**I do not own these characters or the world, that belongs to our lovely author of MHA, Kohei Horikoshi. Also, cover art was a commission by me from the artist Krumbs. Follow them on if you'd like! They are extremely talented!
Twenty-three
But Math Homework Is Evil
Izuku sat staring at his math homework. Math hadn't ever really been something that he particularly struggled with, though tonight he seemed to be having quite a hard time with it. The particular problem before him wasn't that hard, he just couldn't seem to make his mind solve the equation.
(-7+i)(-3+6i)
He stared at the equation and squeezed his eyes shut. Okay Izuku, order of operations. Negative seven times negative three equals positive twenty-one, multiply the same negative seven by the 6i to get 42i which gives the first part of the equation toward solution, 21-42i. His mind drew a blank at the next step. Order of operations meant that he had to multiply i by the negative three and the 6i but that meant that there'd be a 6i squared…what did i squared mean?
Why couldn't he focus? This wasn't a hard math problem that should've been this difficult for him. No matter how hard he tried though, his mind wouldn't focus on calculating the solution.
Uraraka's face popped up in his mind then, distracting him even further. It was quarter past eight o'clock and he'd not heard from her. His training with Kacchan and All Might hadn't taken that long, but it had occupied a few hours and even after that passage of time he'd not heard from her or seen her return. They were just going shopping, right? Did shopping with other girls normally take this long? He didn't really know.
His mind kept wandering back to the events earlier in the day, the awkward consent presentation. She'd said yes to him during that painful encounter…did that mean that she wanted to have sex with him? No! Stop thinking that and think about your stupid math homework, he chastised himself.
21-42i-3i+6i squared.
Why couldn't he remember what i squared equated?! Was background thinking of Uraraka really that distracting?! And why couldn't he stop thinking about the stupid consent garbage from earlier in the day? Just because she'd said yes in that pretend scenario didn't mean that she actually wanted to have sex with him or had even thought about it. Why were thoughts of her so distracting? Had they always been this way? No, but they're this way now so get used to it, a snide little voice inside of him snapped in response.
His phone suddenly buzzed from the side of his desk. Deku practically jumped at the loud buzzing sound. Was it All Might? His mom? Kacchan sending him a photo of his middle finger? Mineta sending a picture of his poop? Uraraka? The prospect of Uraraka texting him made him excited but also made him nervous.
Since her walking in on him in a most revealing way had happened, he'd made sure to have his phone well within ear shot so he could both hear and see who was texting him. He had no desire to have a repeat of that embarrassing event. He also always locked the door now. Though if he was being honest, in some ways he was glad it had happened. If she hadn't walked in on him then they wouldn't be as they were now. The relationship they shared wouldn't be on the precipice of changing. Not that he was all that certain of the direction it was going.
Deku picked up his phone and gazed at the sender. It was Uraraka!
2017 Hey Deku! Sorry it's taken me this long to get back to you. The shopping took a little while and the trip back also took as little bit of time. I know I still owe you an explanation for this morning and I want to do that. How about I do my homework for about an hour and then we see if we can meet up to talk. Does that sound okay?
Giddily, Deku wrote, "sure thing!"
After he'd sent that message, he realized that he'd not be able to finish his math homework. If he was going to have a nighttime meet up with Uraraka, well he certainly wasn't going to be able to focus on his remaining homework. Where could they even meet up? Probably downstairs in the common room would be the safest, though he knew that Jairo was often down there quite late. They wouldn't be able to have a truly private conversation. He couldn't have her in his room though and he couldn't go to her room. Not after Mr. Aizawa's warning that morning.
He looked back at his math problem and sighed. He'd have to finish that sometime. Just as he had that thought the solution abruptly dawned on him. 6i squared or rather i squared equaled a negative one. From there the solution flowed easily: 15-45i.
With that done he was able to close his math notebook and then began to nervously pace around his room. He briefly considered going to the bathroom to freshen up but decided against that. That seemed like a silly idea. It wasn't like he was going to go on a date or something.
Instead, he lined up some of his All Might action figures on his desk and then moved to the other side of the room and practiced carefully reaching out with black whip to grab hold of them. He'd done this kind of practice in the past and it had gone very poorly. He lacked good control, and the finite control needed to carefully wrap around one of his action figures was more than he'd been able to muster.
