Hey everyone! Sorry for the late update. Just kept forgetting to get around to uploading.
Thank you so much for all the reviews, favorites and follows! They are much appreciated.
TWs for this chapter are referenced Transphobia, Gender Dysphoria and Panic Attacks. If any of these are a trigger for you, please put your comfort first.
"OK, Ei! You can do this. Just focus. You can do that. Right? Yeah, totally. I can definitely do that. Wait, is it weird that I'm talking to myself. Or….'thinking to myself?' Ah, it's probably nothing."
Shaking his head, Kirishima began attempting to once more attempt at reading through his studies. The tutoring with Bakugou had been helping a lot, got his grade up by about 20%. But Kirishima didn't like relying on Bakugou too much. Especially with all she was dealing with. She didn't need any extra pressure.
Speaking the words out loud as he read through his textbook, Quirks and their Effect on the World, Kirishima was doing his damndest to memorize everything on the page.
"In the year 2008, the first person to user of a Hydrokenisis Quirk, Cross-Streams, emerged in the city of Madrid. Using their power to distil and reconfigure the local water of their stream, they managed to provide clean water for the entire city. This caused economic issues, as the Water Purifying companies of the city were losing income due to Cross-Streams actions. To remedy this, the two sides agreed to-"
Any further researched on the now famous Water-Purifying contractor, Cross-Streams, was lost when Kirishima's head collapsed on the book, slamming it on the table.
"How the hell does Bakugou manage all of this?"
While her grades had always been a point of admiration for Kirishima, how Bakugou had been managing to keep them up with everything going on in her life only caused that admiration to skyrocket. Kirishima couldn't believe that she was somehow still scoring in the 90 percentile score.
It was almost like there were two sides to Bakugou. The one she showed the Class-1A and everyone else. The gruff, rude and frankly anti-social loner who strived to succeed at everything she did. Someone who was likely to curse you out when you talked to her. If she didn't physically attack you in response.
And then there was the girl that only Kirishima saw. The one he saw on that night when she came to his room with a bleeding hand and a mysterious bag, looking terrified as if her world was crumbling down around her. The one she saw that night when Bakugou finally tried on the shoes. The one who'd go from confident to withdrawn in an instant. Not to say she still wasn't gruff in those moments. She wouldn't be Bakugou if she wasn't.
Bringing his head up, Kirishima decided to try attempting to finish the paragraph he was reading. After about half a second, he decided that was a lost cause.
Getting up from his desk, he noticed a piece of white paper with tiny black writing typed on it.
The receipt. From the heels he got Bakugou.
"God. She loved those." A smile came onto Kirishima's face momentarily, but left as soon as it arrived. There was no question that Kirishima supported Bakugou. But he'd be lying if he said he knew everything about being Trans.
Transgender. Kirishima had only heard it in passing throughout his life. Be it on the news. Or when his sister came home from her LGBT+ Meetings. He was never quite sure what it was. When it came to his circle of friends in his old high school, he only heard hints of it. And it was never anything kind. Ugly words thrown about them. Words that Bakugou repeated to herself. If Kirishima had known how hateful those words had been when his friends uttered them, how much they hurt Bakugou, he definitely wouldn't have stayed silent.
That night, when he learned that Bakugou was really a girl, Kirishima wasn't sure what to do. He wanted to be there for his friend, but he didn't have a clue how. He had never seen Bakugou break down. For all the time they knew each other, Bakugou was like paragon of manliness to him.
"Ei, don't say shit like that about her. She's a girl. Gotta stop throwing that word around." Kirishima shook his head at his casual use of his catch-phrase to describe Bakugou. The incorrect use.
To find out she had this inside her, this whole other part that Kirishima couldn't imagine….Kirishima would've never have expected.
But that's Bakugou. Has a Fort Knox armoury around her emotions. Afraid that showing she hurt was a weakness. It wasn't as if she thought that she had to do that to be strong, right? Freakin' All Might, the best of the best, was open about being nervous or vulnerable. Hell, Aiazawa gave a lecture on the importance of letting others know how you feel.
