Archive of Our Own ^beta

Shinsou idly thinks that he should be thankful. 

He walks mindlessly with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie—the fingers of his left hand lazily tracing the frayed edges of the open hole separating the inside seams—the backstreets are sparse, save for what he can only assume are his kindred insomniacs, as the streetlights illuminate his path that is bracketed by an array of residential buildings. Clouds obscure the sky in a dark, dreary canvas and he wonders if such promises the threat of rain. Which then results in thoughts of the fact Kanemaru-san would absolutely wrinkle her nose, as if smelling a foul odor, if he were to return only to track rainwater into the home.

The fact that Kanemaru-san, the current house parent, even permits him to leave at night and alone is progress. A blessing, even, if Shinsou were feeling pretentious. Or indulgent, because he knows how the saying goes: count your blessings. He’s walking outside, at night, wondering the streets past curfew and—this is important—he won’t come back to a locked door. Kanemaru-san has allowed this stroll and so he will revel in steps that are slightly slower than they need to be. Afterall, it's past midnight, it’s not like he can be expected to merrily frolic all the way to the convenience store.

He is thankful, he decides, as he breathes in the cold, crisp evening air with only the quiet ambiance of infrequent distant traffic to accompany him. He is thankful that Kanemaru-san has finally decided she trusts him enough to send him on an errand to retrieve headache pills (those, he’s  especially thankful for) and an assortment of snacks for the home.

Even if it is probably only because she is a woman nearing her seventies, nursing a sudden migraine, and who knew well that Shinsou would be the only ward still awake and listlessly staring at the ceiling in his bed. With all other staff having long since gone to their own homes for the evening, Shinsou was the obvious choice to send on this impromptu errand.

Progress. She even gave him money, actual real wrinkly yen, to him, Mr. Probably-has-’kleptomaniac’-marked-in-his-file, for his mission. Of course, done so with the warning, as ominously spoken by a woman who possesses rabbit ears and whiskers and is a head shorter than he could give, that she would calculate the difference of the receipt to ensure he didn’t have ‘sticky hands.’ He likes to think he has given her plenty of reason to believe that he hasn’t pilfered (as she would phrase it) because he hasn’t, not recently, not in years now, and that her faith in him isn’t entirely born from her using him just for convenience. 

He’ll take her being suspicious of him thieving money over her fearing he would Brainwash the cashier anyday. 

Progress. A paradigm shift that he can mark on the calendar: the day he received his UA acceptance letter, and with it the entire trajectory of his life took such a sudden shift he still feels vertigo from it. 

He can hardly remember how he stumbled out of the home to seek some semblance of privacy in the fenced yard, away from the presences of any of the other children and especially away from Oye-san—one of the rotating house parents, and one who has never held Shinsou in particularly high regard—but he does remember well the deceptively innocuous paper fluttering in his trembling hands, so much so he could hardly read the text, feeling as though his legs would give out from under him. 

Then his legs had actually given out when he realized he was accepted on scholarship. At the moment it didn’t even matter he was in General Education, he was going to be a UA student. There’s a chance. He has a chance.  

There’s a dreamlike quality to it, to how Kanemaru-san has gradually made the effort to not automatically tense up when he has to speak, to how there were children he lives alongside who had appeared genuinely delighted for him, to how he was given an honest-to-god congratulatory cake by the home staff the next day. Sure, they clearly hadn't known what he likes and consequently got a flavour he didn’t enjoy but the fact he was even presented with such a thing after years of merging into the background furniture was enough that he had to quietly excuse himself to the bathroom to control his breathing.

He’s been allowed to share a room, a room (it bears repeating), because it only took literal years but he had finally been quietly deemed as ‘safe’ to sleep in the same room as three boys his junior. Prior, the walk-in closet with a futon he had to make and unmake each night/morning was his abode—unless storage mounted and he had to take residence on the couch in the living room. Now, he attends a Hero school, and his reward is a room, as cramped and loud and with no privacy as it may be, but Shinsou can and will capitalize on any iota of that fabled thing called trust given to him by the home staff.

(And with the bed, specifically with the space under it, he was given a more secure place to store his battered shoebox that houses the most precious things he owns: his UA acceptance letter; his old, bent replica of Eraserhead’s goggles made out of cardboard he glued together when he was eleven; a chipped cat keychain he got from a capsule toy vending machine that was one of the first things undeniably his as he paid for it himself; an English assignment that he did well enough on to warrant having been decorated with a Present Mic thumbs up sticker saying 'great job!!'; the many scrawlings and revisions of his proposed Hero costume scribbled on loose sleeves of scrap paper; and a whole assortment of newspaper clippings and print outs of blurry images of what might be Eraserhead he’s collected over the years that make him appear like an obsessed stalker.)

Attending the Top Hero Academy of Japan has some definite perks outside of the 'maybe I actually have a future now' realization. Oye-san hasn’t felt it his duty to ruin any of Shinsou’s future sitting aspirations by taking his belt to his ass ever since he got into UA. And he has only threatened Shinsou with the muzzle—ahem, quirk regulator—once since. Progress!

All in all, it is a good night. The ever present hum of the fluorescent lights in the convenient store wrap itself around him in a muted embrace as Shinsou quickly grabs items from his mental shopping list. He feels a mild pang in his stomach as he surveys the generous bounty of all the sweets and snacks stacked upon the shelves like a colourful altar to self indulgence, but he knows well he isn’t allowed to eat this late and he knows better that if he bought something that Kanemaru-san hasn’t explicitly authorized that she would employ a hearty smack of a wooden spoon against his palms. He can follow orders and he respects his elders, he will persevere. 

With his purchases safely crinkling inside the plastic shopping bag and his mutterings of ‘thanks’ given to the cashier (because he was raised in residential care, not a barn), Shinsou begins his trek back. 

And that is perhaps it: completing a selfless task for the good of the many, one would expect this to give him a point to good karma. But the universe is a spiteful thing that delights in his misery, so his good deed is answered with a cosmic contempt. 

His mistake was having the gall to yawn when approaching an intersection, stretching his jaw with an audible click and closing his eyes for naught but a moment, but that is all it takes.

A sudden body colliding with his own makes him let out a grunt—said body’s shoulder smashing into his face—and hands gripping his shoulders to give him a hasty shove backwards has him automatically adopting a defensive stance that Aizawa taught him.

He catalogues the threat quickly with his legs ready to spring, arms raised and poised to use his shopping as an impromptu club if need be with retorts prepared on his tongue and he finds—

A woman, dressed in black business attire and appearing to be in her thirties, an expression of dismay on her face as she looks in his direction. A reasonable reaction, considering his fists are raised. And he supposes the bags under his eyes and unruly hair also do not give him any favours in not looking like a deranged, late night maniac.

Shinsou quickly rectifies his posture, stiffly switching to what he hopes is the image of someone non-threatening as he feels his shoulders hitch towards his ears in his sudden newfound awkwardness.

He opens his mouth with the intent to apologize, but is interrupted.

“W-Watch where you’re going! Are’ya blind or, or something?”

He blinks, noticing that the woman he bumped into is not alone; her companion, the one who just spoke, is another woman who is similarly dressed. She is leaning heavily against the opposite shoulder Shinsou unceremoniously thumped into, wearing a pinched scowl as if she can’t pass a bowel movement, and is very clearly drunk. 

“Sorry.” Shinsou replies quickly, before promptly taking his leave. He gives the pair a wide berth as he has no desire to mingle with anyone, let alone drunks, late at night. He hears the one who berated him attempt to slur out a sentence at him, but she is shushed by her more sober companion.

His return trek is done quicker than his journey to the store. When he turns the knob of the door, he unconsciously assumes it will be locked, as past experiences enjoy reminding him. But not this night, as the door opens and he quietly toes his shoes off before shutting the door behind him. Mission complete, he idly muses, and Kanemaru-san takes the shopping bag with a nod and a thanks and a stern poke to his chest as she tells him that he should go to bed, in a tone that suggests she views his insomnia as another fault of his character. 

Shinsou navigates the dark room of his sleeping quarters (shared with an avid snorer of course) with his arms outstretched to find his bed, as his eyes attempt to adjust to the shadows. The floorplan is present in his mind’s eye but he stumps his toe against his bed regardless, because why wouldn’t that happen to him. 

Shinsou receives what is definitely not the recommended amount of sleep, and wakes up before the rest of the home stirs. As the eldest of all the wards, he has the distinguished honour of starting breakfast. He lets out a breath as he gets himself to climb out of bed, like a vampire rising from its casket, and drags himself to the kitchen. The sun has not yet peeked across the horizon when Shinsou readies the rice steamer and takes fish out of the freezer to cook in the pan. 

He falls into autopilot as the home merges into its routine. He hears the bustling of Kanemaru-san waking and summarily starting the task of rousing all the children, as Shinsou takes the opportunity to pinch a small portion of saran wrap to pocket. The kitchen generates a hearty aroma as breakfast is slowly born. Soon, home staff arrive for their shifts and accompany him in the kitchen with his fellow wards following in their wake, still wiping sleep out of their eyes. No one bids him good morning. It doesn’t bother him anymore.

Shinsou takes his rice, fish and miso soup to his corner of the table to quickly, and quietly, eat as the chatter of numerous boys—the home is segregated by gender—of varying ages fill the home to signify the day starting in earnest. When he ensures the staff are not looking at him, does he tear tiny morsels of fish, before enveloping it in the aforementioned saran wrap and once more pocketing it. He has mouths to feed, and he’s not looking to stain his pockets with fish.

He (quietly) finishes breakfast as some children are just starting their’s, and (quietly) washes his dishes before (quietly) returning to his room to get ready for school. He (quietly, but with feeling) fumes at the fact some brat used his toothbrush again (it has his name on it for fuck’s sake), and then resigns himself to fish breath.

UA uniform donned and backpack equipped, he has no reason to linger, so Shinsou takes his leave.

He walks briskly, and with time to spare before his train arrives, Shinsou darts into a familiar alleyway. The morning air is cool as the sky adopts a gentle lavender hue that compliments his hair, and it only takes a few hearty calls of ‘pspspspsp’ and the shaking of his wrapped fish before his efforts pay off. 

He hears the pair of them before he sees them, the gentle meowing emitting from underneath the dumpster which signal the arrival of angels.    

The corners of his lips rise upwards easily as two cats, one black and the other piebald, happily trot towards him. Both are equally scraggly with disheveled coats that speak to their stray lifestyle with their ears clipped denoting the pair have at least been neutered. Their gleaming little eyes of amber and green peer upwards at Shinsou with obvious interest and excitement at the prospect of being fed. And while Shinsou’s goal in life is to become a Hero, he also endeavours sainthood by feeding any and all stray cats he crosses paths with. He intends to kickstart his Hero career early, by helping the helpless, like a proper Mr. goody-two-shoes.

He calls them Ms. Black and Ms. Harlequin in the privacy of his mind, referencing their coats, just for—ease of identification, which is logical, because he knows better than to name something and fall into attachment with an animal that disappears for weeks at a time. The cats serenade him with a litany of meows, and Shinsou pulls apart the saran wrap to offer the pair their fish as he crouches down to their level. 

Their purrs settle in his bones as Black gives him a happy squint, rubbing against his leg as Harlequin politely paws at his knee with a beckoning meow. 

He lays fish on the ground for them to share, and they eat happily. And they’re purring, and he remembers fondly when they both have taken naps in his lap, and their coats may be dirty but stroking them always makes it feel like he basks in direct sunlight with the warmth it generates in his chest, and these are two animals that have deemed him trustworthy and safe in this scary world of uncertainty, and to have the faith of an animal so freely given is a precious thing, and they’re so precious, so cute, so wonderful, and he reaches out and strokes Harlequin’s back as she eats, and they love him, and he loves them—

His hand trembles as he brushes Harlequin’s fur, his breath hitches when he hears the two cats purr, and his vision has gotten blurry. 

“W-What the—?” He sputters inelegantly.

He blinks rapidly, attempting to dispel the sudden wetness of his eyes. It does little to alleviate the lump in his throat that bobs up and down in tandem with his shuddering gasps. He jerks backwards from where he is crouching, the movement done so abruptly he nearly topples onto his rear.

He’s fucking... Crying? Leaking from the eyes? What?

He stares in confusion at nothing in particular, gaze simply pointed towards the empty space of the alleyway in front of him as he takes conscious observation at his surroundings swirling in double images with blurred outlines.

Shinsou is rendered immobile, body shocked into utter disbelief. He hears himself sniffle. Then he is shocked into abject horror.

Teary eyed, stuffy nose, closed up throat. There’s no way.

He lets out a thoroughly disgusted scoff before he can stop it (it comes out wet and phlegmy, ugh), scowling at nothing as his hands curl inwards with his arms raised, the urge to strangle someone suddenly very tempting.

A meow interrupts his sudden villain origin story, and he looks down to Black leaning her body against his leg, rubbing herself against him as she emits another meow. She looks upwards, her eyes meeting his own, and she blinks.

A slow blink, her snout making her appear as if she smiles, and a slow blink is how cats signify affection, he knows that, he knows many cat facts, facts that could rival Broccoli Head’s stalker notebooks, because he loves cats, he loves Black and Harlequin, and they have both slow blinked at him before, purring, rubbing against him, and they love him, and, and, and—

His breath gets stuck in his throat as a whine exits him. It is high pitched and thoroughly pathetic and he adamantly refuses to call it a whimper.

His cheeks have become wet with a trail of tears and he cannot, in good conscience, ruin the cats’ breakfast with such a display.

He stands as he quickly scrubs his face dry, stupid sniffles coming from him as air suddenly becomes a precious commodity with how tight his throat feels. Shinsou turns on his heel and marches to the alleyway’s exit, no matter how dreadful it feels to leave Black and Harlequin without their customary pets goodbye. 

If he has suddenly grown allergic to cats he is going to jump off a bridge.

The school day starts and proceeds like any other, with Shinsou appropriately on time and equally appropriately quiet as he sits at his desk.

Homeroom passes with little fanfare (except for an errant sniffle that has him vigorously rubbing at his nose in a vain hope that his hands have turned into sandpaper, so that he can cull the sniffles at their origin), and classes proceed to merge into one another as the day progresses. A certain haze drapes across him like he’s being dipped in molasses, and he leans on his elbow with his cheek cushioned against his palm, eyes heavy in their sockets and frustratingly misty, despite his efforts.

He sniffs again. It’s an ongoing theme with him today.

“Hey,” his desk neighbour whispers, a girl with an elaborately braided ponytail who is currently knitting some unidentifiable heap of cotton from the yarn she strings directly out of her wrists. 

He squints at her direction. Sensei is conveniently facing the blackboard with the lecture about history swirling through the air like water flushing down the toilet.

Desk-Neighbour-chan quirks a brow at him, pausing her knitting. She leans towards him before whisper-asking: “You okay, Shinsou-kun?”

He’s impressed she even knows his name, considering he's completely forgotten hers. He winces at his negligence, but—in his defense, his Gen-Ed classmates were supposed to be indifferent to his existence on a good day and not…

Not cheer for him after his Sports Festival defeat. Earnest, sincere words of encouragement after such an embarrassing (he still gets full body cringes thinking about it), resound defeat. Words that had no place being directed at him. The complete opposite of jeers, words instead born with such raw honesty he momentarily thought Midoriya had knocked him out and he was either having near death delusions or was dreaming.

His classmates were supposed to pretend he didn’t exist, or give him the barest of courtesy, or be outright hostile at the Villain in their class, not, not—tell him they were proud of him after failing in the first round. And continued to do so even after he left the arena, with congratulatory hands on his shoulders and wide smiles and words of praise, even when there weren’t any more cameras around. It just doesn’t happen to him. It shouldn’t happen to him.

He sniffles, eyes suddenly wet, god dammit.