However, he was able to grab hold of most of them without much difficulty now. His training with Kacchan and All Might as well as his work studies, was clearly paying off. He'd need to continue to practice religiously if he wanted to maintain the dark energy for more than a few seconds. To exert a level of precision, something akin to how Mr. Aizawa handled his binding cloths, would continue to take lots of practice.
Izuku had been super impressed at Shinso's use of the binding cloth when class 1-A and 1-B had faced off. It was clear that Shinso was nowhere near Mr. Aizawa's level, but he was far more proficient with the binding cloth than Deku was with his own black whip. He'd gotten better, but he lacked the ability to use it long term and was still not so great with grabbing hold of smaller objects that required more precision.
He'd also been working on different styles for black whip. In theory, it was not unlike Mr. Aizawa's binding cloths or Asui's tongue or even Sero's tape. Why couldn't he employ such tactics? Surely, if he practiced enough and put in effort he could potentially incorporate their styles into practice. Speaking of Asui and Sero, it might be beneficial if they attended one of his impromptu training sessions with All Might and Kacchan.
That thought gave him another idea; what if he practiced with Uraraka too to gain more mastery over floating midair? All Might was certain that the seventh users quirk would manifest soon and who better to help him prepare for that than someone who's quirk was all about floating? Plus, it would mean that he could train with Uraraka…of course, Kacchan and All Might and probably Sero and Asui would all be there, but she'd be there too. That thought alone was enough to make him knock over one of his action figures instead of capturing it. Oops. After setting the fallen All Might figure back up, he returned to his place on the other side of the room to continue practicing.
As Deku thought about his training and the slow but steady progression of his black whip training, he began trying to shoot multiple tendrils of black whip out at once—trying to grab several action figures in one go. He watched, beaming with pride, as multiple tendrils shot out at his command and latched themselves around the various All Mighlt figures. That pride was quickly deflated though as the tendrils of dark energy became frazzled and chaotic, failing to maintain hold on the action figures.
He continued to practice like that, his mind now completely focused on the dark energy, everything else far away. Without even realizing it, an hour and a half had elapsed without him even realizing it until he heard the telltale sound of his phone buzzing from the desk.
Acting more on instinct than anything else, he projected a single tendril of energy that wrapped itself around his phone and then snapped back to him. For half a second Deku felt nervous that he might've broken his phone since there were times when he exerted too much pressure with black whip and crushed the object he was trying to pull to him. Not that that had ever happened to a person, though there had been one time when he'd been training and had successfully latched onto Kacchan's arm with too much force resulting in a curse from his friend that had immediately caused the dark energy to dissipate. Black whip seemed to be highly influenced by emotions including things like anxiety and insecurity. If he felt even the slightest bit insecure about something, black whip would start fizzle.
Thankfully, he'd not damaged his phone when he brought it over from the desk. He looked down at the screen and was delighted to see a message from Uraraka.
2142 Deku! Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I got caught up with my homework. I had a lot of it from missing class this morning. It's kinda late and I'm not sure we should meet up like we did last time. What do you think?
Deku reread the message and thought to himself. It was a bit late and after Mr. Aizawa's warning he was less enthused about having another person in his room with him, especially after hours…especially a girl. Not that he wouldn't have been delighted to have her in his room with him again, he just wasn't sure if it was a wise idea, but he did want to talk to her.
He began composing a message. "Hey Uraraka! I'm not sure what we should do. We could go downstairs to spend some time together but I think Jiro will be down there. She seems to stay up pretty late most days. We could try to do like we did last time but I'm kind of nervous about that since Mr. Aizawa made a point of telling us not to have people in our rooms after hours."
He sent that message away and continued to ponder places they could go to have a nice chat. Not that anything they were going to talk about would need to be that private. It was more so just a preference. He wanted to spend time with her without interruptions and what if he decided he wanted to hold her hand or that he wanted to hug her? It would probably cause whoever they were around to start asking a lot of questions and make things embarrassing.
His phone buzzed again pulling him out of his inner thoughts. Uraraka had responded.