Although, it didn't really help that Aiazawa did it from his bed-roll. How does he even stand in that…
Kirishima had to resist the urge to just hug Bakugou and let her know that it was OK to cry sometimes. That it wasn't a big deal to have moments like she did during the night last week.
But Kirishima was aware that hugging Bakugou would most likely have consequences. Explosive ones, to be exact.
*Knock! Knock! Knock!*
Hearing the knock, Kirishima checked the clock. 7:00 PM. They were planning to have their weekly movie night at 8. Thanks to lucky straw picks, Seto and Kaminari got lucky enough to pick the movie for the night. Probably some comedy with Seth Rogen or something.
Thinking it was probably Ashido coming to tell him his job for the night, Kirishima picked up a blue hoodie off the back of a chair and quickly threw it on as he opened the door.
"Be there now, Ashi- Waaaahhhhhhhhhh!"
As soon as the door opened, a hand shot through the gap between it and the wall. Quickly clamping over Kirishima's mouth, the hand pushed him back into his room, the girl it belonged to following it.
After she had entered the room, Bakugou swiftly swung the door back shut, removing her hand as she did so from Kirishima.
"Did you have to do that? I'm gonna have the smell of your hand in my nose for the rest of the night!"
"My hand smells like fucking roses. You're lucky." Placing an ear to the door, Bakugou seemed to be listening to check if anyone was outside. Why she didn't just check before barging in, Kirishima didn't know. Bakugou was dressed slightly different today. A leather jacket bearing a few metal beads over the sleeves was adorned. The most noticeable difference was that fact that Bakugou had a beanie on her head, a grey one to be exact.
"Well, what's up?" Kirishima's goofy grin stretched across his face as he recovered from the impromptu visit. "Excited for movie night?"
While her back was facing him, Kirishima could tell Bakugou was rolling her eyes.
"Oh, yeah (!) I'm real excited to watch a movie with a bunch of fucking idiots as they laugh at fart jokes or some shit like that." A quick grumble under her breath followed this, before Bakugou finally pushed off the door and faced Kirishima.
Besides the change in attire, not much seemed different with Bakugou. Same frowning expression. Same tired eyes. Yup, that's a Bakugou!
"You know, you don't have to be search a jerk about everyone. They DID invite you. It would be nice if you tried to be a little friendlier." Kirishima placed hand on the wall, focusing his eyes on Bakugou. Whatever Bakugou needed throughout her transistion, Kirishima was there for her. But she would not, and would never put up with her bad mouthing the rest of the class.
This time, Kirishima got a full sight of Bakugou rolling her eyes to high heaven, given a dismissive grunt to emphasize it.
"Look, I'm not having this conversation right now. I need you to come with me." Pulling at her hat, Bakugou seemed to be attempting to not show her hair. This struck Kirishima as odd. She was generally pretty proud of her hair.
"Where we going?" Kirishima tried to keep the confusion out of her voice. He had been planning on having just another 'Thursday Movie Night' with everyone. Not quite expecting to go on a trip somewhere. Especially with Bakugou.
"I'll tell you on the way. Just fuckin' come on!" Nudging her head towards the door, Bakugou began to give off an impatient growl. There was obviously something important about where they were going.
And Kirishima wasn't about to leave before he knew where.
"No, tell me now. Look, you can't just come in her, out of the blue, and expect me to follow yo-"
"Got time?"
Cut short by the interruption, Kirishima blinked in surprise. For as long as they established that code-word, he had been the only one to use it. They had pretty much decided that it meant that Kirishima was going to ask a Trans-related question.
The disgruntled look on Bakugou's face showed that she wasn't happy about having to use the word.
"OK." Kirishima conceded. "Just let me get my shoes on."
Bakugou didn't respond, instead just pacing back and forth in front of the door, agitated. Definitely somewhere important. Kirishima was honestly getting curious about where they were going. It was something related to the Transistion. Why else would Bakugou use the code-phrase?
"Unless he's decided that it was a mistake telling me and is planning to murder me so no one knows? Nah, that's crazy talk. But still…."
"Hey, Bakugou." Kirishima began, looking up from his laces. "You're not regretting telling me you're a girl and are now planning to murder me so no one will know? Are you?"