"Allergies." He says gravely, like he just told her her entire family was found murdered.

She gives him a face of sympathy, and offers him a tissue. He accepts the kindness with probably more tears someone reasonably should.

At lunch, he resolves to find some deserted corner of the school to eat alone (as usual) and to peacefully ascertain what the fuck, is wrong with him (not as usual).

Shinsou has had to retreat into the bathroom to wash his face, because he got disgustingly blotchy with tears and snot. He gave his reflection a well deserved glare that would have flattened mountains before huffing indignantly and walking to the cafeteria. 

He holds his filled food tray, his eyes irritated and itchy, and he walks with a purpose towards the exit, but of course. Of course, like clockwork, the big doe-eyed little Hero-to-be that should be, for all intents and purposes, his nemesis, is suddenly making his way towards him.

“Oh hey, Shinsou! Over here!”

Midoriya, as Shinsou has come to realize, is like a very persistent rash. One that lingers and with no apparent cure at that.

Shinsou gives him a withering glare as he approaches. He would keep walking, ignoring Midoriya altogether, but he knows—despairingly, he might add—that Midoriya would just follow him. 

Midoriya approaches with his fingers twiddling nervously in front of him. 

“What do you want.” Shinsou grits out. Shinsou can spy Midoriya’s little entourage in the background—at the other side of the cafeteria because they've been through this song and dance too many times now, but Midoriya either likes the challenge or doesn’t know how to take a hint. His friends are seated and chattering amongst themselves, save for the girl, Uraraka, whose name Shinsou only knows because Midoriya just talks and talks and has seemingly taken upon himself to try and drag Shinsou into his group like a tar pit. Uraraka spots him and gives a small wave in his direction.

He rolls his eyes at her, although he knows she cannot see it considering the distance, but it's the principle of things. He looks down at a sweating Midoriya.

“J-Just wanted to know how you’re doing! Has your, uh, has your day been going okay?”

If this was perhaps a month earlier (or, really, if he had more energy), Shinsou would reply with a flat: ‘worse, now that you’re talking to me.’

As it stands, Midoriya with his big stupid eyes and his stupid genuine expression and his stupid insistence to talk and trying to get Shinsou to sit with his stupid friend group is wearing him thin.

“It’s…” Shinsou sniffles, fuck. “... whatever.”

“That’s. Uhm. Good.” Midoriya blinks up at him. Stupidly. “Uh, anyway, I wanted to tell you about a really cool retired Underground Hero from Canada who recently did some interviews about her past Hero work, her quirk is called Sleep Paralysis! As the name implies, it's pretty scary stuff. She activates it when making eye contact, paralyzing whoever and creating hallucinations. She was called Somnus, and one time saved a family that had been kidnapped for ransom by successfully interrogating a Villain with her quirk!”

It really is like watching a trainwreck in real time. You just can’t look away.

Midoriya beams at him, eyes shining with his fists raised like an overexcited preschooler. Shinsou impassively raises an eyebrow at him, just like Aizawa taught him. 

Midoriya, to his credit, falters for only a second. “It’s just… uhm, she’s a Hero! Or, uhm, was. With a successful career!” He exclaims.

“As you’ve already mentioned.” 

“Y-Yeah!” Midoriya licks his lip nervously, which isn’t saying much, because he does everything nervously. “She has… a scary quirk. Some might even say… villainous.” 

Ah. Right.

Midoriya’s voice was cautious, eyes intently on him and awaiting his reaction. 

And he shouldn’t do this, not the boy who soundly crushed Shinsou’s hopes and dreams on live national television. Midoriya should be some haughty golden boy who had everything served to him on a platter, with a silver spoon so far down his mouth it comes out of his ass. He should be like the braver kids at the home who sneer that Shinsou will never be a Hero, he should be like the schoolmates who scoff at Shinsou when he passes in the hallways, those that give him unsubtle sideways glances with a scowl or a derisive snicker and whisper behind his back. 

(He should be like the students who freeze when Shinsou approaches, breaths hitched and eyes flashing with fear, ready to flee the very moment he dares to open his mouth.)

Shinsou swallows a sudden ball of thorns in his throat, his grip on his food tray white knuckled and meal completely forgotten.

“...Yeah.” he mumbles. And sniffles.

“Yeah!” Midoriya says, clearly emboldened. “She, she’s spoken about her experiences growing up and training to be a Hero while having a quirk others are scared of. Of how she felt like an outsider, that…”

And, true to form, he babbles, unable to close his mouth to so much as breathe, and he doesn’t stop.

This fucking guy.

It’s infuriating, really. The continuous attempts. The real effort the guy makes. Over and over, like Shinsou is some charity case. And it's a smart move, Shinsou understands the logic; befriending the token villain is sure to make his image look very noble. A coin toss, between looking very naïve and foolish—or—looking very fearless, talking to the likes of Shinsou. The villain, the bad kid, the slave maker, the one better off disappearing altogether and the one who wouldn’t be missed. 

Midoriya makes it a point to talk to him. Is it a game? A bet? If Shinsou were to actually take up his offerings to sit with him and his friend group, what happens then? Even if Midoriya is sincere, foolishly so, his friends cannot possibly share his misplaced enthusiasm. Maybe for one, or two lunch periods Shinsou would be tolerated, but Shinsou isn’t stupid—he’s not —Shinsou knows that things like friendships are conditional for people like him.

Shinsou had initially thought that Midoriya's unrelenting persistence in acting like a fly was a ruse in order to get Shinsou to use his quirk, in hopes of getting him in trouble. But then the guy just spouts about how cool Brainwash is and how many Heroic situations it could be implemented in, and everytime it feels like Shinsou's been hit with a truck.

Midoriya is the walking embodiment of Shinsou’s greatest failure, a constant reminder that it doesn’t matter how close Shinsou could ever get to his goal, he’ll always flounder. A too large, unignorable part of Shinsou wants to hate the green haired boy. To fester a grudge and gnaw on the roots of vengeance. And yet.

Always talking to him. Still, even when at the brunt of Shinsou’s scorn and repeat victim of Brainwash, Midoriya still talks to him, without any wariness weighing down his shoulders.

Shinsou lets in a shuddering breath against his will. His eyes have turned downcast to his cooling lunch of teriyaki chicken. The image of which is blurred, no matter how many times he blinks.

It takes him a moment to realize the boy in front of him has ceased his relentless blathering. 

“Shinsou…?” Midoriya carefully and softly says, worry obvious in his tone. “...What’s wrong?” 

“Nothing.” Shinsou hisses through his teeth grinding themselves to dust. He lifts his face to give Midoriya a well earned glare, and he sees the boy’s giant fucking eyes are laden with concern.

Any intimidation Shinsou strives for is markedly diminished by the fact his cheeks are wet. The food tray trembling in his hands is because he’s annoyed and nothing else.

“You’re crying…” Midoriya very unhelpfully supplies, looking a second away from following suit.

He keeps staring at Midoriya, and suddenly the thought of throwing his food tray at the green haired imbecile is very tempting. But that would draw attention to him, attention Shinsou vehemently denies any chance of existence because if he keeps staring (re: glaring) at the shortstack in front of him, then they aren’t in a bustling cafeteria, they’re in purgatory, just the two of them. 

Shinsou breathing continues to shake in tandem with his body’s trembling as his cheeks persist in dampness. Midoriya’s lip quivers. Shinsou wants to claw both their faces off.

Midoriya suddenly squares his shoulders and straightens his spine, fists balled as an expression of determination takes over.

“Whatever is wrong, please! Let me help! I-I-I’m here for you, Shinsou!”

Shut up shut up shut up, shut the fuck up. Maybe if Shinsou thinks it enough, he can manifest it into fruition, because his tongue is currently cotton in his mouth and there’s a noose around his neck that tightens with every breath. 

Midoriya steps forward. “And so is everyone else! Uraraka, Iida, Todoroki! You are not alone—!”

Shinsou chokes. By some grace of whatever god this side of the universe, he croaks, “D-Do me a f-favour.” 

“Anything—!”

Shinsou pulls on the threads of Midoriya’s mind as if he is drowning: frenzied, near animalistic, and fighting for his life.

And it is a beautiful thing to have Midoriya go instantly limp with his arms falling to his side, as oxymoronic it is to posit Brainwash as ‘beautiful,’ but Shinsou has never been more relieved to see eyes go entirely blank at his behest. 

This has to be Midoriya’s fault. It has to be, somehow, someway, he’s made his incessant crying contagious. The twerp has made it his mission to ruin Shinsou’s life. He gets off on humiliating Shinsou. God, why didn’t he tell Midoriya to run out of the ring in the Sports Festival, for fuck’s sake.

It takes Shinsou a conscious effort to wrangle speech, but he manages this with a watery voice: “T-Turn around and walk back to your friends. S-Slap yourself when you reach them.”

Really, a pinch would have done just as well, but Shinsou likes to think he’s earned the pettiness. Midoriya seemingly breaks his own bones as a hobby, he’ll be fine. Not that Shinsou cares about the tiny, insignificant freak.

Midoriya does as he is told, and Shinsou wastes no time turning on his heel so abruptly he nearly twists it. He abandons his food tray at the nearest table, causing the warning sirens in his brain to blare out that he’s being needlessly wasteful, but Shinsou is forced into survival mode and that means the immediate freeing of his hands so he can rip his eyes out.

He briefly entertains the idea of seeing whether or not he has the capabilities of erasing memories, still being linked with Midoriya, as he speed walks out of the cafeteria—running would bring too much attention on him—and once he exits, he jogs, he doesn’t flee, and he definitely doesn’t let out a broken gasp as he uses his sleeves to clean his face with much enthusiasm. 

It’s settled: Shinsou can never step foot in the cafeteria ever again, it’s all tainted ground, the feeling of the errant eyes of curious students haunting him as he makes his escape.

He should skip the rest of the school day. 

If only to spare the feeble remains of his dignity. He knows there are animals that will hide themselves away when they’re near death and perhaps he should do the same, finding some hole to curl himself in and rot away. Skip school, find a train and take it to the opposite end of the country and then swim to another continent. He can get Aizawa to email his training. 

But curse his perfect attendance. Curse the English language and all those who speak it because Shinsou zombie-walks into class, eyes puffy, and he keeps his head cast downwards as he shuffles past his chattering classmates with practiced ease, like a ghost and unnoticed.

He glumly sits in his chair as he wipes snot from his nose, taking a sip from his water bottle since all his fluids seem intent on evacuating through his tear ducts, and then proceeds to bury his head in his arms. If luck is smiling down upon him, he will fall asleep and wake up when the school day ends.

Mic-sensei wouldn’t be too thrilled at Shinsou sleeping in class, but maybe if the Voice Hero woke him up with a hearty, ear-splitting screech, it will restart Shinsou’s traitorous body and the tears will have evaporated. 

He hears the tell-tale sounds of his classmates settling in their seats. And, on cue:

“Yo, yo, yo! What’s sizzling listeners?! Hope you’re ready to eat up the five basic sentence patterns in English and chow down on those tasty transitive and intransitive verbs, ‘cuz that’s what’s on the menu today, baby!”

Mic-sensei enters with his usual flourish, as Shinsou hears the man kick open the door and stroll to his desk at the front of the class. Shinsou is thankful for the fact his desk is towards the rear of the classroom, therefore he can safely keep his head cushioned in his arms for a few precious moments longer, as attendance is taken.

“So you better get your notebooks out and keep your ears wide open and listen, listeners, let’s start with the two basic elements of a sentence, the subject and the predicate! Anyone here brave enough to tell us what those are? Don’t sweat it if you get it wrong, you always get points for trying!”

He hears Mic-sensei write on the blackboard, and Shinsou decides now is as good a time as any to lift his head, lest he be called upon for continuing to act like a corpse. Not that he doesn’t know the answer—the subject is the noun, the predicate the verb—but rather because he knows his voice isn’t exactly fitted for answering anything, grown embarrassingly raspy as it has.

It takes considerable effort, because currently his body is filled with concrete, but Shinsou manages to lift his head, eyes still shut. He wrenches them open sluggishly, letting out a slow exhale as he does so. 

The shapes of the room are indistinct as the colours bleed into one another, all imagery looking as if shown through frosted glass. He blinks, once, twice, before clarity is given and the classroom comes into proper focus.

Mic-sensei stands at the front, his smile bright and pleasant and very easy to believe as the genuine article as he surveys the scattering of raised hands to his question. He appears as he usually does: as an overgrown, excitable cockatoo preening under the attention of his class, in his natural habitat with all eyes on him. His exuberance makes it very easy to understand why the man was voted winner of Kids Choice Hero four times in a row.

There is nothing new to Mic-sensei’s ensemble, nor is there something particularly out of the norm with how he gesticulates. But it is Mic-sensei, and that’s really all that matters, it’s Mic-sensei, and Shinsou’s body is suddenly too small and being crushed beneath an avalanche, never to resurface. 

Air is stripped straight from Shinsou’s lungs, and there’s a keen, shattered and cacophonous in the confines of the classroom, signalling the swift abandonment of Shinsou’s soul as it drops straight to the center of the Earth.

It’s Mic-sensei.

It’s, it’s, it’s—

(It’s Yamada easing Shinsou through his English pronunciations, decluttering his consonant clusters and coaching him how to properly articulate ‘th’ sounds, always with patience and always with praise and always, aways, encouraging Shinsou to speak and ask questions.)

(It’s Yamada somehow implanting himself seamlessly in his and Aizawa’s training sessions, casually suggesting the idea of a voice modulator and the name ‘Mindjack’ in a single sitting as if he hadn’t single handedly defined Shinsou's hypothetical Hero career in only two sentences.) 

(It’s Yamada putting those stupid stickers onto certain assignments, as if he were teaching elementary, little colourful ‘great job!!’ ‘awesome!!’ ‘you're amazing!!’ with the accompanying cartoon caricatures of his Hero persona praising the receiver, that give Shinsou some objectively ridiculous flutterings in the chest.)

(It’s Yamada tagging along when Aizawa takes Shinsou to the cat café, a natural addition that, for some reason, feels like completion, when he watches Aizawa listen to Yamada’s gossip about students with faux disinterest.) 

(It’s Yamada putting his hand on Shinsou’s head, ruffling his hair in such way that would have Shinsou scowl in righteous indignation, if it were anyone else, but instead leaves Shinsou an embarrassing kind of breathless with red colouring his cheeks, the feeling of which he has reminiscenced upon on more than one sleepless night.)

(It’s Yamada saying, “We’re not in the classroom, little listener, call me Yamada, ya dig?”)

—Shinsou is fucking dying.

He’s suffocating, chains binding around his neck and weighing him down to what feels like directly to the ocean’s floor, the unfathomable and inescapable weight of the depths making his body splatter into an indistinct smear of red. With each choked gasp he only invites the coils to constrict even tighter, like a snake squeezing the life out of its prey. His ribs splinter under the pressure and shards of bone ravage the integrity of his lungs. 

He is hunched over his desk, forehead pressed against the edge of the wood with his hands clasped so tightly against his mouth it acts like a muzzle: a desperate attempt to keep everything in.

An act done in vain, because Shinsou is currently expelling his body weight in tears. He must be a medical anomaly because there’s no way the human body can possibly produce such bucket loads on a fucking whim.

And it doesn’t stop, the torrent continues as an onslaught on all his senses. If his head doesn’t explode and kill him on the spot, the sheer mortification of having an audience will have him disintegrate. 

He is dimly aware of the rustling around him: the sounds of his classmates turning to look at him, utterly stupefied at his sudden imitation of a howling animal.

(“Inhale to a count of 4; hold 4; exhale 4; hold 4. Repeat.” Aizawa’s voice echoes in his head.)

