Mirio finished helping Oswald get to the office setup for Recovery girl in a minute or so then dropped him and Hado off with a wave goodbye. His smile dropped the moment the door closed and he was alone in the hallway. Mirio sighed, trudging down the hall with a hand on the back of his neck feeling somewhat downtrodden, something that has been happening more often since the beginning of the term.
Don't get him wrong, Mirio was loving U.A, ever since the first day things were just looking up and up in almost every way possible.
There was a bit of a snag at the beginning since he and Sunny were put into different classes. Mirio remembered being so confused when he didn't see Sunny at the opening ceremony and then incredibly worried when he heard about his teacher's expulsion habit. But it didn't matter in the end, as when Mirio got out of the hall he found Sunny and his new friends waiting for him by the gate.
He already knew Hado, but it was still a surprise how Sunny made three whole friends on his own even if Hado had done most of the work. He was glad though that Sunny was making more friends because Sunny deserved to have a lot of friends to back him up and support him, and it wasn't like he and Sunny were any less close with three more people in their group.
But Mirio would be lying if he said he didn't feel, how should he put it… left out sometimes when Sunny and his classmates talked about something that happened during class even if he went through a similar situation since they had the same classes. He wasn't sure if adding Oz into the mix made it better or worse for him, Oz's more sarcastic wit had concerned him at first because he would make comments that were quite the jab to Sunny's self-confidence.
However, Sunny's confidence had taken a boost since coming to U.A. because Sunny seemed to just rebound from them in a few minutes instead of sulking over it for weeks like in Middle school. Sunny was even trying to smile and wave at his friends when they called out to him something Mirio was utterly ecstatic to see for the first time and every time since.
Not that he wasn't close with Sunny's friends either. He and Hado had bonded pretty quickly, Haya was chill enough to be relaxed with, Miyake was… quiet but he was ride or die and didn't give any bad vibes with his closeness to Sunny, Oz wasn't as friendly but that kind of made him just as fun to be around in a weird way.
*If only it was that easy with my own class.* Mirio thought feeling a slight hint of envy. There was this weird disconnect between him and his classmates that started almost instantly with this odd rivalry Vlad-Sensei insisted on fanning the flames of, and his friendship with Sunny seemed to be the breaking point for his more outspoken classmates.
He'd never even consider cutting ties with Sunny which was a reason to isolate him, and it only got worse when he befriended even more of class 1-A. They never said anything to his face but that didn't stop him from hearing all the things they said, or make him feel incredibly unwelcome whenever the teacher left the room. There was a reason he always sat with Sunny and his friends at lunch and never stayed in his class longer than he had to.
Mirio didn't feel sour about it, he really didn't, though… he would often find himself wondering if this animosity was what Sunny felt whenever he tried to interact with people regardless of context due to his anxiety. If it was then Mirio's respect for Sunny had more than tripled for dealing with that kind of intensity every day, especially since he was getting better socially and as well as using his quirk.
That was another thing that made Mirio so inexplicably proud of his best friend for, he thought he understood Sunny's quirk before, but it was another thing to see Sunny running around with Miyake and learning to do things like leap from trees (even if Sunny only did it once), Sunny even seemed to be enjoying running around like a rabbit during their training.
Their friends were also making improvements with their own quirks, Miyake was more focused on helping Sunny, but he made improvements all the same. Hado had learned to focus how she shot her quirk out of her feet in a way that gave her the ability to jump almost two meters straight into the air and she worked on her aim with Haya. Oz worked on lifting things with stretched out limbs and stretching himself out without losing his strength.
Maybe it was because he didn't grow up with them but comparably speaking Sunny's growth since joining U.A was in massive strides in every way possible… especially to his own.
Frowning he lightly beat his fists against his head to get rid of the negative thought, it never worked but it helped distract his thoughts sometimes from going down that path. He didn't want to think like that because thoughts like those were basically seeds to cause a rift between him and Sunny and he refused to let something like that happen.
He didn't want to become bitter over how well Sunny was thriving while he was stagnant. He was still having a hard time going through things and he's had no luck in getting anything to join him going through something. Physically talking he knew he needed to work on himself as well since he got winded too easily after using his quirk.
Mirio also knew he shouldn't be so tough on himself but when he was surrounded by everyone else's successes it was very hard not to feel a twinge of envy and that was normal. He was human and he's going to have bad days but it still made him feel awful, he was Sunny's best friend and a good friend should just be happy and proud of all the things he's done instead of this bittersweet feeling that just seemed to be clinging to him.
So, while he knew it wasn't necessarily healthy to just bury all the feeling he had, Mirio also wasn't going to voice them knowing it would make Sunny feel awful, and Mirio liked to think of it as less as he was burying his feeling and just focusing on the positive ones so the negative thoughts wouldn't drag him down.
"Togata." Someone called and Mirio jumped, he had been lost in thought and scolded himself for being oblivious and immediately turned to who called him with a simple smile on his face. Standing there was Miyake holding a backpack that just seemed to further emphasize Miyake's gigantic proportions.