Giving the Kirishima the most 'What the fuck are you thinking' look, Bakugou brought a hand to the bridge of her nose.
"Believe me. If I wanted to kill you, you'd be fuckin' dead."
"Whelp! That's all I need to hear!"
The bus ride into the city centre was pretty quiet. A few people were scattered across the seats. Not too crowded, so no-one had to stand. A man reading a newspaper sat in the front. A woman with child was sitting across from them, the woman making baby-talk with her child. The baby gave a small wave towards Kirishima, which he made sure to return.
They had been gone out of the Dorm for about thirty minutes, but still no explanation from Bakugou.
As he was about to ask, Bakugou reached up towards her head and tentatively took off her beanie. Kirishima was expecting to see her blonde hair.
Not her blonde hair with violet blotches on scattered throughout the space of it. Like someone shot a purple coloured paintball gun at her hair. This nearly made Kirishima laugh, but he managed to stifle it.
"Hey." Beginning awkwardly, Kirishima was pretty sure that it would just be as awkward to ignore as to bring it up. "You're hair looks really cool! I like how you styled it."
"You're a shit liar." Bakugou practically grumbled this into her hand as she placed in on her chin to rest on the buses window still.
"Was looking up tips on my chat-thing. How to help when I start feeling crappy about…." Bakugou looked at Kirishima and used her free hand to gesture to her body. "Some dipshit in the group said dying my hair might help. Found a dumbass giving advice on Utube for dying. Fucker didn't know what he was talking about." Trying to smooth out her hair, Bakugou seemed to be nearly trying to wipe out the purple spots of it.
Kirishima took all of this in. The group chat was familiar. Bakugou had mentioned that she had joined one recently. Transformers, it was called. She also mentioned that she had gotten over ten warnings and one temporary ban about her behaviour on it. Still, talking to people like her seemed to help.
"Ah, Bakugou. You coulda asked me for help. I've been doin mine myself since High School." It was a point of pride how much skill Kirishima had gained in styling his hair. During the early try outs, he had a few incidents like Bakugou was going through right now.
Waving a dismissive hand, Bakugou didn't seem to really take what Kirishima asked into consideration. There it was again. Refusing to ask for help.
"Whatever. I just didn't want any of the idiots in the Dorm to see me."
"They're not idiots! Bakugou, you can't just keep being mean to your friends all the time."
"Fucking watch me." A hint of a smile appeared on Bakugou's face.
"I'm serious. One of these days, you're really gonna hurt someone's feelings." Leaning in so they're at eye level, Kirishima continued. "They're good guys. You should give them a chance."
The smile quickly disappearing, Bakugou switched to a more aggressive expression, bearing her teeth.
"Good Guys? How fucking good you'd think they'd be if they found out about me?"
"That's not fair, Bakugou. None of them would have a problem with you." While Kirishima only thought the best of his friends, part of him could see where Bakugou was coming from. When it came to this, being careful was how you stay safe. You don't know how anyone truly feels about this until they come face-to-face with it.
Letting out something of an irritated groan, one that dismissed Kirishima's optimism, Bakugou refocused on looking out the window.
"Not everyone's as fucking great about it as you are."
This caused a momentary pause in Kirishima.
"You…..You think I'm doing great?" There was times that Kirishima was worried he was doing horribly at this. Like the incident with the paper in class. Sure, that day had a happy ending. But if something had gone wrong, Kirishima wasn't sure if Bakugou would have ever forgiven her. Hell, Kirishima wasn't sure if he would have forgiven himself.
Letting out another groan, although less angry this time, Bakugou half-turned back to Kirishima.
"Oh for the love of! Don't get all fucking sappy. We're in public for Christ's sake." Letting out a sigh, Bakugou seemed to be trying the calming techniques she had learned, albeit an accelerated version.
"Yes, you're doing great. There's a reason I brought you with me tonight."
Hearing that, this reminded Kirishima of what he was going to ask Bakugou before she took her hat off.
"You still haven't told me where we're going."
A few moments of silence passed between them before Bakugou replied.