Shinsou wants to curl upon himself so tightly that he’ll shrink and disappear among the cracks of the floor. His hands have moved away from his mouth and instead grip at the edges of his table in an effort to ground himself and open his airway, lifting his head and bowing over the table. His breathing is harsh and fractured, panting like a dog with his eyes resolutely shut. His face is uncomfortably moist. He can only imagine that his desk needs one of those wet floor signs. Tears, snot, drool— his life is so fucking over.

He hears the march of footsteps nearing him.

“Hey! If you know what's good for ya, you’ll open to page one-sixty-five and get to reading with your heads down low, or else I’ll pull an Ayyy-zawa and expel your sorry butts! Chop chop, listeners!”

It’s the end of the world. A low whine escapes him as Yamada approaches, the desire for the man’s closeness but also to never look him in the eyes pulling Shinsou in opposite directions and splitting him in two.

There’s a crinkling of leather to his left. Shinsou keeps his eyes closed. Yamada has kneeled next to his desk as Shinsou continues to snivel.

“Hey, Shinsou, little buddy,” Yamada says gently, too gently, how is that tone even possible? He’s fucking Present Mic, being loud is his entire schtick, and yet—

Hands caress his shoulders, rubbing up and down delicately, soothing out the tension that is embedded into his very sinew and prompting his stream of tears to renew itself. Eyes shut, fingers curling into the wood of his desk, and teeth gnawing his lip. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Do you want to take a breather outside, Shinsou? Do you need to go to the counseling office?” Yamada continues with the impossible, is this part of his quirk? To speak so softly, so tenderly, and have Shinsou believe he could deserve it? Yamada leans closer, and speaks in a conspiratorial whisper. “I’ll even let you have some of Shou’s coffee from the lounge if you want, even though I’m not supposed to, it’ll be our little secret, yeah? How’s that sound?”

And it would be easy, painstakingly so, to simply lean towards Yamada's direction. To render himself boneless and let the tide take him into the maelstrom of shame with Yamada as his only refuge. And Shinsou knows, hopes, Yamada would catch him and hold him through it (and the mere thought alone—to have Yamada’s arms encircle his trembling frame encourages the tears to continue still), but to have that become reality would require Shinsou to jump off the cliff’s precipice and chance the jagged rocks below. 

At this point Shinsou doesn’t know which thought is more reassuring: the idea of Yamada straight up throwing him out of the classroom, a relief in what is earned, or the thought of Yamada cradling him, just so— undeserved, undeserved, undeserved. He is going to die of dehydration at this rate.

Yamada shifts; Shinsou feels the man bring himself nearer, attempting to coax Shinsou out of his seat and into a side hug.

The action prompts Shinsou to risk wrenching his eyes open. He is greeted firstly with a (obviously) blurred streak of yellow. His breath hitches, and he cannot fathom why Yamada would allow the grimy mess that is Shinsou’s face so near to his immaculate hair. 

He sees green. Yamada has taken off his sunglasses, and without it Shinsou gets an unobstructed view of soft eyes tinged with worry, accentuated with a small, but honest, smile. 

“C’mere, my little listener.”

It renews the waterworks with a vengeance.

The decision is made for him as his flight or fight system kicks in. Shinsou’s chair clatters loudly, like a gun being fired right in his ear.

“Shinsou! Hey hey hey, wait! You’re not in trouble!”

Yamada’s voice follows him as Shinsou all but flees the classroom, running without a direction and with the goal to only stop when he collapses. 

What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck!

Shinsou seethes at his reflection, his ragged breathing rattling against the pale walls of the bathroom. He already has too many problems with his face when he isn’t being a blubbering fool—his incurable eyebags, his sallow skin—all made worse tenfold with a veritable flood of tears marring his cheeks and a blotchy red polluting his skin. 

“Fucking—stop!” Shinsou snarls at the mirror. It does little to halt the ongoing stream exiting his tear ducts.

His hands are raised in front of him with his fingers curled inward as if he is going to throttle his reflection. Squeezing his throat and shaking himself like a chew toy would be ideal, as he watches his image pant. This is disgusting. Like an army of slugs slithered on his face with how it glistens with moisture. He’s disgusting. 

Shinsou turns on the faucet and douses his face with vigor, uncaring to the fact his uniform is in the splash zone. 

Skip the rest of the day. Never attend school again. It’s a sound strategy that could possibly extend Shinsou’s lifespan, because if he never has to see his English class again then maybe he won’t feel like jumping in front of a train.

But here’s the thing: the universe, as established, feels nothing but contempt for Shinsou. His birth was a mistake—hell, even further, his very conception—because he won the lottery in misery.

Rationally, he knew, somewhere back in the deep recesses of his mind, that retreating to a school bathroom always held the risk of unwanted company. But of course out of the entire student body, it's a certain blond maniac that strolls in with a slouch and hands in his pockets like he owns the place.

Shinsou meets Bakugou’s gaze and all the air is promptly sucked out of the room. 

The only sound is the running water of the faucet, punctuated. By. Fucking. Sniffles.

They stare at each other as Shinsou’s feet have merged with the floor. Bakugou’s brows are pinched in his perpetual scowl with his lips curled and Shinsou peripherally wonders, through his bubbling hysteria, what Bakugou put up his ass to have irritation be his default state of being.

Bakugou’s crimson eyes lower. As in: Bakugou, very deliberately, sizes Shinsou up, his glare raking up and down his body. Shinsou feels his eye twitch. It feels like all his internal organs have vanished. His face is very wet.

The blond scoffs. “The fuck’s with you, Eyebags?” 

Shinsou wants to speak. He wants to ask a question. He knows with certainty that Bakugou’s common sense would turn off and he would respond and Shinsou could Brainwash the volatile idiot and make him dunk his own head in the toilet.

As it stands, Shinsou’s throat is raw with his eyes feeling like lead in their sockets, and his misery is only compounded further by the fact that Bakugou is blocking the only escape. Shinsou quickly turns off the faucet and waves his white flag: he retreats into a toilet stall and locks the door behind him.

(“Inhale to a count of 4; hold 4; exhale 4; hold 4. Repeat.”)

He tries. Sitting on the porcelain throne with his hands gripping the edge and practically heaving, he tries.

But Shinsou can hear him—the imagined voice of Aizawa coaxing him through his breathing exercises, breathing with him, his voice its usual starkness but an impossible comfort that wraps around Shinsou’s hunched form and it encourages a whine to exit Shinsou’s throat.   

It’s with the ghost of Aizawa effectively haunting him and with his renewed tears that Shinsou can almost, almost, ignore the sounds of Bakugou using the urinal.

At least Blasty knows to wash his hands. “Don’t pass out on the toilet, idiot.” He states before leaving the bathroom, and Shinsou mentally renews his war declaration.

“Hey, Sensei.” Bakugou says when returning from what was supposed to be an uneventful bathroom break. But a guy can’t even piss in peace. “Your kid’s having a meltdown in the bathroom.” 

Aizawa pauses from where he is writing some heroic ethics bullshit on the chalkboard. He turns, slowly, for dramatics presumably, to appraise Bakugou with a flat expression as the boy takes his seat.

Bakugou leans back on his chair in boredom as he watches his teacher’s brain comprehend his words, the eyes of every occupant in the classroom glued upon the blond.

“Want to try that again, Bakugou?” Aizawa raises a brow.

“Your kid,” Bakugou rolls his eyes with the right amount of theatrics. Not his fucking problem if the man wants to waste time and have Eyebags cry himself into a coma. “The purple haired freak from Gen-Ed that looks like your carbon copy. He’s crying his eyes out in the bathroom like a loser.”

Aizawa’s expression breaks, imperceptibly: his brow creases slightly as his frown deepens.

“Sensei!” Fucking Deku decides to screech from his desk. “Shinsou-kun wasn’t… he wasn’t feeling well at lunch either!”

Should’ve stayed fucking home then and saved everyone the trouble, the useless crybaby. Bakugou sneers at the thought.

Lesson apparently forgotten, Aizawa swiftly approaches his desk and checks his phone— 

(Aizawa is intimately aware of which class Shinsou has right now. He checks his phone, and there:

[Hizashi]: Toshi ran out of class crying

[Hizashi]: am trying to find him but have to go back to class soon

[Hizashi]: Gonna call for a sub to take over class. Will let u know when I find Toshi

An emergency, Aizawa instantly decides.)

—Aizawa doesn’t look up from his phone as he rounds the table. 

“Iida, Yaoyorozu: make sure your classmates complete their study packets.” Aizawa raises his head to meet Bakugou’s gaze. “Bakugou, which bathroom?”

Shinsou’s breathing slows to an acceptable, not-going-to-hurl, level. It is still ragged, because his breathing will never be normal again he surmises, since his lungs and throat are all but shreds, but he doesn’t sound like he is dying. Merely that he is… Well. Recovering from a very obvious crying fit.

He numbly reaches for the toilet roll and tears off a generous amount of tissue to scrub his face and blow his nose.

He is going to skip the rest of the school day. Then he is going to walk away in some random direction, and hopefully disappear into the ocean. 

He hiccups, lowering his face to press his palms against his eyelids. 

"Doesn’t sound like you're having a good time in there, kid." 

There’s a brief, fleeting moment wherein Shinsou can convince himself that he is having auditory hallucinations. Or, that this has all actually been a dream, specifically the dream he has wherein the world crumbles around him but Aizawa’s voice is there to act as a shelter wherein he is shielded from everything.

Rationally, he despairs that Aizawa is, in fact, physically standing inside the bathroom.

Irrationally, Shinsou is unable to stop the whine that bubbles through, as he shoots his head up (so suddenly he hears his neck crack) to stare at the (still closed and locked, thank fuck) stall door.

His eyes are welling up again. 

"Shinsou?" Aizawa’s voice is twinged with something Shinsou can reasonably discern as the beginnings of urgency, which in turn only spur more fucking tears.

"G-go away!" Shinsou gripes like a toddler, immediately feeling his cheeks flush in embarrassment.

"Mic is outside guarding the door. Do you want to talk to him instead?"

Another whine, as Shinsou grips the fabric of his pants. Aizawa’s voice is free of any annoyance, no hint that this is all merely procedure regurgitated from the Dealing With Your Student’s Completely Unwarranted Meltdown for Dummies handbook. 

"I-I don't," Shinsou huffs in frustration. "It won't, it won't stop! I don't know why!"

"Okay. I'm listening, Shinsou." Aizawa absolutely cannot just casually say these things, because the words make Shinsou’s chest clench uncomfortably. "Can you tell me what won't stop?"

It takes a moment for Shinsou to wrestle with the unwieldy burden currently acting as his tongue. He clears his throat with a broken cough.

"T-t-t-the, the crying," he mumbles. "I don't. I don't know why I'm crying."

"... Okay." Aizawa deliberates. "Can you open the door so we can figure it out together?"

There really isn't something Shinsou would want to do less. He really is a villain. Stealing Aizawa's precious time like this. Forcing Yamada to look like some creeper as he 'guards' the entrance to the boys bathroom.

"...S-sorry, Sensei."

"You don't have to apologize for crying, Shinsou."

"Dis-Distupting class." Sniffle, sniffle. "For both of you!"

"Don't concern yourself with that, it's not your problem. Our classes will survive and they'll forget this ever happened come next week." He can clearly imagine Aizawa rolling his eyes. "Let the teachers worry about that. Our priority right now is you. Can you open the door? You can't hide in the bathroom forever, Shinsou. Hide in the lounge instead. There’s snacks."

Our priority right now is you.

It loops in Shinsou's head. Repeating until the phrase is seared into the very fabric of Shinsou's brain so that he will be able to perfectly recall Aizawa's flat voice when he can't sleep, when he loses his food privileges, when his muzzle—quirk regulator is brought out.

Shinsou takes in a deep, shuddering breath. Aizawa graciously doesn’t say anything.

"Just… a minute. G-give me a minute, Sensei."

"Okay. I'm setting a timer. Don't think I won't break this door down." The dry sarcasm prompts Shinsou to give a snort before he can quell it.

It has to take longer than a minute, because it feels like a lifetime, when Shinsou can assemble himself into some semblance of presentable. He scrubs at his face with toilet paper and will never take a face washcloth for granted again. He counts his breaths and resolutely ignores his pitiful hiccups and huffs. He stares at the ceiling and wills his eyes to dry as he clenches and unclenches his fists to steady them. 

He rises from where he is sitting on the toilet, before crouching down to collect the used tissue sullied with Shinsou-goop, and discards them into the toilet, because he respects UA and not because he is stalling. 

Shinsou stares sullenly at the closed stall door still providing him sanctuary. He now knows, intimately, how condemned criminals felt before walking to their execution.

He rolls his shoulders. And then notices how ruffled his uniform is, and decides Aizawa deserves the utmost tidiness from him as penance for dragging him away from his class. Not stalling, just manners. He cards a hand through his hair to neaten it. Not stalling. His fit was very unseemly, so he decides to wipe his face once more just in case. Not stalling—

“Shinsou.” 

Right. The only escape is through. Shinsou knows that Aizawa wasn't being entirely facetious when he mentioned breaking down the door.

“Yes, Sensei.” Shinsou concedes as he unlocks the stall door.

He almost expects Aizawa to be in his sleeping bag, but instead Sensei is leaning his back against the sinks with a slouch, head down and typing one-handedly on his phone with the other hand in his pocket. The picture of indifference, as if he wasn’t literally in the bathroom dealing with Shinsou and all his… patented Shinsou related baggage. 

Hearing the stall door creak open, Aizawa raises his head. Their eyes meet.

And it's Aizawa-sensei, who he doesn't have any classes with but is his mentor still, the man who is an already inundated teacher who has actual heroes in training but still—unfathomably— has made time in his schedule to train Shinsou. The thought is still dizzying: Aizawa, Eraserhead (the Eraserhead!), teaching him the intricacies of the capture weapon and guiding him through the uncertainty of Brainwash to the point Shinsou no longer automatically goes taut with guilt when he uses his quirk. Aizawa, Eraserhead, choosing Hitoshi to train out of all the ambitious wanna-be heroes competing for the coveted vacancy still available after that grape-headed pervert was expelled the first week.

Each training session he thinks he will finally wake up and return to an uncaring reality, or that finally the man will realize Shinsou isn’t worth the effort, and yet Aizawa always meets him in the gym to train. Takes him to dinner, pays for it, and Shinsou has his literal phone number; the Shinsou of only a year prior would have rightfully sneered at the mere idea, because to assert that Aizawa would even glance at him could only be the workings of a cruel prank.

The sight, Aizawa exactly the same as he always is and literally nothing out of place, knocks the wind out of Shinsou.

It’s, it’s, it’s—

(It’s Aizawa nearly giving Shinsou a heart attack when he had seemingly materialized out of the shadows, still mummified, after the Sports Festival to comment mildly of his lousy defeat, and then in the same breath offering training, as if commenting on the weather and not nearly giving Shinsou a second heart attack.) 

(It’s Aizawa soundly becoming the icon of Shinsou’s youth, a figure of near mythical proportions with near worship a nine, ten, eleven, twelve, sixteen year old Shinsou will feel; a Hero with a villainous quirk, and not all hope is lost.)

(It’s Aizawa noticing: Shinsou’s persistent headaches and insomnia and then not only listening, but giving vindication when he explains that both overuse and underuse and the simple fact of possessing a mental quirk can result in such side effects, and then immediately telling Shinsou to practice Brainwash on him.) 

(It’s Aizawa making it a habit to offer Shinsou a chance to go out to eat after training, and scoffing in disbelief when Shinsou attempted to assert he would pay his Sensei back; “I don’t intend to put you in debt, Shinsou. Just say thanks and don’t waste it.”)

(It’s Aizawa asserting “when” Shinsou transfers into the Hero Course, not “if.”) 

(It’s Aizawa offhandedly saying, “Just ‘Aizawa’ is fine, kid.”) 

—It’s just. Like. That. 