2148 Mr. Aizawa went over that in class this morning?! Really!?
Izuku's eyebrows raised curiously. Why was she surprised by that? What did she know?
2149 Deku: Yeah he did. He made a point of telling us that at the start of class. It seemed a little out of the blue.
2150 How about we FaceTime? Like with laptops since I don't have a smart phone. Momo loaned me a laptop a few months ago so we can chat face to face while following the rules with our rooms being after hours.
A blush rose to Izuku's cheeks. She wanted to FaceTime? Like camming? No, not camming you pervert! An inner voice scolded. Right. Just face to face communication like how he'd have a FaceTime chat with his mom over his phone or through the computer. It made sense and was a good idea that allowed them to follow the rules.
But my room, she'll see my room, he began thinking to himself in a nervous panic before snorting at himself. She'd already seen his room. In fact, she'd slept in his room. He doubted that if she could see his room in the background that would be particularly offensive considering their recent history. Besides, if he was that embarrassed at his surroundings, he could always blur his background.
2153 Deku: Okay, that's a great idea Uraraka! Give me five minutes to get my laptop set up.
2153 Okay!
Deku hurriedly dug around in his backpack until he pulled out the laptop. He quickly hooked it up to the power cord and started to boot it up. He'd never really done a face to face, or FaceTime, with a girl other than his mom…let alone a girl he liked. This was exciting! It was like going on a secret date!
That thought gave him butterflies and made another blush rise to his cheeks. Did it count as a date? Was it actually a date? Was she actually okay with that? She'd been the one to suggest it so she must have been okay with it…then again, maybe she didn't realize the implication of it. Wait. Was there an implication associated with it? Was he making a mountain out of a mole hill?
He continued to entertain similar nervous thoughts as he mechanically set up his computer and booted up a video chat app. His mind was still spinning with the possibilities that Uraraka had inadvertently agreed to some virtual date and would be horribly embarrassed once they actually started chatting, when her face suddenly popped up on the screen and smiled at him.
"Hey Deku!" She'd said cheerfully, startling him out of his nervous thought spiral.
"Uraraka! Oh, uh hi!" He said, cheeks flushed, eyes wide. Why did he feel so embarrassed? It wasn't like she was actually in his room or like he was actually doing something bad.
On the screen before him, Uraraka smiled at him. She looked like her usual cheerful self and didn't look particularly embarrassed which made him feel a little bit better. Maybe it was just a normal conversation between friends. They were friends after all….but they were also something more than just friends.
"Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I had a lot of homework to do and I guess I didn't realize that it would take me as long as it did," she said apologetically.
"Oh that's okay. I don't mind," Deku replied.
"I didn't realize that we'd also be shopping as long as we did. I wanted to be done a lot sooner than we were. So sorry about that too," she continued to apologize.
He didn't like that. Why was she apologizing so much? Sure, they'd agreed to chat with one another, but that didn't mean she had to curtail her activities to accommodate him.
"No, it's okay Uraraka. I don't mind, honestly I'm fine with it. Did you have fun at least or find some fun stuff to buy?" He asked as cheerfully as he could.
Now a flush rose to her cheeks that surprised him. Why was that a subject that would make her blush?
"Uh, yeah, I did, and it was fun for the most part, we uh, I, uh—we saw Mirko there!"
"Really?! That must've been pretty cool. Did she look like she was doing hero work or just uh, doing her own thing?" Deku asked, seriously interested.
"No, she wasn't in her hero costume and looked like she was just out shopping like we were. She recommended a place for Hado to go shopping, since Hado is like well, she's kind of built curvy like Mirko is," Uraraka said with another blush to her cheeks.
This time Deku blushed. He recalled when he and Lemillion had been going around together during the school festival and had seen Hado dressed up and getting ready for the beauty contest. She'd been so close to him and in that extremely revealing dress with her cleavage up front and center. He'd barely been able to look at her without his cheeks furiously reddening. Lemillion had had to finish his sentence for him he'd been so tongue tied by those large spherical orbs practically bouncing in his face.
"Oh, ah, yeah, that makes sense, haha," Deku said with a forced laugh. Thinking about the voluptuous figure in his face made him remember the flashing of Uraraka's belly last week. He had to try very hard to refrain from turning an even deeper shade of red.
