugou of all people. He immediately cursed at himself. If he was insisting that he didn't want them as friends, he really shouldn't be participating in conversation like this.
"Oh yes," Aoyama answered him anyway, "Once he started dating Eijirou, Bakugou realized that he was a terrible person and apologized to Izuku for-"
"Shut up you damn glitter boy! He doesn't need to know none of that!"
"He's in our class now, Bakugou, he kinda does," shrugged Satou, Kouda nodding next to him.
"Anyway, it was really sweet, and absolutely hilarious. He looked like he was in pain," sniggered Aoyama.
Shinsou found himself smirking as Bakugou kept growling, "I would have loved to see that."
No no, Hitoshi stop talking!
"Don't worry I've got it on video!" Ashido said helpfully.
"You fucking what?!"
"Guys leave Kacchan alone!" Midoriya waved his arms at his friends, "We all promised not to mention it anymore."
"I did no such thing," Sero shook his head, followed by nods of agreement around the tables.
"Shut your fucking mouths!" Bakugou thundered.
"His vulnerability is supposed to be a secret guys, seriously, stop." Tried Momo
"My what?" the blonde boy almost red in the face, "I'm not fucking vulnerable shut your stupid faces!"
"Embrace it Kacchan," Kaminari grinned. This boy had no fear, "there's nothing wrong with letting us see your sensitive side once in a while. Maybe you should even-"
Kaminari was suddenly interrupted by a loud ringing, and Shinsou closed his eyes. God please no.
The ringing was coming from his pocket, and he was electing to ignore it. Everyone else took the hint and pretended not to hear it. It finally stopped, and Shinsou sighed in relief.
But after ten seconds, the ringing started again, and this time, no one pretended to ignore it.
"You should answer that," said Ojirou.
Shinsou really, really didn't want to, because he had a feeling that he knew who it was.
He pulled out his phone, and yep. It was Yamada. Luckily for him, most of the class had decided to leave him alone and continue with their conversations. Or at lease, pretend to continue.
Shinsou finally answered the phone.
"What?" he all but hissed, eyes darting to everyone else.
"Yes, I'm in the cafeteria," he replied.
"Yes."
"Yes."
"Yes, I'm okay."
"Yes, I'm eating.
"Yes."
"Oh my... yes!"
"Jesus Papa, you gotta chill!"
Shinsou almost didn't realize what he said, until he heard gasped around him, "Guys, shush it's his dad!"
Hitoshi really really hoped his face didn't look as hot as it felt.
"Well if you know I'm with the class then why would you ask me?"
"Ooh it's his dad?" hissed a voice at the table, "Yo Shinsou, pass the weed!" it then cried.
Shinsou snapped a glare to Sero, who was grinning as if he had done nothing wrong.
"No that was just…"
"No.
"No, there's no weed! I'm in the cafeteria!"
"Wha- how can I bring you some weed if there's no weed, Papa for fuck's sake."
"God, I hate you so much."
…
"I know you're not actually crying."
"Stop pretending to cry."
"Papa, come on."
Shinsou looked around. Not surprisingly, all eyes were on him. No one was even pretending anymore. And he really didn't want to finish this conversation with everyone looking at him. He ducked down into his food, hoping that that would muffle his voice somehow.
"Papa, please."
"No, don't tell dad."
"Oh come on."
Shinsou groaned, "Fine, I'm sorry."
"I said I'm sorry!"
"Yeah yeah, whatever. Yeah I love you too, now fuck off."
"Okay bye."
Finally, finally Shinsou was able to hang up. And the class went off.
"Oh my god that was so cute!"
"Shinsou you're adorable!"
"You're gonna make me cry, oh my god!"
Fuck, this really wasn't going how he wanted this to go. He bent over his bowl with a sigh.
"You call your dad, Papa? That's adorable." Smirked Jirou.
"He basically drilled it into me," scoffed Shinsou, "He literally won't answer to anything else."
"So you call one dad 'Papa', and the other one dad?" Midoriya asked, "That makes things less confusing, I guess."
"Two dads, huh?" Sero snickered, "Gay."