"Ah, hey Miyake." Mirio greeted with a quick wave and Miyake blinked "Hello." Miyake replied and the two of them stood for a second "How's Sunny and Haya doing?" Mirio asked, seeing as neither of them were there now, even being in different classes he knew how rarely Miyake left Sunny's side.
Miyake gave him a soft thrill "Amajiki is in with Recovery Girl, sprained his arms and Haya is likely helping to set up the games." Miyake answered and Mirio nodded "Yeah that sounds about right, Sunny used Oz's quirk just as much. Oof, my arms burn from thinking about it." He joked and wasn't surprised when Miyake didn't laugh at it, Miyake wasn't all that… reactive? Yeah, reactive was the word he was looking for.
Mirio sometimes wished he could be just as stone-faced in situations, being so unflappable will no doubt be a great asset as a hero "Walk with me to the cafeteria, I want to get something for everyone." Miyake told him and Mirio blinked then nodded "Sure thing buddy, got anything in mind or are we just going to wing it?" Mirio inquired following Miyake.
"I brought some taffy for Oswald, and candied ants to split with Hado and Amajiki from home. I want to see what we can grab from the cafeteria that will be helpful for Amajiki before deciding anything." Miyake answered, briefly showing Mirio what was in the backpack to Mirio, and he spotted the different bags of candy inside.
"Yeah, that will probably be the best idea. We should keep a lookout for any seafood, Sunny can get way more options from them, especially clam, or octopus." Mirio advised, sea-life just had so many adaptations and wasn't all that hard to get a hold of than a bunch of exotic animal cuts, that would probably be illegal to obtain now that he thought of it.
Miyake nodded leaving it at that. Lately Mirio has grown to appreciate how accepting Miyake was of Sunny's little quirks, Sunny has never been the popular kid and Mirio wouldn't change a single thing about his best friend because Sunny was an amazing person he was blessed to have met.
But as he quickly learned, people weren't as generous as Miyake was. They saw Sunny's shyness and anxiety and normally left him to his own devices which was fine. But there were people out there that just seemed determined to twist everything to make it as if Sunny was a creepy weirdo like it was their life's mission or something.
Sunny had some kinks, sure he couldn't look anyone in the eye, and he suffered from the occasional bout of pica from his quirk but he was still Mirio's precious little shy bean, and he couldn't understand why so few people could see that. It was like when people got all weird when he told them that his dad had planned to be a single parent from the beginning, and that his biological mother was just a surrogate his dad hired.
Sunny was the first person not to get super weird about his dad and Sunny's classmates were all chill about it, well… Hado had a bunch of questions, but she wasn't being invasive or intentionally offensive about it, just curious, but Miyake set her straight really quick like any other time she was being pushy.
Speaking of setting people straight, Mirio jumped when Miyake suddenly wrapped his tail around his waist and pulled him close, much like he would with Sunny. Brought out of his thoughts Mirio saw the corner he was about to run into if Miyake hadn't acted. "Ah, sorry about that Miyake, I can be a bit of a ditz sometimes." Mirio quickly apologized, his hand going back to his neck.
Miyake stared at him "You're not a ditz, you just need to work on your situational awareness, having a quirk that lets you go through anything would make it difficult to avoid things when your body's natural instinct to go through anything in your way." Miyake told him and it made Mirio's heart twinge, his dad would always say that, and he knew his dad would know since they shared a quirk, but it seemed that as far as everyone else cared he was clumsy, and he got tired of trying to explain it.
"Thanks Miyake." Mirio replied, waving off the touching moment and continued to the cafeteria. Getting there he and Miyake spent like five minutes going over what to get everyone, well it was mostly him struggling to pick stuff for their friends while Miyake was patiently indulging him.
When Mirio was satisfied the two of them started heading down to the student boxes since Miyake said they'd be eating there, Mirio was happily trailing after Miyake carrying the other tray for Miyake, only to pause when he stood outside his class's booth *Right, I'll have to sit there instead.* Mirio reminded himself, his shoulder sagging as he thought of how unpleasant it was going to be.
"Togata." Miyake called and Mirio snapped his head towards the boy "Yes- Yes Miyake?" Mirio sputtered wincing at how loud his voice started out and faked a cough "Do you want to sit with us in the 1-A booth?" Miyake asked taking Mirio aback.
"Huh?! W-wait really? I mean, is that okay? Like with your class and all won't mind?" Mirio questioned and Miyake shrugged "It's not like you're going to be taking up someone's seat." Miyake answered and Mirio's heart was doing somersaults at the thought of watching with all five of his friends instead of his nineteen classmates.
"Then, sure. I'd love to!" Mirio quickly agreed with a new wave of vigor as he continued to 1-A's booth, not noticing Miyake had yet to move or the look Miyake gave the door to 1-B's booth before he followed after the blonde.