"Anyway, yeah," Uraraka said awkwardly, clearly trying to break the silence.
Say something Izuku, don't make it weird!
"So uh, you were going to tell me about what happened this morning? Why you were in the infirmary?" He asked conversationally.
"Oh yeah…that," Uraraka said with eyes closed, forced smile, blush in her cheeks.
"So, what happened?" He asked curiously.
Uraraka took a big breath in. "Okay it's really stupid but yesterday night Momo showed us a birth video—apparently we're all going to have to watch it at some point so be prepared—that was really awful and several of us were on the couch including me and Bakugo. He'd fallen asleep like maybe five minutes after the video had been started so he didn't have to see all the, uh, graphic stuff the rest of us saw. I watched a lot of it but I didn't want to watch much more so I closed my eyes and kind of fell asleep and when I woke up it was just Bakugo and me on the couch with Jiro across from us. Bakugo had, er, well, he'd gotten closer to me while he slept so he was kind of leaning on my shoulder and I didn't want to wake him up since I thought he'd be angry and explode my face or something so I came up with a really stupid plan to float him upstairs to his room since I thought it would be irresponsible to leave him floating over the couch when releasing him could potentially hurt him if he drifted away from the couch. Jiro agreed to help me and we managed to get him up to his room but I kind of miscalculated things and when I released both Bakugo and Jiro—oh I made her float too, stupid really—she kind of crashed and hit me in the eye which made me fall over and hit my head and pass out on the floor."
Deku just stared at her. She relayed the story so quickly that he wasn't sure he'd caught all of it. It was clearly something that she found embarrassing. He'd not had any sleepovers with Bakugo since they'd been very young and he couldn't recall him being particularly cuddly when they were sleeping as kids. Kacchan had always been independent. Izuku had been a cuddler when sleeping but his memories of Kacchan didn't involve cuddling, more so getting kicked or slapped by his friend while they slept. Even asleep, Kacchan was foul tempered.
In addition to being somewhat confused due to the speed with which the story had been delivered, the fact that she was telling him that she'd been hurt enough to lose consciousness greatly concerned him. Getting hit in the face by Jiro also explained why her eye looked like a healing black eye, but to go to the infirmary for it, well she and Jiro must've been hurt enough to require Recovery Girl's attention.
"Oh my gosh Uraraka! That sounds really bad! Are you okay? I had no idea you'd been hurt so badly. That's why Kacchan came by when we were talking at lunch, wasn't it? He took you to the infirmary, didn't he?" Deku asked, his brow furrowed with concern.
Another blush colored her cheeks. "I'm okay, really! Don't worry about me, Deku! It was a stupid plan that I came up with and caused all that trouble. It could've all been avoided had I just woken Bakugo up. I doubt he would've actually really hurt me," she paused and looked away sheepishly. "I passed out on his floor and sometime later he woke me up and took me to the infirmary. I don't really remember a whole lot of that since I lost consciousness again when he took me to Recovery Girl. I know he got Mr. Aizawa to help Jiro because she'd wandered back to her room and passed out…so that's probably why he said what he said this morning. When she and I came back from Recovery Girl, he lectured us and threatened to give us detention but said that attending our work studies were more important than wasting our time with detention right now."
"I'm just glad you are okay but I'm glad if Kacchan was able to take you to the infirmary. It sounds like it was scary," Deku said sympathetically. While what she explained definitely sounded like a poorly thought-out plan, he was just glad that she was okay. It sounded like it could've gone a whole lot worse.
"I told you it was stupid," she said with lowered eyes.
"No, I don't think it's stupid. It was just a plan that didn't quite go the way it was supposed to."
Her eyes raised to him then and a slight smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "Thanks for not thinking it's stupid."
"Yeah, sure thing," he said softly with a shy smile of his own.
"You've got your work study tomorrow, don't you?" She asked.
"Yeah. Tomorrow we go back to Endeavor's agency," Izuku replied casually not realizing the real reason Uraraka was inquiring.
"So I won't see you outside school tomorrow, will I?"