"The Community Centre. The one on Blue Street."
Kirishima left a space for Bakugou to expand on this. When he got no reply, he decided to dig further for himself.
"And we're going there for…..?"
"Support group." This came out quickly and quietly from Bakugou, almost if she was trying to make sure Kirishima both did and didn't hear it. When she noticed he did from the change of expression on his face from confusion to concern, she continued.
"Someone in the Group-Chat lives in the city. Found out I lived near and told me there was a group nearby for people like us. Like me." This seemed to be all Bakugou was going to say on the matter, but one thing was still bugging Kirishima.
"But, why am I coming? Am I allowed?" Kirishima only had a broad understanding of how LGBT+ groups worked. He was only around ten when his sister went to one. And even then, he only ever went to a Relatives Centred meeting they held that year. Kirishima had no idea what was happening at the meeting besides the fact it had a buffet table.
"Yes, you're allowed. I wouldn't be fuckin' stupid enough to bring you if you weren't."
"You still didn't answer my question." Kirishima faced forward in the bus, worried that he was putting too much pressure on Bakugou. "Why did you want me to come?"
This was rewarded only with silence from Bakugou, as she placed her hands on her knees. Seeming to be actively ignoring.
"Bakugou." Kirishima began. "Are you…nervous about going?"
No change, barring a slight tightening of Bakugou's fists. Yup, she was nervous.
"Because that's OK! I get nervous all the time." This was one of the opening's Kirishima was looking for. To let his friend know it was OK to be honest about this stuff. "Lemme tell ya, on my first day of High-School, I was so fricken terrified of starting there. Worried the other kids would make fun of my teeth. So, my sister had to walk me into the room and sit down with me for the first ten minutes of class!" Kirishima let out a quick, but good natured laugh at his story. Trying to lighten the mood a bit with Bakugou.
Once again, there was little change to Bakugou's demeanour. But Kirishima could swear he saw the slight twitch of a smile when he told that tale. To Kirishima, that's a mark in the win column.
The bus came to a rather sudden stop in the road, nearly sending Kirishima falling into the back of the seat in front.
"We're here." Bakugou's first words in the last fifteen minutes. After giving Kirishima a look, she began nudging him to get up and let her out of her seat.
As they were walking down the aisle, Kirishima noticed the baby from before pointing at Bakugou's hair, the mother trying to stop her child from pointing. Bakugou either didn't see it or was just too preoccupied to care. Usually, something like that would earn a pretty loud, swear-filled rant from her.
Paying their ticket fee, the two hopped off the bus onto the curb. It was getting dark pretty early, the stars in the sky giving a nice ambiance to the night. They worked well in conjunction with the street lights.
"Nice night." A familiar non-response was given to Kirishima's comment. Bakugou seemed to be more focused on what was in front of them then was surrounding them.
The Community Centre was well built. Solid red bricks formed the foundation of it, with strongly placed window giving a strong feel to the stature. Above the door, a wooden sign stating "Blue Community Centre" hung from a chain attached on the building.
A small crowd was forming in front of the door, sitting and standing around the stairs that led up to the entrance. About five or six people, all around their age. Each one an individual unto themselves. One was a girl with long white hair falling down to her shoulders. Another person had over four septum piercings in their nose. Kirishim winced slightly at how much that might've hurt. A man with a tattoo of a flaming dragon flowing down his arm turned his head up as the duo approached, quickly getting up and approaching them. Once he reached the two, he held out a greeting hand.
"First time?" A friendly smile that was on his face gave Kirishima a good feeling about this guy. "I'm Zach. We're just waiting for the Peer Educator to get here. He has the keys. You perfectly welcome to sit with us." Zach gestured a thumb back towards the group.
Bakugou, while originally been looking straight at the building, was now focusing on anything other than Zach. Kirishima was right to notice Bakugou was nervous.
"We'd love too." Kirishima nodded eagerly at Zach, and then leaned into Bakugou's ear.