Again.

The dam breaks, and what remains of Shinsou’s tattered dignity is not only swept away with it, it is ruthlessly drowned.  

His chest caves in as a heave leaves him, breaths quickening and tears streaming with teardrops dribbling to the floor. Shinsou's hand still clutches the stall door handle, grip tightening and unable to let go, because if he does, Shinsou will summarily melt into the floor and flush down the drain.

He cannot fathom the scene he is making. His body wracking with his dismal whining, sobs clawing out of his chest and massacring his throat like some sort of prickly, barbed animal is desecrating his body from the inside out.

And all in front of Aizawa. Shame runs hotly through his veins, his skin crawling.

Shinsou takes his hair into his hands and pulls, the sharp prickling giving a small, insignificant triumph at delivering retribution against his treacherous body. He bows his head and grinds his teeth together.

“Arrgh!”

“Shinsou, I’m stepping closer. Can I touch you?”

So, so stupid. Shinsou’s hands gripping his hair should be replaced with Aizawa’s, with Aizawa shaking Shinsou’s head and ordering him to stop being such a fucking baby. Tighten the quirk regulator—muzzle onto Shinsou’s face so he never makes a sound again.

Instead, Aizawa’s voice acts like a guide through the fog, and Shinsou slumps. His hands fall to dangle at his sides as he glares at the floor and blinks uselessly against the tears.

He nods in response to Aizawa’s question because he is weak.

“I-I’m not sad, ” Shinsou sputters dejectedly, because Aizawa deserves some sort of an explanation. “It’s just, just happening.”  

A delicate weight lands on Shinsou’s shoulder. Aizawa has placed a hand on Shinsou to steady his trembling. It causes Shinsou’s breath to hitch as he automatically squeezes his eyes shut.

“There are many reasons why someone might cry.” Aizawa says mildly, his other hand also gracing Shinsou’s shoulder. Fuck. “Now, can you walk or do I need to carry you somewhere private? We have time before the hallways fill up again, let’s press the advantage.”

Shinsou can hardly parse what Aizawa even says, because Aizawa’s thumbs start to trace circles on Shinsou’s shoulders, which effectively causes his brain to short circuit. He shudders because he’s pathetic, stupid, weak, and he must be some sort of perverse little cretin to have such a reaction to his (teacher, mentor, idol) touching him so.

His response to Aizawa is delayed, but he manages a nod with a quivering lip.

“Y-Yes, S-S-S-Sensei,” Shinsou is able to mumble miserably.

Shinsou raises his head to peer over Aizawa's shoulder, because eye contact is too difficult. He sniffs, and hastily rubs his face on instinct, internally cringing at how utterly revolting he feels. Human faces were never meant to become so moist. His head feels like it’s been stuffed with something rancid. 

Aizawa’s hands slide from Shinsou’s shoulders, charting downwards to rub his arms, and he can’t do that. The action makes Shinsou’s knees feel weak as air becomes stuck in his throat, and he lets out an embarrassing sob.

He screws his eyes shut in a useless attempt to protect himself. Aizawa’s chest must be fucking magnetized with the amount of sheer force of will Shinsou needs to employ to stop himself from headbutting the man and. And. 

(Crying directly into his chest with hands clinging onto Aizawa’s jumpsuit like a lifeline, emptying himself of his tears and wailing, holding, holding, holding and, and, and—being held.) 

"Then let's get going. It's a short walk and then we'll figure things out."

Shinsou startles his eyes open, and Aizawa is holding a literal toilet roll in his direction. He must’ve pinched it during the time Shinsou shut his eyes. Since Aizawa isn’t berating him for his lack of situational awareness, Shinsou does it for him in his mind.

"You'll be fine, kid. Things will be fine." Aizawa says simply as Shinsou shakily takes the toilet roll, tearing off an ample amount and scrubbing his face. 

Shinsou could almost be deluded enough to think he has dried his face, until Aizawa places his hand on his shoulder, squeezes reassuringly, and Shinsou’s tear ducts promptly reopens.   

"Sorry, for, for—"

"It's okay. Don't worry about it." Aizawa responds, markedly subdued for someone who is currently experiencing the most asinine inconvenience of the century. He pauses. Gives Shinsou’s shoulder a pat, and then steers him out of the bathroom. 

Yamada is, indeed, standing outside the bathroom. The picture of blasé, a hand in his pocket with the other twirling a plastic water bottle, whistling an aimless tune as he casually paces in place.

His whistling and movements cease as soon as Shinsou and Aizawa emerge from the bathroom, and Yamada lights up the hallway with a megawatt smile.

“Hey-o, listener,” Yamada sings as he approaches. “How are you feeling? Thirsty I bet.” 

He flips the bottle completely unnecessarily with one hand, before offering it in Shinsou's direction. The water bottle, a real life ambrosia, is swiftly snatched by Shinsou after heartedly using more tissues to clean his face. His uniform pockets will be very full of used tissues, very soon, Shinsou bleakly accepts.

Shinsou downs the bottle, emptying it to its half, relishing as the cool water cascades down his scorched throat and soothing the strain of his esophagus.

"Feel like, like s-shit." He mutters, pointedly keeping his gaze downwards to the floor as he feels Aizawa coax him to continue walking from where he is still standing by Shinsou's side.

"Language." Aizawa says flatly, as both teachers sandwich Shinsou in between them as they walk together.

"Is t-true." Shinsou responds, wiping his face with his sleeve.

"Eh, I think we can let bad language slide just this one time, Eraser. He's earned it, I would say. Shinsou-kun certainly looks the part!" Yamada chirps cheerfully, lightly bumping his shoulder with Shinsou's.

"Hey," Shinsou croaks, although the corners of his lips turn upwards. He steals a glance at Yamada, at his smile, and his English teacher gives him a wink as a response.

The action of which propels Shinsou to return his gaze dutifully downwards, because the tears re-continue their onslaught, and Shinsou has to fumble with his toilet roll to retrieve more tissues.

Shinsou feels Aizawa idly pat his shoulder. "Don't bully your student in his time of crisis." He says.

"Y-you're worse, and you know i-it, S-Sensei."

"I do have the power to expel you, brat."

Yamada gives a soft chuckle, and Shinsou must gnaw on his bottom lip to suppress a bubbling whimper that is currently rearing its ugly head. It clogs his throat like he swallowed a pile of stones, and before Shinsou is aware of it, he raises a fist that is squeezing the water bottle to chew on his knuckles. 

He doesn’t do a good job at stifling the whine that escapes through the cracks, shuddering in its wake. His face is pinched uncomfortably with eyes shut and please, please, he needs the hallways to be completely barren.

“—hey, nuh-uh, don’t do that, Shinsou—”

Yamada gently encourages Shinsou to take his fist out of his mouth, and without his impromptu gag, a tattered chorus of high pitched cries tear themselves through his body.

Luckily for all involved, Shinsou is sequestered into a nondescript room very quickly after. 

Shinsou briefly wonders if students having sudden, unreasonable meltdowns is common, as he surveys the mundane, but serviceable, room. Like taken directly from some nobody’s living room, with brown couches on either side of a small table situated in the middle of the room. A box of tissues—actual tissues meant for the face—sit in the centre of the table. There’s a potted plant in the far corner, and a bin in the other. There are two simple cabinets side by side lining the wall alongside a mini fridge. There is a door to the left, to which Shinsou assumes leads to a small bathroom. A single window provides natural light to illuminate the table and couches.

It’s private; suspiciously as though specifically constructed for the sole purpose to provide a space for sobbing idiots to get a hold of themselves.

He wonders what that says about UA as an institution, before musing if Principal Nezu has secret passages throughout the school (and subsequently internally scoffing at himself, because of course the Principal would), if only to distract himself that he is, currently, the aforementioned ‘sobbing idiot.’

Yamada steps into the room proper, rolling his shoulders and gesturing to the couches with spread arms.

"Why don't you sit down, Shinsou? Or lie down. Take a snooze even, if you're up for it!"

Merging with the couch and becoming one with the leather cushions so as to never wake up again and subsequently become nothing more than a high school legend is a very, very welcoming thought. He hobbles to the couch with a too-heavy body, and collapses.

Shinsou downs the rest of his water, before placing the empty bottle onto the table. He mops his face with tissues, then places the ever convenient toilet roll next to the empty bottle on the table.

Shoulders hunched, Shinsou attempts to ease his shuddering breaths, but blinks upwards when he hears movement in front of him; Aizawa has procured another water bottle and placed it on the table, seating himself on the opposite couch on the other side of the table.

Shinsou has to blink again, and again, because more tears rudely makes themselves known.

"Can I sit with you, Shinsou?" Yamada asks kindly, and Shinsou nods.

Yamada seats himself, he and Shinsou on either end of the same couch. Having had the man walk beside him, the distance between them on the couch is suddenly cavernous, and Shinsou quickly needs to banish that thought away.

"Got some biscuits here for you, if you want them. Shortbread matcha, from Okinawa, the real good stuff." Yamada says.

He sets an open box of the promised cookies on the table, and Shinsou blinks dully at the offering, wondering if Yamada somehow kept the box on his person this entire time. It would be on brand for Present Mic.

The cookies lay neatly in their box, individually wrapped. Shinsou is suddenly reminded that he hasn’t eaten anything since breakfast, although he feels little to no hunger.

Regardless—Shinsou is loath to waste food so readily offered.

He nibbles on the cookie, gaze focused on the smooth surface of the table’s corner, eyes feeling so cumbersome in their sockets he expects them to roll out.

Sniffle. Shinsou spies Yamada and Aizawa sharing a look, seeming to communicate wordlessly. Then, Aizawa leans forward, elbows on his knees and there’s suddenly a void where Shinsou’s stomach should be. 

"You said earlier that you don't know why you're crying. That it is ‘just happening.’" Aizawa squints. "Have you been feeling stressed lately? Exhausted?"

Shinsou lowers his half eaten cookie and scoffs, using his free hand to wipe his still infuriatingly wet face. "M-more than usual, y-you mean?"

An unimpressed raised brow is given in response. "We’ll take that as a yes."

Yamada speaks next. "You're a full-time student, and you have after school training on top of your studies and personal life. You're pursuing a spot into the Hero Course, the most demanding and difficult program this school has to offer. To become a Hero is your life’s goal. You need this, so you’re giving it your all." He tilts his head remarkably bird-like at Shinsou. "Am I hitting the right notes?"

Shinsou shifts in his seat, wincing, and listens intently to how the couch creases with his movement so he can ignore the fluttering of his heart.

It is time for the inevitable vivisection of Shinsou’s already weakening will to live. Shinsou takes a proper bite of the cookie to finish it, and as a meager attempt to deliberately prolong the unavoidable. He wipes his face.

"Y-yeah," Shinsou says quietly after the most awkward pause of his life, studying the scuff marks on his shoes as he mindlessly shuffles his feet on the floor. His hands are in his lap and are ready to tear the skin surrounding his nails into shreds with some prime fiddling.

"It's a lot for anyone to handle, Shinsou. Now, Shou and I know you're a very capable person, a very dedicated student, and I need you to know that burnout is very real, and not something to be ashamed of. Prolonged stress can make it hard to regulate emotions because everything is out of rhythm, yeah? Haven't lost you yet, have I?"

Yamada’s voice is far too soothing for how it makes Shinsou’s body flush with white-hot embarrassment.

"I-I'm not," Shinsou stammers, lifting his head to look at Yamada and then quickly to Aizawa. "Sensei, I'm not giving up!"

He is going to find a way to travel however many millennia into the past so he can throttle whatever human ancestor is responsible for cursing the human race with incessant crying.

Pleading his case would be infinitely easier if it didn’t feel like he was choking on each word.

Aizawa sighs. “I know. That does not change the fact that you are not immune to stress.”

“It’s okay if you need a break, Shinsou. Everyone needs breaks, Pro Heroes included, in-training or otherwise. Arguably the demographic that needs it the most.” Yamada’s voice is what blooming sunflowers are if put to text, Shinsou decides, as he quickly procures a tissue from the table to blow his nose.

“I don’t—I'm, I'm," Shinsou lets out a snarl of frustration as speech continues to disagree with him. 

He scrubs his face with the palm of his hands roughly, idly hoping he can mangle the flesh of his face. He tries again, hands gripping the fabric of his pants and staunchly glaring a hole in the floor. "It's not that. Training is, it’s. The best part of the d-day.”

It’s true. He just wishes it wasn’t confessed under duress and spouted like a water balloon bursting.

Shinsou folds his arms and sinks into the couch petulantly. “I'm f-fine."

He is thankful when Yamada doesn’t allow for a painful pause. “And there’s no one at school bringing down the vibe, is there?”

Technically, there are multiple schoolmates who could snugly fit the description. Those that quickly leave the room whenever he enters, those that attempt to goad him into activating his quirk because they were dared to by their friends, those that found out he was living in alternative care, cooing in faux sympathy about how his parents threw him away, and how they would’ve done the same.

He won’t say any of that, because he knows it will be misconstrued as bullying, and Shinsou isn’t being bullied.

So instead he settles for: “M-Midoriya keeps trying to be my f-friend.” 

Aizawa snorts. 

“And does that upset you?” Yamada asks.

Stupid broccoli haired idiot. Shinsou cannot remember having a genuine friend that dared to stay. Stupid giant doe eyes. Shinsou wants—maybe Shinsou wants that. A friend. Even if it will most likely only end in some sort of failure, because that's the only way Shinsou knows how to do anything. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“... No.” 

Shinsou retrieves another tissue. And, considering the amount of liquids he is expelling, he decides it’s time to replenish with a swig of the water bottle.

Luckily, Aizawa waits until Shinsou has placed the bottle back on the table before speaking, otherwise Shinsou would have choked. “How is your home life?” 

Although it doesn’t prevent Shinsou from choking on his spit instead.

“Fine.” Shinsou grits out, thumping his chest. “N-Normal. The same.”

Better than it’s ever been, technically, as Shinsou recalls his last night stroll he was permitted to take. He’d never been allowed outside the home, other than for school, prior to UA. And even then, Aizawa had to personally appeal to Sugiyama-san—the home’s director—for Shinsou to be trained after school hours and then taken for dinner, after Shinsou was unable to get permission himself.

He knows that they both know his home situation. And he knows that they know it isn’t something that needs discussion.

“And are you lying?” Aizawa asks while staring directly into Shinsou's soul and Shinsou wants to crawl out of his skin.

"What Shouta is trying to say," Yamada cuts in, leveling Aizawa with a look. "Is that you can come to us for anything, Shinsou. We will always listen to whatever tune you play; the good, bad and the ugly, doesn't matter, we're here to help you, always, and at any time."

He should be used to it by now, the festering feeling curdling beneath his skin that seeks to make Shinsou retch all his innards outwards. The pressure mounting behind his eyeballs splitting his skull apart. The crying, the crying, the ceaseless (fucking) crying.

His teachers have really got to stop saying things like that. It cannot possibly be a promise they'd be able to keep.

He bends forward, hands shielding his face. He tries for only a moment before all resolve leaves him ungracefully.

"Oh, Hitoshi…" 

It’s an eerie repeat of English class, with the sound that Shinsou makes. A helpless, intense keen that shatters his very bones.

When was the last time he heard his given name spoken so freely, in a tone of such palpable warmth? He hadn’t thought such a thing was even possible, with his name being a poison— villainous— and yet melded effortlessly into something safe in Yamada’s voice.

"May I… do you need a hug, sweetheart?"

Yamada is trying to kill him.

Shinsou is falling apart from the seams and unraveling into something unspeakably ugly. Can this even be constituted as crying? He hardly feels human.

He nods. He gives up.

He hears Yamada shift quickly, the unbuckling of something (the removal of his directional speaker, Shinsou will realize shortly), and then there are hands coaxing him forwards. Shinsou all but collapses, like a thousand shards of glass, burrowing his face into Yamada’s shoulder and breaks.