"Oh. I guess no, you won't see me," he replied now grasping what she had actually been trying to find out. He briefly noted a subtle down casting of her eyes and the barely visible downward turn of her mouth. Was she disappointed? Did she want to see him outside class tomorrow?
"Okay." The words were flat, resigned.
"But we can see each other on Wednesday outside of school. I know you've got your work study but we can see each other after that," he began and then briefly recalled seeing something on the internet about how the aurora borealis was supposed to be especially visible this Wednesday. He vaguely remembered something else notable about Wednesday too but for the life of him, he couldn't currently recall what that was. "The aurora borealis is supposed to be super strong on Wednesday so after you get back, we could uh, we could, like sit outside together and um, well, look at it and stuff."
Her eyes grew to the size of saucers, her cheeks scarlet. Was it not okay to ask the girl you like liked to watch the aurora borealis with you? He wondered about her reaction. Was there something he was missing?
"Umm, yeah, we could do that. It might be kind of cold though," she mused, her voice quiet and shy.
"We can wear our coats," Deku added, hoping to be helpful. Some other part of him really wanted to add, 'and we can hold hands too so our hands don't get cold,' but he refrained from adding that part.
"Okay…aurora borealis together for Valentines Day!" She agreed and gave a timid smile.
"Right! Aurora borealis and Valen—" his voice stopped dead as he realized that that was the thing he'd been forgetting. Valentine's Day was Wednesday not just the aurora borealis. He had essentially just set them up for a romantic date under the stars and the shimmering luminescence of the aurora. That hadn't been his intent, but then again why did it matter if it was Valentines Day? He liked her, like liked her so it would make sense for him to spend that holiday with the person he liked and what better way to spend it than looking up at a natural and beautiful phenomenon? Except that it set the scene for romance…was he okay with that? Would she give him chocolate? Did she want to give him chocolate? Did he want that? Did she? What were they supposed to do on a date exactly? Was watching the aurora borealis lame? Was he supposed to come up with some other idea other than that?
"We don't have to do that though…I mean we could like go to the movies then, though it'll be late since you'll be getting back from your work studies, but we can still go to the movies or something if you'd like. Or we can uh, like, do, uh," he paused panicking when he realized that apart from going to the movies together, he wasn't entirely sure what couples that were together did. "Uh, we can, like got out to dinner or like, a park? An amusement park maybe?" His voice was rising in pitch, reflecting his growing anxiety.
Uraraka surprised him by laughing. "It's okay Deku! The borealis sounds like a great idea! If we went to the movies or something it'd be so late and we have school the next morning, so just sitting together and watching the sky seems like a great idea!"
His anxiety abated just a fraction. So, she didn't think it was lame, or at least she was claiming she didn't think it was lame. Still, he'd have to try to do something to make it a notable Valentine's Day for her…but wait, they weren't even officially dating so was he supposed to go out of his way to make it fancy or something? He didn't know.
"Okay, uh, I guess I better go though, gotta get some sleep for tomorrow," he said in a rush with a semi forced smile.
She nodded at him and smiled again. "Okay. I'll see you tomorrow, Deku. Sleep well!"
After a few moments he logged off and closed his laptop.
He sat and stared at the closed laptop and felt butterflies dance about in his stomach. So, he was going to watch the aurora borealis with Ochako Uraraka on Wednesday; on Valentines Day. He was both extremely excited at that prospect and intensely nervous. Would they hold hands? Would they hug? He remembered her quick and brief kiss just a few days before. His first kiss.
Would they kiss?
A part of him hoped so and another part spun with anxiety at the thought of locking lips with her again. What if he wasn't a good kisser? What if he had too much saliva in his mouth? What if his breath smelled bad? What if his lips were chapped? What if they held hands and his hands were clammy and gross? What if he got too excited and got a boner? Or worse, what if he got overly excited and did something really embarrassing like making a mess of his pants?!
…but nervous thoughts aside, the thought of potentially getting to kiss her again, really kiss her was like a direct tugging on his heart strings. He might actually be able to really really kiss her this time. Was that possibility worth it when all those scary other things could happen too?
Kiss her and find out, whispered an internal voice that made his heart flutter.
He smacked his fist into his palm. It was worth the risk.