"Well yes, that's the whole idea," Shinsou shrugged.
"I'm gonna have my kids all me 'Mom', and confuse them for the rest of their lives." grinned Kaminari.
"For the sake of the rest of the world, Denki, please never have children." Jirou begged.
"Oh, when I get married we're gonna adopt so many kids!" Midoriya beamed, all but hopping in his chair, "Like at least six, so I can start my own cult."
"We?" Uraraka perked up immediately, "You and who, Deku?"
Midoriya blinked as he realized his mistake, "I... wh-... huh? What?"
"You said 'we're gonna adopt'," her grin was almost sinister, "So you already have a husband in mind?"
Midoriya's eyes widened comically, and he went red.
"No that's not what I said! I don't know what you're talking about! I... I... uh..." Midoriya was basically wheezing, to the amusement of everyone at the table.
"You already have a husband in mind?" Todoroki spoke up suddenly, and Midoriya wheezed.
"No I don't!" he waved his hands frantically, "I was just talking about some generic faceless person with no specifications at all!"
Todoroki frowned a bit and then nodded, "Oh. Alright."
It was pretty obvious that Midoriya actually did have a husband. in mind. And the way he absolutely refused to even glance at the boy next to him was very telling.
God, he was so obvious, it hurt.
"I'm gonna go get some water!" he suddenly squeaked, "Anyone want anything? No? Okay!" He leapt out of his seat and all but sprinted out the cafeteria, apparently having already forgotten that he said he wanted water. The table was in stitches.
"I swear to god, he's even dumber than Kaminari." Jirou shook her head.
"Why you always gotta drag me Jirou!"
Next to Shinsou, Todoroki had completely forgotten his meal, opting to stare at the door that Midoriya had disappeared behind.
"Is he alright?"
"No he's not alright, he's a disaster," Kirishima replied. Todoroki frowned, still staring intensely at the door. Was he even going to move until Midoriya came back?
"You dense fucking bastard," Bakugou shook his head, looking personally offended by these two.
"Guys, leave Todoroki alone. Let him have his crush in peace." said Yaoyorozu.
Todoroki, still not looking away from the door, shook his head, "I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Come on, Shouto, don't be embarrassed. Everyone's had a crush on Midoriya at some point," scoffed Shouji.
This time, Todoroki, did look away. He blinked at Shouji with a frown.
"What?"
"That's not true at all," Iida assured him.
"Yeah it is," scoffed Asui.
Tokoyami's eyes narrowed, "Aren't you a lesbian?"
"Yes, ribbit," she replied, "And he is very pretty, like a girl."
The table sniggered and Shinsou shrugged as he picked at his meal.
"Even I've had a crush on Midoriya," he muttered.
The table stared.
"What, really?" gasped Kaminari.
"When he slammed me to the ground at the sports festival? I really felt that." He nodded.
The table laughed, and Shinsou, for some godforsaken reason, felt quite pleased. Until he looked at Todoroki.
He thought his stare before was cold. But it turns out it was just stoic.
This was cold.
"Back. Off." He said quietly. Somehow, everyone heard it, and there was a collective gulp.
Shinsou wasn't frightened. Nope, of course he wasn't. But he explained anyway.
"I said 'had'. Had, like, a year ago."
Todoroki's glare softened, and he nodded, going back to staring at the door, waiting for Midoriya's return.
Iida leaned closer to Hitoshi, "No one's allowed to like Izuku anymore, Todoroki gets upset. I apologize for not informing you earlier."
Shinsou let out a little smile as he nodded, "Thanks for the warning."
When Midoriya returned, with no water, mind you, Todoroki visually relaxed, going back to his soba and smiling when the boy sat down.
The table chatter resumed, and Shinsou returned to his food. He replied when he was spoken to, but didn't initiate anything. He didn't really need to anyway, these people talked enough amongst themselves anyway. He was surprised at himself that he really didn't mind the noise as much as he thought he would.
He was even more surprised to realize that by the time lunch ended and they all trailed back to class, his earlier smile was still plastered on his face. This time, he didn't even try to get rid of it.