Something very precarious is strumming behind his sternum, one that he decides gently smother with a metaphorical pillow, as Shouta surveys the scene in front of him.

It’s not even just—grisly, like an open, festering and maggot filled wound, the spectacle before him. The sight of Shinsou, body curled in on itself like the twisted corpse of an insect, speaks of distinct, devastating hopelessness. He appears years younger than what he actually is, suddenly dwarfed by Hizashi’s body as Shouta’s husband arms delicately, yet firmly, encircle the boy, sheltering him against the swirling tempest of a very raw kind of sorrow.

And a hurricane will always leave havoc in its wake, even at the edges; Hizashi’s face is an open canvas that speaks plainly of his grief. Brows knitted, a pained frown and eyes that possess stars twinkling at the edges. No longer the boy’s English teacher but rather a stable bedrock for him to freely weep upon—and there really is no other word to better encapsulate it, the boy weeps. He feebly fists the leather of Hizashi’s jacket as sobs wrack through his body, face pressed deeply against the man seeking to disappear, but it does little to muffle the guttural noises that leave him and carve through Shouta’s body like a knife.

Through the onslaught of Shinsou’s cries, a soft chorus sings in gentle defiance; Hizashi has Shinsou’s head safely tucked beneath his chin and so he murmurs words of promise to ease the turmoil, melodies of ‘I’ve got you,’ and ‘it’s going to be okay,’ and ‘I’m here,’ flourish in the air around them. In response to each word spoken, the student attempts to stutter a hoarse sob that drains through his gritted teeth, exiting his throat like sandpaper.

Hizashi has alternating rubbing and patting Shinsou’s back down to a precise science. Expertly, and with infinite patience, he entices Shinsou’s taut shoulders to loosen like the slow unraveling of a twirled thread. Shinsou gasps haltingly, as if unable to retrieve enough air, and it is then that Hizashi delivers a finishing blow: slowly, deliberately, he begins to rock the boy in his arms. A desperate, high pitch whine is given for his efforts.

Small mercies; Shouta knows the room is fitted with noise dampeners and outside ears will be none the wiser. Shinsou evidently has many grievances to air out.

In the background recesses of his mind, does Shouta determine that this would be the exact moment many a nagger would self-assuredly declare that the professional teacher-student line has been irreversibly crossed.

To which he would pointedly ask what the 'teachers promote a student's social and emotional health' spiel they all got is supposed to mean then. Shinsou has clearly reached some sort of breaking point. Better to do so in Hizashi’s arms, no matter how messy, than in what Shouta knows is a cold group home.

He feels his lips purse at the thought. Even with the fact Shinsou has his number—and will soon enough have Hizashi’s number as well, undoubtedly—and Shouta had, subtly and unsubtly, asserted on multiple occasions that Shinsou will always have his mentor’s confidence, still. Still, they are here, with Shinsou reduced to such a state. He mentally cycles the past few days, weeks, months even; had there been warning signs he missed?

It is an uncanny thing to see the normally stoic student crumble so. Viscerally uncomfortable, likewise, shaping a deep pit to engulf the likes of his stomach and slowly branching outwards to consume every helpless shred of his body like a black hole. Shouta is no stranger to guilt. It makes its presence known as an unwelcome weight as Shinsou continues crying.

He sighs. Unlocking his phone, he sees that it is the next period. Regrettably, the responsibilities of a teacher extend to all students. For the sake of UA as a whole, Shouta needs to ensure his idiot problem children haven’t spontaneously combusted and took half the building with them. Likewise, he knows the rest of the faculty need an update on why two teachers and a student are absent entirely, and soon to be three teachers, because he endeavours to make use of Hound Dog’s title. Some pertinent phone calls concerning a certain welfare office also need to be made.

Hizashi may literally and figuratively have his hands full, but Shouta also knows that his husband is more than fully capable on his own while Shouta sets himself on the warpath. Shinsou can hardly be left alone in such a state.

Shinsou has quieted to hiccups, through a combination of considerable effort and pure exhaustion—Shouta is impressed the boy is even still conscious, considering it’s been non stop crying for what feels like hours already—and Shouta raises himself from the couch. He winces when his knees crack.

Shinsou, if his circumstance was more aligned with something ‘normal,’ would have legitimate cause to be sent home early. Logically, Shouta knows such an action would only cause more harm than good, considering Shouta has been able to reasonably deduce that it is ‘home’ that has caused Shinsou to deteriorate so severely.

A home visit is necessary, then. And a few mandatory sessions with Hound Dog. 

He rounds the table, nearing a quivering Shinsou who has been reduced to pitiful sniveling, and a mournful Hizashi still slowly rocking himself and his student back and forth in a consoling, methodical rhythm.

(He is reminded suddenly, very much against his will, of the times when Hizashi mentioned the idea of kids, then the connecting thought that Shinsou is currently in an institution and subsequently remembering they, as Pro Heroes and teachers of UA, have the ability of emergency, temporary custody. Shouta puts a pin on the thought process to focus on the immediate task at hand.)

Shouta places a hand on Shinsou’s shoulder, causing the kid’s breath to hitch. A bloodshot, teary lavender eye peers at him through disheveled purple hair as Shinsou turns his head.

“Make sure you keep hydrated, kid. I need to take care of a few things. Try not to drive Yamada into an early grave while I’m gone.” Shouta squeezes his shoulder as he sees more tears spill. “You are not alone, alright? Yamada and I are here to help. Take as much time as you need, and when you're ready, we’ll be here for you.”

Shinsou turns back to burrow into Hizashi’s shoulder. The boy nods when his face is covered, a muffled, garbled whine escaping, setting his shoulders to tremble.

He turns to leave, wordlessly giving Hizashi his condolences as his husband gives him a weak smile. He raises his hands to sign: will return, and good luck, and love you, before valiantly resisting the desire to lean down and plant a chaste kiss on Hizashi’s cheek. He steps away, a physical effort to do so.

Obviously, this is now the time his phone decides to vibrate with an incoming call. The caller ID states that it is Nemuri.

With a sigh, he answers it.

“A little birdie told me you're currently indisposed with an AWOL student."

“What is it.” He asks tiredly, rubbing his eyes.

“Always the hard ass, thought Zashi mellowed you out by now. Anyway,” she clips, and Shouta knows her well enough that she is currently checking her nails as she continues. “The school just got a very fascinating phone call from a concerned citizen. Something about a certain purple haired teen who may or may not have been accidentally hit with said citizen’s quirk last night.”

Shouta halts, hand frozen in the midst of unlocking the door.

For a split, fraction of a second, Shouta draws a blank. Then, the full understanding of the statement detangles itself.

“I’m putting you on speaker.” Shouta announces to the room, swiftly turning on his heel. He sees Yamada raise his brows in question, to which Shouta mouths ‘Midnight’ in his direction. He quickly reseats himself where he had been sitting previously, holding his phone out.

Shinsou, having clearly inferred that the sudden phone call definitely involves him in some way, slowly stirs. He uncoils from where he was fused with Hizashi, the English teacher gently releasing him but retaining an arm slung across the kid’s shoulders in a side hug as they sit side by side.

Shinsou’s face is a disaster. Blotchy red and the picture definition of utterly miserable. His cheeks are soaked with his eyes downcast and near corpse-like, glazed and unseeing. He breathes open mouthed, slow and shuddering and with a nose that is clearly running. A small moment of respite, the veritable rollercoaster of emotions on its downward trend, but one that Shouta surmises will return to its unpleasant peaks given enough time.

“Helloooooo, Nemuri!” Hizashi cheerfully calls, several decibels lower than he usually would greet with. He leans forward to give Shinsou much needed tissues. “Shinsou-kun is here. Please behave yourself.” 

“Ah, the whole family’s there? Even better!”  

“Out with it.” Shouta grits as Shinsou blows his nose. 

“Bite me.” Nemuri happily says, before thankfully continuing. “Kid, you remember running into a lady and her drunk friend during your midnight stroll? ‘Cuz she certainly recognized you from the Sports Festival, hence why she knew to call the school, lucky you. Koufuka-san would like to send her sincerest apologies, by the way.”

Shouta squints at Shinsou, who is blinking slowly as he digests Nemuri’s words. “Why were you out at midnight?” He asks.

“That is irrelevant right now, Shou-chan.” 

“Were you out alone—?”

“Answer the question, Shinsou.” Something suspiciously like a whip cracking sounds off through the phone speakers. Shouta mentally shelves his question, for now.

It takes a clear effort, but Shinsou clears his throat with a ragged cough, expelling phlegm into the tissue. “Y-Yeah,” he manages, voice mangled into hoarseness and sounding as if belonging to a lifelong chainsmoker. Hizashi pats his back. “I r-r-remember. I, I bumped into her. By accident.”

“And she gave you a great, mighty shove! As she tells it. You spooked her. So she set off her quirk on you on instinct. Anyone have any guesses as to what it could be?”

“Kayama.” Shouta pinches the bridge of his nose.

She at least has enough sense to not pause for dramatic effect. With each word that was spoken, Shinsou has visibly perked. He slowly, manually regains focus as he continues to stare listlessly at the table.

“It’s called ‘Tears of Joy’! Now isn’t that cute?”

A natural pause. Shinsou’s brows begin to pinch. An expression Shouta feels mirrored on his own face

“‘Tears of Joy’?” Hizashi parrots unsurely, glancing at the tear-stricken boy next to him. “Is it called that for irony, or…?” 

“Oh, allow me to give it to you dirty:” Shouta rolls his eyes. “The quirk causes the victim to start crying when they feel any ounce of affection or happiness. The amount of tears is proportional to how much love— ” she very deliberately emphasizes the word, “—the victim feels towards… whatever. People, animals, things, memories, whatever. It brings out all the mushy feelings when Shinsou looks at or, better yet, interacts with the object of his affections.”

It becomes very, very quiet. Overpoweringly so, like his head is being held beneath water by an unyielding, iron grip. The seconds pass by agonizingly slow, as if treading through mud. Shouta doesn’t think Hizashi is breathing. Shinsou definitely isn’t.

Shouta carefully catalogues Shinsou’s hunched form and notes the boy is giving a great effort to disappear between the couch cushions, with his wide eyes staring at the table on what can only be described as horror. His face has steadily become redder, with shoulders slowly hiking to his ears. Shouta glances at the statue that is currently his husband, and black eyes meet green.

The realization comes to them both with the grace of a racehorse galloping directly into a brick wall.

(Hunched over his desk and trying to smother his cries, Shinsou’s misery courses through his body and ripples outwards. Yamada is quick to approach to defuse the oncoming eruption, settling beside the boy and ready to supply whatever he may need. Their eyes meet, and something breaks. A waterfall is opened, and Shinsou literally needs to flee.)

(The bathroom stall door opens to reveal Shinsou looking as if he’s finished running a marathon, uniform in as much disarray as his face is destitute. Their eyes meet, and immediately, with no warning, the boy crumbles. Tears are renewed almost violently, his crying done as if mimicking a banshee with his knees buckling, readying to collapse.)

(A continuous, never ending stream of tears with no reprieve in sight as they walk with Shinsou. Tear stricken cheeks that are never dried no matter how many tissues are implemented as they sit with Shinsou. Watery eyes constantly spilling with ragged breaths punctuating the air as they speak with Shinsou. And then the total collapse, and Shinsou weeps.) 

Ah.

“Piecing it together, aren’t ya boys?”

The thumping behind his sternum may have returned.

“How long does it last?” Shouta finds himself asking.

“Eh, a couple of days? Depends.” There’s a whine, suspiciously sounding like a dog. “None of that, kid. There’s an easy solution: it can be effectively flushed out. The more you cry, the quicker it’ll go away. Good thing you’re with your favourite teachers, huh?” 

Shinsou squeezes his eyes shut, sucking in his bottom lip to chew on it.

Hizashi figures out how to move again, his arm that is still situated across Shinsou’s shoulder flexes, lightly jostling the kid closer. Predictably—predictably only now— tears fall from the action.

“You’ve already cleared our schedule for the day, haven’t you?” Hizashi asks in monotone, on a completely different plain of existence as he carefully watches Shinsou wipe his face. The teen squeezes his palms against his face.

“You’re dealing with an emergency, Zashi! Of course I did, because like little Shinsou-kun, I love you two very dearly.” That elicits a strangle whine from the resident victim. “Effective immediately, you two are on strict cuddling duty. Now make that boy cry! Buh-byeeee!”  

She cackles, before the line goes dead.

Shouta lowers his phone mindlessly. The quiet born is piercing, like the silence of a storm mid thunder; the air feels charged, as if they'll be electrocuted if any occupant of the room dares breathe too loudly.

Tears of Joy. Shouta thinks he may have to seek out Recovery Girl for sudden whiplash. The boy in front of him looks anything but. Shouta can only imagine what an utter nightmare it must be to have one's emotions rendered completely uncontrollable, even more so because it was due to what was apparently an avoidable accident. Yet—obviously tears wrought from affection are objectively better than those sprung from misery. Even if Shinsou is not a very pretty crier.

Shouta watches silently, completely enraptured, as all the worry weighing Hizashi’s body begins to ease outwards and dissipate. Hizashi’s focus is entirely on Shinsou, who in turn is very purposefully keeping his palms against his eyes as the boy hunches in on himself.

Hizashi releases a slow, shuddering exhale, the pressure released like the trickling of a small, peaceful river. Shouta sees his husband’s face twist, palpable relief painting his features, and the corners of Hizashi’s mouth turn upwards in something modest but undeniably warm, a testament in itself; that Hizashi does not instantly grin like a maniac speaks of the significance of the moment. His emerald eyes speak loudly of such a raw and open affection that it causes Shouta’s own heart to seize, and while Shinsou is steadfast in his attempt to block out the outside world, Shouta is certain the boy can physically feel Hizashi’s gaze.

Shouta stares, unblinking, at the quivering purple haired teen whose shoulders shake with stuttered breaths. Tears of Joy. Truly not something Shouta would wish upon his worst enemy. And Shinsou’s tears have not ceased. 

'Love' is a very perilous word. Too strong of a weight that Shouta isn't comfortable bestowing on anyone or anything except for Hizashi (well, and also their cats). But Nemuri’s words repeat themselves in his mind, the explanation of the quirk effectively besieging any attempt of thought, and Shouta is not one to ignore facts laid so bare in front of him.

Shinsou has been afflicted with the quirk Tears of Joy and it forces him to weep when engaging with those that he—feels strongly towards.

He and Hizashi are both so thoroughly doomed.

Shinsou would really like to wake up now.

He couldn’t have been hit with Tears of Joy, he’s absolutely been hit with some sick freak’s quirk that has put him in a never ending nightmare.

Any relief from having an explanation for his perpetual leaking is made entirely moot by the fact shame gnaws across every inch of his skin. As if he were tied to a pyre, with the flames having started by licking and then melting his ankles before slithering across his body to mutilate him beyond recognition.

His body is just a sack of stones, the rocks grinding amongst each other and likewise crushing his skull to innumerable little bits, and that’s a migraine, that sure is a migraine. His brain has become completely liquefied and will soon seep from his ears.

He’s still crying, obviously, he wonders peripherally if cheeks can get all pruney like fingers can, considering they’ve been damp for practically the entire day. Wonders if eyeballs can get dried out like wrung sponges.

Tears of fucking Joy. No wonder she used it offensively. This is definitely his villain origin story, because at this rate he will abuse his teachers’ trust and Brainwash them both so he can flee the suffocating confines of this room, and the suffocating ramifications of—Joy. 