"It's OK if you want us to wait somewhere else." A slight worry had come over Kirishima as he had agreed to Zach's offer. A worry that he had been pressuring or being too pushy towards Bakugou. While he had only looked up recently how to support a friend going through a Transistion, one important factor he learned was that you had to let your friend take it at their own pace. Not yours.
Fortunately for Kirishima, Bakugou looked up at his face, gave a quick dismissive grunt and moved towards the group, with Kirishima quickly following.
As they joined up with the rest of the people attending the meeting, Kirishima and Bakugou were greet with "Hey" "How you doin? "First time? You'll be fine."
The faces became a bit more clearer when they got close. The girl with white hair had a purple eyeliner colouring her eyes. The same shade as Bakugou's hair, but Kirishima knew better than to mention that. The person with the septum piercings had a somewhat lopsided bob. Kirishima put that hairstyle in the 'consider for myself later' folder.
Another girl, standing next too-
Oh.
The wide eyed panic of Bakugou showed that she recognized the person sitting across from them as well. The green hair. Crouched stance. Bow tied hair.
Kirishima could recognized Tsuyu from anywhere. As could Bakugou.
In their defence, Tsuyu seemed to be just as surprised as them, her mouth hanging slightly agape. Kirishima knew that Tsuyu left the Dorm one night a month. She always said it was just a regular thing with a friend from school.
A hurried breathing from Bakugou next to him took all of Kirishima's attention. This was a sign. A precursor to her bad panic attacks.
Gently putting an arm around her shoulder, something Bakugou would never let him do normally, Kirishima brought Bakugou down into a seating position at the left, outside of the stairs.
"Hey, Girl." Kirishima whispered, knowing how using feminine pronouns and references helped Bakugou feel more comfortable. He only hoped that this would be enough. "It's OK. It's OK. Just breathe. In for five seconds. Out for five seconds." Kirishima began starting the breathing himself, which Bakugou began to follow after a few seconds hesitation.
The rest of the people there look at them with concern, but kept their difference. From the expressions they wore, Bakugou wasn't the first person to have a moment like this here. And probably wouldn't be the last.
Wait, someone was missing from the group.
Hearing the sound of someone crouching down next to them, Kirishima was slightly taken by surprise by Tsuyy appeared. A more calmer face replaced the surprised one from a few minutes.
"Hey, Bakugou." Tsuyu started softly. "I ain't gonna tell anyone if you don't." While this seemed to be a casual statement, the atmosphere, place and tone of Tsuyu's voice spoke to what it truly was. A trust between the two of them, not quite ready to tell the people they knew about they were just yet.
And to Kirishima's delight, it did more than he possibly could to help Bakugou.
The breathing becoming more steady and regulated, Bakugou's eyes began to seem less excited and anxious. Looking up, she gave Tsuyu a quick nod of respect, before grabbing a bannister from the stairs and pulling herself up.
Kirishima attempted to help her, but a raised hand stopped him.
"I'm fine. I'm fucking fine, OK." Bakugou may have intended for this to sound like one of her normal grumpy 'I don't need anyone' remarks, but the fact that it came from a tired and quiet voice ruined the effect.
The three of them made their way back over to the group. Zach handed a water bottle to Bakugou, which she accepted without a word. Kirishima was amazed by the silent understanding of everyone here. Honestly, he was in awe of it.
Bakugou and Kirishima sat at the left side, resting their backs on the supporting pipes for the bannister. Tsuyu sat down opposite from them, quickly starting a conversation with the white haired girl.
Leaning in towards Bakugou, who was tentatively sipping the water bottle, Kirishima kept his voice down low enough so no one else could hear.
"If you wanna leave, just say the word."
Taking a longer drink of the water, Bakugou let it sit down next to her.
"I told you, I'm fine." Bakugou brought the bottle to her mouth again, taking another swig
"Besides, I got you here, don't I?" A weak smirk appeared on Bakugou's face, as she offered the water bottle to Kirishima.
Returning with a smile of his own, Kirishima took his own drink from it.
"You know I'm proud of you, right?"
Hearing Bakugou's trademark groan was a welcome sound to Kirishima's ears.
"What did I say about sappy shit?"
A low chuckle came from Kirishima, which Bakugou soon joined.