He’s ruined everything. Completely and so irreversibly just spoiled everything. All because he accidentally bumped into some random lady like a buffoon. Aizawa has definitely gotten enough evidence now that Shinsou is—he’s not worth it. Caught completely unawares by some civilian, it’s embarrassing. Aizawa is probably already devising strategies so he can never be seen in the same vicinity as Shinsou and his radius of stupidity. Yamada is going to transfer him into a different class because there’s no way he hasn’t made the English teacher viscerally uncomfortable. He’s his student, and he’s sobbed a stain into the man’s leather like some uncontrollable, overgrown baby.

He cannot even begin to count the amount of boundaries he’s crossed. He can’t come back from this. Ruined everything. His teachers will keep him at arm’s length, a firm distance away as to establish sturdier walls because they’re teachers and Shinsou has just proven that he’s some greedy leech that’s grown far too attached.

The arm still slung across his shoulders is just. A formality.  

“Hitoshi?” comes a gentle voice, and it should be uncanny that the likes of Yamada can morph his voice to be so quiet yet so affecting.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

He squeezes his palms against his eyes harshly enough he hears them make a dreadful squelching noise in their sockets. He does not think he will ever get used to hearing his given name spoken so, so—

“Sorry,” Shinsou rasps. “I-I’m, s-s-so, sorry—”

Yamada squeezes his shoulder, causing his body to shudder.

“You have absolutely nothing to apologize for, my little listener.” 

Does Yamada have his arm across Shinsou’s shoulder, or is it pressing against his throat? He chokes wetly.

Shinsou bends forward, peeking his eyes open to discern where the water bottle is on the table as he quickly grabs it. Through his teary vision Shinsou spots Aizawa’s seated form from across from him and obstinately doesn’t look at the man, but his mentor’s gaze is heavy upon him. 

“Stupid,” Shinsou mutters after gulping half the bottle, shutting his eyes once more in a feeble attempt to protect himself. “S-So, so f-fucking s-stupid. Shouldn’t, shouldn’t h-have happened. I—”

The world shifts: Yamada, the damnable fiend, has brought Shinsou closer, urging the boy to lean against his chest. If Shinsou’s strength hadn’t been completely drained from his slumped body, he might’ve shoved the man away, maybe even spat a few choice words, if only to remind the man that he needs to reinforce boundaries for both their sakes.

“No, nope. None of that, Hitoshi.” Yamada says anyway, bringing both arms to embrace Shinsou and making him gasp. “What’s done is done, accidents happen to everyone, and we are dealing with the consequences of it together right now. No one was hurt, well, except maybe your pride, but you’re good, Hitoshi. We’ll rock this tune out ‘till it's no more, and then we’ll all look back on this and have a good laugh when it’s over and done with, just you wait.” 

It’s the quirk, the fucking quirk, that makes Shinsou nuzzle his face into Yamada’s chest as he becomes completely boneless.

“Y-yeah,” he coughs, wiping his face like the world’s most flimsy puppet. “L-Laughing on my grave.”

“Sure, I’ll even bring a shiny disco ball for the occasion.” 

If Shinsou keeps his face hidden, maybe he’ll suffocate and escape this entirely. “Y-You’re a, a sadist, M-Mic-sensei.”

“Aw, thought I told you to call me Yamada, little listener!” 

Gulp, gasp, shaky breaths and wiping his wet face again. “We’re at, s-school?”

“And also technically not in a classroom.” Yamada’s hand starts to trace Shinsou’s spine, up and down, and this should be considered a human right’s violation because Shinsou full on whimpers. “Also, you’re crying into my chest, I feel as though we’ve bonded, Hitoshi, don’t you?” 

He can’t formulate an answer, at least not one that is understandable, because all Hitoshi can manage is to make that statement true and, just. Cry.

He’s floating, above the clouds. Has that Uraraka girl made him weightless when he wasn’t looking? His head is in a daze, the ability to focus a far off dream, with the colours of the room swirling around him. He’s slumped against Yamada, still, and he doesn’t have the energy to be embarrassed about it. Yet.

Then Hitoshi is promptly jostled with a grunt; someone has seated to his unoccupied side, close enough to brush against his body, and he’s become effectively wedged between the two.

“Drink up.” Aizawa intones flatly, and Hitoshi blinks at the water bottle that is unceremoniously thrusted his way. “We’re in for the long haul, kid.”

Hitoshi blinks at his mentor, probably looking like some mentally slow owl. Aizawa shakes the bottle in his face, which breaks him from his stupor, so Hitoshi plucks the bottle and brings it upwards to soothe his parched throat.

“You’re—” Hitoshi chokes, “—s-staying?”

Aizawa is his mentor, sure, but not technically his teacher, in the sense that they share no classes. Yamada is, and it was in Yamada’s class Hitoshi made a fool of himself in, and it is in Yamada’s arms he continues to embarrass himself in. Aizawa is not the prisoner in this scenario, his duties have, for all intents and purposes, already been fulfilled after finding out this whole debacle is because of unfortunate quirk shenanigans. And one that Yamada can safely deal with on his own.

But here he is, sitting up close to Hitoshi on the same couch and whose mere presence is eliciting another barrage of tears.

Aizawa gives him a measured look. “‘Course I am, kid. The quirk wears off faster if you keep crying. It’s not my usual method for making students cry, but I will do what I must.” He points to Hitoshi’s water. “Now, remember to drink. Cuddle with Hizashi until you finish that and then we’ll switch.”

The fact that what Hitoshi is currently doing, saddled up at Yamada’s side with his teacher’s arms curled around him, can be accurately described as… cuddling … inspires his face to turn red. Well. Redder.

And Aizawa said it so nonchalantly. Alongside the implications that—

—That they’ll … cuddle. Hitoshi and Aizawa. Is this what an out of body experience feels like?  

Finding his voice, Hitoshi dregs up a belated attempt at humour to distract himself from the thought. “Y-You’re gonna c-cuddle M-Mic-sen… Yamada?”

“We only cuddle at home.” Aizawa says far too casually. Hitoshi hears, and feels, Yamada huff out a small chuckle.

Not for the first time, does Hitoshi wonder what exactly is Aizawa and Yamada’s relationship. 

“Between you and me, Hitoshi,” Yamada stage whispers as he coaxes Hitoshi closer. “You’re totally the way better cuddler. Crying and all!”

Aizawa rolls his eyes. “Don’t lie to him, that’ll only teach him bad habits.” 

This is—

This is delusional.

He’s snuggled on a couch with his teachers both sitting closely on either side of him, cuddling—no, no; simply curled up against. He is curled against one of them with the promise of curling up with the other in an apparent shift change, because they’re both seemingly intent on having a front row view of Hitoshi’s downfall. And neither of them seem particularly… bitter, annoyed, resentful at the fact. At least not visually, but, Hitoshi’s vision has been constantly assaulted with tears, so maybe he just can’t discern any of it at the current moment.

Speaking of.

Hitoshi throws his head back, tears dripping from his chin. “T-This is t-the wor-worst day of, of my life.”

“Awww, poor baby,” Yamada coos, wrapping Hitoshi closer and Hitoshi seriously needs to drop out of English. “Why don’t you tell me all about it?”

He lets out a disgruntled noise as he forcefully nuzzles into Yamada’s shoulder, and it only prompts a laugh from the man.

This is so, so weird.

Maybe even bordering on the edge of unnatural. He knows Aizawa isn’t a particularly tactile person—unless he’s kicking Hitoshi’s ass in training—so to have had the man swing an arm across his shoulders and pull Hitoshi towards him with little warning was jarring, to say the least. Hitoshi did not squeak in surprise when it happened, no one can prove he did, and therefore it cannot be used against him.

He did, however, immediately burst into tears.

The empty water bottle he had been holding rolled onto the floor when Hitoshi automatically took fistfuls of Aizawa’s jumpsuit, burrowing himself closer into his mentor’s chest, his desperate gasps muffled as he made a wet spot form on the man.

Body shaking as if in the throes of a hurricane and hollowing himself out against Aizawa, his mentor just. He just held him. Aizawa holds him, grip tightening in reassurance, steadfast and with no hesitation. Like maybe this isn’t just. Just an obligation he has to deal with. 

Hitoshi knows, rationally, that it could all just be wishful thinking born from his exhaustion, with how his brain is basically just pulp inside his skull.

But he’s been crying for hours. And he’s in Aizawa’s arms, bawling on the man’s chest, is he not allowed just a moment of weakness? Hitoshi does not want to be selfish. But the universe does enjoy testing him.  

Hitoshi’s head feels like it will roll off his body at any moment. Slouched against Aizawa, he knows his eyes are glazed over as he stares at nothing with his fit having finally resolved itself with his face far too wet. His eyes are blotchy and itchy, wouldn’t be surprised at all if they were likewise swollen, and if his body wasn’t currently sinking like the Titanic, he would wipe with his sleeve to alleviate the discomfort. 

Instead, he lies against Aizawa like a corpse, his mentor’s arm still around him.

The other side of the couch, where Yamada had been sitting, is conspicuously bare of any blond Voice Heroes. The man had excused himself, claiming boisterously the ‘need for a leak’ (complete with finger guns), before retreating into what Hitoshi had correctly assumed is a bathroom.

Hitoshi likes to think he is something of an expert on crying by now. Yamada’s wobbly voice was not lost on him.

“Is,” Hitoshi starts, voice ruined. He clears his throat and tries again. “Is Mic—Yamada crying?”

“Thinking it might be contagious?” Comes the dry drawl from above him, the man seemingly unaffected by everything and presumably just staring at the wall.

That’s nice, Hitoshi thinks blearily. Not outright accusing Hitoshi for making his—coworker? Friend?—cry in the bathroom.

Hitoshi decides to play along, so he doesn't have to ruminate upon why Yamada could be crying. He supposes everyone has a breaking point, and no one, not even Yamada, enjoys dealing with crying teens for the better part of the day.

“M-Might help with your d-dry eye, S-Sensei, i-if it is.”

Aizawa hums. “With you around, sure. Wouldn’t need my eye drops for the rest of the year.”

There are—

There’s implications to that statement. Tears of Joy. Hitoshi fervently avoids thinking about Midnight-sensei’s word choice when she explained the quirk, a certain four letter word starting with L.

Hitoshi feels his face twist, a new legion of tears on the horizon. “Oh.”

It's to encourage more tears so that the quirk is flushed out quicker. It's just to—Aizawa is just fulfilling his responsibilities as a teacher to move this whole debacle along. He just knows how to pick the right words to incite more tears so he can carry on with his life. That, and his life’s goal is to give Hitoshi some sort of lasting cardiovascular problems, because his heart is definitely strumming something embarrassing right now.

There’s a shift and the world tilts on its axis. Hitoshi automatically tightens his grip on Aizawa’s jumpsuit as he tenses from the sudden movement. Aizawa leans forward, arm still around Hitoshi, and with his free hand, plucks a tissue and cookie from the table. Oh yeah, those still exist.

Aizawa offers Hitoshi the items, who shakily grabs them.

“Eat up. And call me Aizawa.” He says simply, settling back on the couch with Hitoshi still snug against him. 

Hitoshi cleans his face with the tissue, an upward battle and one that he loses as the tears continue to plague him regardless. Hitoshi gives a wobbly inhale as he crumbles the tissue into a fist, clutching both sullied tissue and wrapped cookie with fumbling hands as he gawks like some idiot at the floor to the walls to the table, attempting to settle the disquiet that coils itself inside him. 

He cannot allow himself to contemplate Aizawa’s words because he knows he’ll spiral and make dangerous assumptions like a needy imbecile. It doesn’t mean anything. It wasn’t some offhand admittance that Aizawa—That he—That Aizawa could—

(Hitoshi’s parents do not visit him anymore. He hasn’t seen them in years. Hitoshi learned the term “throwaway child” at age six.)

It’s the quirk. Hitoshi presses his face against Aizawa’s chest, below the capture scarf, with something grotesque leaving him. He feels too small. Like he’s been forgotten in some nameless, endless forest, destined to die of exposure, something slow and agonizing. The inevitable fate that he is powerless to fight against, his singular role in an uncaring world being just to curl up and wait for the end.

He wretches; he knows it's unsightly. In a world that made sense, Aizawa would have rightly removed himself and left Hitoshi to force him to finally accept fate.

But Aizawa folds his arms around Hitoshi’s (small, frail, defenseless) body, tight and unyielding like Hitoshi could be something worth protecting, worth holding and worth melded back together from a thousand broken pieces. A large, calloused hand cups the back of his head, fingers massaging into his hair, and Hitoshi weakly (greedily, desperately) takes it as a promise.

“Please,” Hitoshi begs, because he’s not above begging now. “Please, can we c-call M-Midnight-sen, sensei to knock m-me o-out.”

“Hm, let me think about it,” Yamada pretends to be deep in thought, tapping his chin. “The answer is still no, Hitoshi.”

Yamada, who has since returned from his stint in the bathroom and looking infinitely better than Hitoshi, because there’s no evidence he was crying meanwhile Hitoshi can’t stop crying, is back on the couch, with Hitoshi slouched against him. Cookie wrappers litter the table and he has a new water bottle in his hands to finish, alongside his phone that does little to distract or entertain him with mindless, endless scrolling.

Hitoshi, brain very much the consistency of mashed potatoes as already established, hadn’t even noticed when his school bag was delivered to the room by… Vlad-sensei? Thirteen-sensei? Someone, at sometime. Either way, whoever it was had the decency not to stay and bear witness to Hitoshi’s worst moments.

“She’s a busy woman, problem child, with her own problem children to herd.” Aizawa says, not looking up from the paperwork he currently grades, also delivered alongside Hitoshi’s bag. He sits across from Hitoshi and Yamada again on the opposite couch, clearing his side of the table from the growing mound of used tissues, empty water bottles, cookie wrappers and a very appreciated headache pill bottle.

“S-She wouldn’t s-say no,” Hitoshi grouses, using his sleeve to clear his eyes.

Yamada gives him a tissue in response. “Had no idea you were so close to Nemuri, Hitoshi. Would you cry at the sight of her too?”

Maybe, but that would only be because of her outfit and the fact he’s a compromised hormonal teenager. “No,” he mutters, blowing his nose before aimlessly throwing the balled tissue in Aizawa’s vague direction. A little too close to the target, if Aizawa’s withering glare is anything to go by.

“Aw, poor Nemuri, she’ll be crushed to hear it!” 

Hitoshi flicks his phone to the empty space of the couch next to him, the device proving pointless in alleviating the ongoing tedium of the day. He shifts, bringing his feet up on the couch and tucking them under himself—his shoes are safely removed, he’s not a heathen. He burrows himself closer to Yamada’s side as he nestles his face into the man’s leather jacket.

“Only… only like A-Aizawa.” Hitoshi slurs, eyelids drooping. The words themselves are uncomprehending to his own mind despite it coming out of his mouth. “And you."

His fatigue is a physical burden, one only slightly lifted with his eyes now shut but an indomitable presence still, as Hitoshi tries to manually relax himself. His cheeks are still tear stained and his uniform definitely needs a good, long cycle in the washing machine, but Hitoshi is curled upon the couch against Yamada’s body and he intends to blissfully forget that he’s a human with a body.

“You’re killing me here, kid.” He hears Yamada say after a pause, voice oddly strained.

This day needed to be over yesterday.

For a moment, he thinks the body he regains awareness in isn’t actually his. It’s almost a comforting thought, because then the disgusting sack of spoiled meat he currently inhabits isn’t actually his to deal with. Throat dry, head stuffed with cotton and extremities completely uncoordinated with the weight of the entire planet crushing him, he occupies a body that feels distinctly unclean. 

Which of course means it is, undoubtedly, his body and his to actually deal with.

Naps are the work of demons. He doesn’t know why he bothers, considering it invariably always makes him feel worse than before, and very decidedly unrested. Can’t even use it as an excuse to pass the time, because the punchline is that they usually only last around half an hour, because his brain enjoys actively working against him.

He groans. Slowly, he is made aware that he is laying at an angle, laying on—something, suspiciously human shaped, with said—person—reclined against the couch in order to accommodate Hitoshi’s slumped over form. There are arms encircling him, and. Wait.

He’s not sitting on the couch.

Hitoshi blinks rapidly in an attempt to manually recentre himself, the unfamiliarity of the position quickly firing alarm bells and luckily waking him up properly. He almost misses how his eyes are an appropriately normal amount of moist, before tears begin to well up again. He will mourn the loss later, because right now he needs to discern what sort of new nonsense he could have possibly gotten himself into, while napping.

He lifts himself, hearing the person—Yamada, right—grunt under him. His English teacher squints up at him, a wince, and Hitoshi can sympathize; it couldn’t have been comfortable to, to—

Holy fucking, what the fuck—

Hitoshi balks. 

“Wha—?” 

Yamada cracks a smile, strained at the edges because he’s, he has. Hitoshi is, he’s. Oh God, oh God, oh God.

Hitoshi is sitting on his lap.

Hitoshi understands, very well, too well, the term ‘mortified’ now. A deep, gut wrenching shame that thrusts him completely into the realm of utterly horrified.   

“Feeling any better, little listener? Took a little nap there, didn’t ya. Are ya comfy?”

Yamada sounds tired, not bone deep weary—which he definitely should be, having Hitoshi on his lap —but rather like the vestiges of slumber are still in the process of being dusted away. Which is patently absurd, because that would imply Yamada was trying to get some shut eye while Hitoshi was actively on his lap.

“I’m,” Hitoshi sputters, heat crawling up his neck. “I’m on… I-I fell a-asleep on your lap?” 

Fucking. Great observational skills Hitoshi. Good job.

“Looks like it, doesn’t it?” Yamada says mildly, shifting from where he was forced to recline into the back cushions because Hitoshi was on his lap. Is still on his lap. Hitoshi’s body is suddenly struck with lightning, spasming with movement. 

“S-Sorry.” He stammers quickly, retreating backwards and scrambling to the other edge of the couch in a desperate bid to create a canyon between himself and Yamada.

“How many times do I gotta tell you that you don’t need to apologize, kiddo.” Yamada sighs, standing up to stretch his back and roll his shoulders. The click Hitoshi hears coming from the man does nothing to assuage his guilt. “You really are a certified problem child. Would fit right in with 1-A.”

The mention of his class has Hitoshi quickly turn to the opposite couch, expecting Aizawa to be seated and serving him the most unimpressed stare, but he is—absent. The couch is empty, and with a quick swivel of the head, Hitoshi ascertains that his mentor is nowhere in sight, not the man nor even the caterpillar version of him sleeping on the floor.  

Hitoshi blinks, dispelling tears, and turns to watch Yamada as the man collects the, quite frankly alarming amount, of used tissues. 

Noticing Hitoshi’s questioning gaze, Yamada provides him with an answer. “Shouta’s out paying your guardians a visit.”

It’s as if Yamada wants Hitoshi to hurl the entirety of his guts out onto the floor. 

“You’re not in trouble, Hitoshi.” Hitoshi startles when Yamada jabs an empty water bottle in his direction, before continuing his impression of the cleaning staff. “He rang them to give them an update on the jam you’re in, that you’re in a bit of a sticky situation and that it is highly recommended that you spend the night with a certain pair of Pros to fix your off-key mel-oh-dee. He was asked to do the gig in person, to hash out the details.”

Really, Hitoshi understands the words Yamada says. He’s speaking very clear, articulate Japanese. It does not stop Hitoshi from staring at Yamada in apparent paralysis, unable to even blink, even as his vision distorts with the accursed tears.

Yamada aims the ball of junk he collected at the bin, located at the corner behind Hitoshi, and lobs it like he has years of basketball experience. He gleefully cheers “Kobe!” and the litter is successfully dunked. 

“... What?" Hitoshi sputters very elegantly.

Yamada gives him a sympathetic smile, which isn’t fair because he is literally part of the reason why Hitoshi’s world is falling apart.

“Shouta and I are looking to take you to our place, just for the night, at least.” He reiterates, like repeating it could have it make any amount of sense.  

Yamada, the cruel man that he is, decides to be an opportunist. He kneels in front of Hitoshi, who is still frozen on the couch, and raises a hand upwards to—to make Hitoshi’s heart seize and straight up detonate like a goddamn pipe bomb.

It’s completely illogical, what Yamada does. Because he uses a thumb to gently wipe away Hitoshi’s tears despite: A) there are still usable tissues left and B) it does nothing but incite more tears to flow.

Hitoshi would really like the spirit of Aizawa to possess him so he can bark at Yamada for being irrational, but all that comes from his throat is a choked whine. Typical. Ugh.

“Still got that persistent little quirk bugging you, my little listener,” Yamada murmurs softly, placing the hand onto Hitoshi’s shoulder to steady him. “And we’d feel better if we could continue monitoring it. Shouta’s getting your guardians’ permission, and if all goes well, he’ll come back with a change of clothes for you as well. Can’t have you sleeping in your uniform, it’ll get mighty wrinkly!” 

Yamada retracts himself, which is good, but also the worst thing to ever grace Hitoshi’s existence because Yamada is no longer caressing—no, touching lovingly— fuck no, just, touching, totally without feeling—anyway. The English teacher flicks a tissue Hitoshi’s way, before seating himself on the couch, an arms length away.

Hitoshi cleans his face, breath hitching. He replays the interaction in his head and latches on the first thread he can.

“Y-You and, and A-Aizawa…” he pinches his brow. “... Live together?”

Yamada snorts. “Oh, we’re roommates, yeah.” 

He says it as if divulging a secret. He even finishes the statement with a wink.

Coworkers. Friends. Roommates. Very… very good friends? The best of friends, even? It isn’t any of his business. But he has also been invited into their home, so, really, they’re inviting speculation.

God. Yamada and Aizawa’s home. He’s going—he’s been invited into their home. It’s a nebulous thought, like some fuzzy, indistinct image over the horizon. Something that exists but likewise something distinctly not meant for Hitoshi. 

It’s… logical, Hitoshi is still clearly afflicted, and they have a pretty reliable way of making Hitoshi cry until he literally passes out. That being Aizawa and Yamada’s presence. But. Their home?

That’s—it’s akin to hallowed ground. Something deserving of the utmost respect and reverence and something Hitoshi will invariably taint in some way, somehow. His tears will certainly stain something of theirs. 

Hitoshi is staring at the ceiling. Their home, their place, is it an apartment? A house? Are there enough rooms, do closed doors mean he isn’t allowed inside, will he have to sleep in the closet, will his food intake be monitored, will he have to be quiet, will he be allowed outside, will he have to wear the quirk regulator—

God, their fucking home.

Uncharted territory is dangerous. This is dangerous.

He hears tapping, and Hitoshi turns to watch Yamada drumming his hands on his lap, appearing uncharacteristically abashed, whistling a tune before quickly stopping. Yamada clears his throat, turning to face Hitoshi.

“You okay with having a, uh, sleepover then, Hitoshi? Would’ve asked you sooner but, well, you were really out. Did try to shake you awake, honest! But you looked like you needed that little break.” He rubs the back of his neck. “If staying with your teachers for the night gives you the ick, you can tell us. We’ll drive you home when school ends. No hard feelings!”

And does it. Give him the ick.

Maybe it should. From an objective standpoint, teachers inviting their students into their home sounds very distinctly inappropriate, the hallmarks of a slasher horror movie.

But it would be rude to decline. Aizawa is already visiting the children’s home to ask for permission in person. Such effort shouldn’t go to waste. This is what he tells himself.

“It’s… okay.” Hitoshi mumbles, using his wrist to clear his eyes. “It’s not… icky.”

I trust you both implicitly and it scares me, he doesn’t say.

Yamada smiles at him. He swings an arm over the couch’s backrest, an open invitation for Hitoshi to slot himself back at Yamada’s side. 

To get rid of the quirk quicker, this is what Hitoshi tells himself also, as he makes his way closer.

“Happy to hear it, listener.” 

Aizawa pulls a classic Eraserhead move and catches Hitoshi unawares.

Specifically, the man returns when Hitoshi is in the midst of massaging his eyes, trying to rouse the vestiges of his consciousness and likewise cleaning his face, and therefore he does not see the man enter.

“You still alive, kid?” 

“No.” Hitoshi gripes, sluggishly lifting himself from where he had been slouched against Yamada to sit like a normal person. The English teacher pats his shoulder as he does so, not at all helping Hitoshi in his quest to rub his eyes dry.

“Hizashi will pay for the funeral costs then, since he was supposed to make sure you didn’t kick the bucket.” 

Yamada says something about summoning Kokkuri-san in order to send Hitoshi his homework while he’s in the grave, but Hitoshi doesn’t hear any of it because it is then that he actually sees what Aizawa has brought with him.

His mentor saunters into the room, the crinkling of plastic following in his wake as Aizawa holds a loaded black garbage bag in one hand.

In the other, Aizawa holds an old shoebox.

“That’s—” Hitoshi chokes, swallowing his tongue. “—That’s my s-stuff.”

Aizawa wields his goggles around his neck, hidden beneath his capture scarf, and Hitoshi’s childish copy (aged and battered and stained and suddenly the single worst thing in existence) sits in the shoebox. Amongst the ancient, ugly cat keychain he should throw away already because he’s no longer a kid; the English essay that really isn’t anything that special and is only emblematic of Hitoshi’s damnable ego; the childish scribblings of his proposed Hero costume as if it could ever come to fruition; the UA acceptance letter that just proves that becoming a Hero is a fundamentally hopeless daydream.

Amongst the shameful clutter that exposes Hitoshi’s—stalking/obsession/infatuation—all born from a single monotonous visit to the school library one day in elementary school, the assignment then being to research and present to the class on one's favourite Hero (All Might, Sensei warned warily to the class, was not allowed as a subject). It was then, seated alone in the corner as none of his classmates wanted to be near him, that Hitoshi caught a glimpse of it:  

A simple online news article, mentioning—in only a single paragraph at the end—an unnamed and seemingly unknown Hero with a quirk that prompted much unsettled speculation, but one implied to negate or affect the quirks of others in some way. A Hero that, during his online sleuthing into the underbelly of the Internet and discovering the term “Underground Hero,” had the knack of always generating discourse, netizens relentlessly debating one another on the battlefield that are Internet comment sections about the character of this supposed “Eraserhead.”

A Hero that, as many commenters on many an Internet discussion forum would posit, could easily fit the role of a Villain.

The original article was soon printed with much fervour, still present in that shoebox. It all started a manic episode wherein Hitoshi quickly found out he could have a promising career as a private investigator, considering he amassed an encyclopedic knowledge of the man.

(Hitoshi received a failing grade for that assignment, because his teacher was convinced he had made Eraserhead up.)

It’s all in that damn shoebox, the Pandora’s Box that could unleash every facet of Hitoshi’s shame, and Aizawa is holding it.

“Thrilled to know your eyes are still functioning.” Aizawa deadpans, placing the shoebox on the table. “Hizashi assures me he gave you an explanation of what is going to happen next.”

Why does he even have it. The obvious answer would be that Aizawa saw a shoebox and assumed they housed shoes, but Hitoshi knows the box doesn't have enough weight to continue in such a ruse. Had Aizawa mindlessly picked it up, realized it was not what it seemed, but took it regardless because at that point it would’ve been too awkward to stuff it back under Hitoshi’s bed? Did he snoop under Hitoshi’s bed? Was he explicitly given it? Has he opened it?

(Absurdly, the question ‘what do you know’ almost spills from his lips, the need to interrogate setting his teeth to rattle in his skull, because that’s not suspicious at all, nope.)  

Suddenly remembering that he should probably stop staring at the box, because people who have nothing to hide do not stare incriminatingly at the thing they want to erase from existence, Hitoshi looks to track Aizawa’s movement as he seats himself next to Hitoshi, garbage bag placed by his feet.   

“Yeah. It’s—” Hitoshi clears his throat, wiping his face. “—Y-Yamada mentioned, uh, staying the night? Has that c-changed?”

Hitoshi’s fingers itch to grab the box and cradle it close to his body, or better yet, throw it out the window. Obviously, neither action would do well in maintaining the ‘everything is very normal given the circumstances’ front. So instead, to quell the nerves crackling through his fingertips like a loose fuse, Hitoshi quickly reaches over and grabs Yamada’s wrist. 

It’s strategic, of course: it distracts Yamada from continuing his scrutiny—the man notices things, like when a seemingly inconspicuous box puts Hitoshi on edge—and holding the man’s hand instantly makes him cry, which is why they’re all here in the first place. 

It also helps to melt away the sharp icicles that threatened to snap and skewer him, formed as soon as he saw the box, because all tension thaws from his body as soon as he feels the warmth of Yamada’s palm radiate against his own. 

Yamada’s hand squeezes his, which wrings out an embarrassing noise from Hitoshi’s throat. Hitoshi blinks pathetically at his English teacher when he speaks.

“Still the plan as far as I know. Unless the quirk is still dancing its jig and causing a fuss, then you might be able to skip school tomorrow. What, you jiving to stay over for the weekend, listener?”

Another hint that plainly demonstrates that Hitoshi was born unlucky: that this whole disaster decided to happen two days before the weekend. 

He quietly laments the potential loss of a school day. He’s already lost half of today, and the pressure of still having to climb his way towards Heroics with the knowledge he is categorically behind in all aspects if— when— he transfers is something that could completely eviscerate his body into a fine red mist.

It is a special kind of horror not knowing the exact end time of this curse. Being offered to stay the night at the apparent Aizawa-Yamada household (hyphenating their names is almost sickeningly domestic. Huh. Hm.) is… a privilege. A kindness that Hitoshi is inherently unworthy of. Staying the weekend is a flagrant violation of that kindness. That’s the dictionary definition of exploitation. They probably already have weekend plans. Together. Without the adage of a crying teenager.

Hitoshi’s eyes linger at the garbage bag, laden with his personal possessions that outlines the unconventional narrative of his life, and then to the shoebox that precariously houses the—wreckage that is Shinsou Hitoshi.

Disproportionate, if just for one night.

“Oh.” Hitoshi sniffles, glancing between the two adults. “It’s just, uhm. I-It’s all my s-stuff?”

Yamada’s frown and Aizawa’s narrowed eyes help Hitoshi discern, very quickly, that that was the incorrect thing to say.

“S-sorry,” he squeaks, looking downwards to his feet scuffing the floor. He instinctively wishes to retract his hand from Yamada’s hold to dissolve into the ground. But his English teacher can read minds, because right at that moment he gives Hitoshi’s hand another squeeze, causing a certain warmth to bloom across his skin and tears to drop from his wobbling chin.

“Still got nothing to apologize for, little listener.” Yamada sighs, wearily glaring at the garbage bag as if the plastic is poised to strike. It is pretty unappealing, even if there isn’t any actual (debatable) trash within. But it’s—ugly. A filled garbage bag. And now he’s expected to take it into his home because he ill-advisedly invited Hitoshi along.

“I wasn’t made aware this was the… entirety of your belongings.” Aizawa spares an annoyed glance at the bag. Ugly. Repugnant. Hitoshi wants to shrink. “I explained that we were unsure how long the quirk would last but that the school was well aware of and implementing the treatment needed to fix it.”

That’s a really funny way of saying that he is being forced to cry at every waking moment, and that the trigger for him to cry is literally his teachers.

Hitoshi briefly wonders what it was exactly Aizawa told the home. He imagines the bare essentials as to save himself from having to explain to Hitoshi’s guardians that he has found himself in the unfortunate situation of having an overgrown toddler weep at the mere sight of him. He knows that Aizawa most likely mentioned that the incident happened off school grounds and not during school hours, to which Hitoshi quietly mourns the quick death of his short lived freedom. Kanemaru-san has probably gotten an earful. He winces at the thought.

Aizawa continues. “Sugiyama-san proposed the possibility of you staying with us for next week, provided Hizashi and I give daily reports on your condition, should the quirk still persist. I assumed I was given multiple changes of your clothes, as to prepare for however long this may last.”

The night. Then a weekend. Now the whole of next week?

The constant crying has definitely altered the two adults’ brain chemistry in some terrible, terrible way. Even if staying the night was the only option actually promised, the mere fact that they could even entertain Hitoshi staying a week in their home is clearly evidence that the tears must have some sort of secondary effect of putting those in the vicinity under some sort of influence that causes irrational decisions.

In the hollow cavity of his skull, where neurons are still desperately being fired from the remains of his brain, he understands that it is prudent to be prepared, and that no one is actually entirely sure when the quirk will be fully tempered. Considering the trajectory of Hitoshi’s life, crying for the entirety of next week doesn’t seem that unlikely. Should it be so, Hitoshi will visit the nearest shrine to get cleansed. He wills the thought away forcefully, imagines personifying it and subsequently beating it with a stick, to mitigate any meager chance of it becoming true.   

Hitoshi’s insides have swirled into knots, withering like a mass of worms; the night, the weekend, the whole of next week. A leech, gorging itself like the parasite that it is. He shifts uncomfortably where he sits, but on the other side of that same exact coin, something else: the coilings of his gut releasing butterflies and something settling, like the detangling of a net, at the thought.

Aizawa nods to the shoebox sitting so deceptively nonchalant on the table, “One of the boys you room with, Tanomi-kun, told me to take that as it is important to you, according to him.”

Hitoshi almost scoffs, but is able to quell it before it rises. Tanomi, aged ten and with the quirk that makes his eyes act like flashlights in the dark, had the habit of snooping. Hitoshi still posits he would’ve had a very good defense in court, when he very nearly throttled the boy like a ragdoll after finding him lackadaisically sifting through the contents of the shoebox as if it were loot from a video game for him to analyze at his leisure. 

The anger felt then was frigid; ice instantly freezing through his veins and locking his limbs as his teeth suddenly grew sharp in a snarl that could rival a bear’s. And it wasn’t a threat, when Hitoshi declared lowly to Tanomi he could very easily Brainwash him and have him play in traffic, and no one would be any the wiser to the true nature of such a tragic accident, it was merely stating a fact.

In hindsight, a fact that could have easily turned around to bite him with a generous dose of venom, because Tanomi could have run crying to a home staff member and Hitoshi would’ve become a statistic in the missing persons registry. As it stands, the boy merely nodded profusely with tears dribbling down his cheeks as Hitoshi returned the box to its rightful place under his bed.

Hitoshi suspects that Tanomi told Aizawa to take the box as his way of apologizing for that day. It may have been—considerate, of the boy, if it wasn’t completely unnecessary and actively giving Hitoshi heart palpitations that what separates Aizawa and Yamada from seeing the very thorough documentation that Hitoshi is a little freak is only a flimsy lid of cardboard.

Aizawa’s expression is unimpressed. “I didn’t look inside, so you can stop breaking a sweat over it. I have no interest in invading your privacy, and neither does Hizashi.”

A pitiful blubber attempts to escape from Hitoshi’s lungs in response. He bravely attempts to mask it as a cough, “Uh, t-thanks.”

Yamada brushes his thumb across Hitoshi’s knuckles. The cough morphs back into a wet blubber.

Aizawa says, “If this continues on into tomorrow evening without abating, we’ll take you to a quirk specialist and get into contact with Koufuka-san. You’ve gotten approval to take tomorrow off, but next week you’ll need to suck it up and go to classes even if you’re still crying.”

“Luckily, no school after tomorrow! I’m sure by next week you’ll be fit as a fiddle, Hitoshi.” Yamada chirps, and Hitoshi wonders how much different life must be to live with such optimism. 

“You’re going to be catching up on the work you’ve missed in the meanwhile.” At least Aizawa thinks highly of him, since he believes so assuredly that Hitoshi can finish any homework while actively dehydrating into a husk. “You’ve got two teachers at your disposal, so you better make the most of it. Let’s go.”

Aizawa slaps his hands on his knees, lifting himself from the couch as Hitoshi blinks after him like a lost dog.

He feels his brows furrow, quickly dredging his phone from his pocket to check the time. “S-schools not out y-yet?” 

“And we have no use in staying any longer. Hizashi and I have been cleared for the day, we have your belongings, leaving now means avoiding any unwanted attention, and I’m sick of sitting in this room.” Aizawa looks down at him and tilts his head. “Unless there is something you need to do before leaving?”

“N-No,” Hitoshi shakes his head.

“Then let’s not waste anymore time.” 

Aizawa hefts the garbage bag once more and, with the precision only mastered after years of practice, does he also fling a water bottle directly onto Hitoshi’s lap—seriously, how many of these things do they have on hand? The man threw it like a shuriken, was it hidden in his sleeve?—which appropriately resulted in Hitoshi sputtering in surprise because he was ambushed. 

He suspects, when he sees Aizawa has the shoebox tucked under his arm, it was done to distract Hitoshi as to snag it like a cat stealing fish right under a fishmonger’s nose. He gives his mentor a scowl through the tears, but the unsympathetic smile he receives in turn tells Hitoshi it wasn’t particularly effective.

Hitoshi fights a sudden head rush when he stands, wincing, and when he blinks his blurred vision into focus to find his school bag, he sees that Yamada already has it slung on one of his shoulders, declaring, “Let’s get this party on the road, baby!”

Yamada shrugs his shoulder, properly securing the school bag, and then graces Hitoshi with a bright smile.

“Hey, no worries, I got it. You just worry about staying hydrated.” Yamada nods his head at the water bottle currently clutched in Hitoshi’s hand, before something distinctly smug takes over his English teacher’s features. “‘Sides. Your hands are already full.”

Yamada raises his hand, as if to show off some prized gem that he is exceptionally pompous with, and it is only to reveal that: Hitoshi is still holding his hand.

No wonder these two make him cry. They’re nothing but bullies to him.

If Yamada thinks he can tow Hitoshi through the school halls like he’s some sort of bawling toddler needing to have his hand held—well, he’s absolutely right, because their palms are regrettably glued stuck to one another, and Hitoshi is completely powerless to extract himself. It’s Yamada’s funeral, Hitoshi adamantly asserts internally, he’s the one forced around to lug around a dead weight in his hand. 

“Whatever,” Hitoshi strives to be waspish, but it comes out as a hiccup. He clears his face with his sleeve as to bar away Yamada’s stupid face, the man having the audacity to giggle at how he is tormenting his own student as he tugs Hitoshi towards the door, hand in hand.

Aizawa is at the door, hand poised at the handle to open it, but despite being the one to insist not wasting time, he halts as he speaks.

“Hitoshi.” 

Hitoshi suspects this is how it feels to do bungee jumping or skydiving or diving with sharks that are known to have eaten people and whose beady eyes are trained specifically on him.  

“Y-yeah?” he coughs, heart having decided the best course of action was to traverse directly into his throat.

Aizawa levels him with a measured look. “If you want to stay the week, even if this quirk has already run its course, you can. It can be arranged.”

Maybe this Aizawa is some sort of nefarious impersonator and the real one is currently stuck at the bottom of a well somewhere. Hitoshi feels his eyes refill with tears.

“But,” he blinks, trying to recenter the double image of Aizawa in front of him. “Why? I—, if the q-quirk is g-gone, then… why?”

If Hitoshi’s gaze wasn't so thoroughly cemented on Aizawa, he would’ve probably noticed Yamada convey, entirely through eyebrow movements, the sentiment ‘don’t overwhelm him’ directed towards the Erasure Hero.

“We live closer to the school than you do.” Aizawa shrugs nonchalantly, as if that succinctly explains everything. “And you have the permission to do so.” 

“If you want to, Hitoshi.” Yamada breaks Hitoshi from his stupor by lightly bumping shoulders. “We would have no qualms having you boogieing at our shindig for a week, little listener. And, who knows! Probably a good idea to justa keep tabs on ya, even if your eyes are dry, wouldn’t want to leave you with any nasty after effects, y’know?”  

The two men both look like they’re supposed to, undoubtedly both Aizawa and Yamada dressed in their Hero gear, but maybe Hitoshi has cried so hard he’s somehow slipped into some alternate reality. He dumbly swivels his head back and forth between the two adults, the words that were spoken and their—not a promise, it’s. An obligation, they’re being responsible adults, that’s it— weigh heavily in the air like smoke. 

His skin prickles as if encased in sweat. He becomes hyper aware of each tear drop sullying his face, the snot loose in his nostrils and dripping downwards, how he has to huff his breaths through his mouth which dries the back of his throat. The wrinkling of his uniform, how his hair is disheveled, the red rimming of his glazed over eyes; the thought of staying simmering like an overheating pot that has froth spilling over the edge and burning the stovetop. 

Staying, and Hitoshi is like black mold staining the walls.

Yamada taps his thumb against Hitoshi’s hand, which he still resolutely holds despite how disgusting Hitoshi is. “Just chew on it, Hitoshi. If you wanna stay just the night, or the weekend, or next week, it’s all dandy with Shou and I and your guardians. Figure out which one you like best and just give us a holler!”

Given time is—good. To chew and digest and hope his stomach settles from how it wants to rip through his flesh. He nods sullenly, eyes downcast and swallowing a whine that bubbles forth, and they exit the room. 

Eraserhead and Present Mic are safely stowed away in duffle bags, Hero costumes cast off and civilian personas donned. Granted, they’ve already been ‘just’ Aizawa and Yamada for the majority of the day, but that doesn’t change the fact that both of them look like entirely different people now. 

Well. Yamada does, anyway, hair down and cascading off his shoulders with his outfit an expertly done collage of bright orange and yellow, with accents of teal; Aizawa has just put on a black v-neck shirt and grey sweatpants, the perks of going Underground.

Hitoshi, in a rare moment of good fortune, was told to hit the locker rooms to change into his civvies and—hallelujah—wash his face. Dressed in his purple hoodie and jeans with his face some semblance of orderly, Hitoshi can almost feel normal. 

Of course reality comes crashing down like a kamikaze pilot, tears instantly resurfacing once Hitoshi finds himself in their… van. Mini-van. A compact, very rectangular snub-nosed four seater with back storage loaded already with a great variety of emergency items, including a first aid kit, fire extinguisher, tow ropes, jump cables, blankets, flashlights, street maps, two-way radios, portable chargers—kitty litter?—towels, more water bottles, and. A lot of stuff. Hitoshi catches a glimpse of it all neatly tucked away like apocalypse tetris, as his stuff is packed away.

The steering wheel is adorned with a bright pink cover, the seats possessing paw print patterned wrappings, and a lucky cat charm hangs from the rear view mirror. Hitoshi idly toes at the full roll of duct tape and heavy duty scissors that lay at his feet from where he is sitting in the back seat, casually disregarding the full on fire axe that is tucked beneath where he sits. In his lap, the shoebox that Aizawa graciously relinquished as he took his position in the passenger side, Yamada the one driving, and Hitoshi marvels at how much shorter Yamada looks without his hair defying gravity.

After a comical seatbelt check wherein Yamada required verbal confirmation that his passengers were strapped in, they pull out of the parking lot and leave the school grounds.

Aizawa, clearly not content to let the drive pass in a daze as the scenery turns into a blur with Yamada’s whistling serenading the air, has angled his body so he reaches his hand backwards in Hitoshi’s direction. 

Hitoshi stares at the offered appendage, at the creasing of the skin on his palm, at the light scars that criss cross against pale skin and then gazes upwards to the man it is attached to.

Aizawa is turned to look at him. “You know how this goes, kid. You need to keep crying.”

And Hitoshi—

Hitoshi really wants to laugh, is his first reaction. Some hysterical, mad laughter that could land him in the looney bin. A guffaw bursting from his chest and splitting open his ribcage, leaving him bare and open and disguising the fact Hitoshi is on the precipice of melting like ice in a frying pan.

He shakily reaches forward. “Y-your ugly m-mug is enough t-to make me c-cry, A-Aizawa.” Hitoshi says, grabbing the man’s hand and immediately choking on a breath.

“Watch it, brat.” Aizawa huffs, but there is no malice in his tone.

Hitoshi may have giggled, but his crying masks it, as he catches Yamada’s pleased eyes through the rear view mirror.

As it turns out: they live in an apartment. It’s remarkably ordinary. Remarkably unremarkable. But what was remarkable was the first impression Hitoshi gave their neighbour, a woman who decided to leave her own apartment just as Yamada and Aizawa tried to get into theirs. Yamada greeted her enthusiastically, gesticulating wildly as to block her view of Aizawa quickly attempting to usher a crying teenager into their residence. The effort of which was hampered due to the fact that Aizawa’s hand on Hitoshi’s shoulder only inspired the teen to throw his head back and release some thoroughly woeful weeping.

In his defense, Hitoshi can’t exactly control it, and he was subsequently shoved through a door hastily just as Yamada said that it was such a lovely day and no police needed to be called.  

Hitoshi clears his vision as he is steered inwards after removing his shoes, shoebox clutched in his hands like a lifeline as his mind rapidly tries to understand that he’s in their apartment.

He’s in their living room, tear stricken as he surveys his surroundings like a bobble head. There’s a certain sense of awe circling him by virtue of actually, really, physically standing inside their dwelling. Likewise, he is rooted where he stands, his limbs suddenly too gangly and unwieldy in a space he has no idea how to navigate, as if any step he takes now will result in something expensive and probably sentimental to Yamada and Aizawa to spontaneously explode.  

It’s—cozy, if Hitoshi had to put a word to it. He assumes, anyway, because ‘cozy’ isn’t something he is particularly familiar with. Warm, earthy tones abound throughout, with colour cohesion so finely crafted he knew immediately Aizawa had nothing to do with any of the interior decorating and it was all Yamada. It’s almost like an image taken directly out of a magazine catalogue with how all components of the apartment look. Perfect. A clear vision brought into fruition. Fitted all together like a completed puzzle. Lived in. 

There are vinyl records adorning the wall, of which Hitoshi can only assume are from famous musicians because they’re framed. An electric keyboard sits near the corner, accompanied by a bass guitar (that, upon closer inspection, has a ‘Deleteface’ sticker on it) and saxophone on either side of it, the instruments clearly meticulously cared for as their surfaces are near unblemished despite knowing well who their owner is.

At first glance, nothing posits that Aizawa even exists in this space, which in turn paradoxically does show he lives here, because it's predominantly Yamada at the forefront with only subtle utterances of Aizawa—such as the cat mug on the table, the garish neon green fuzzy slippers at the entrance—but everything is made moot entirely, because Hitoshi’s attention is forcefully stolen because there’s a cat tree at the window.

It’s beautiful. Perhaps even the best thing Hitoshi has ever seen in his life. It’s tall and magnificent and appears suitable to house multiple (!!!) cats.

The crinkling of plastic denotes that Aizawa has approached from behind with Hitoshi’s garbage bag, and Yamada’s whistling means he follows suit on the other side as to bracket the teen.

“Y-you have a cat?” Hitoshi asks haltingly, staring intently at the cat tree to catch any glimpses of movement, before darting his gaze around the room with renewed vigor.

Aizawa hums the affirmative. Yamada cuts to the chase.

“Cats, actually. Plural! Three in fact.”

And then, a miracle: from one of hiding places in the cat tree, a ‘mrrp’ and the face of the most innocent creature peeks out at him.

Hitoshi drops to his knees and wails.

It is a bewildering, terrifying thing to have Yamada cheerily state ‘And here’s your room!’ when he herds Hitoshi to the guest bedroom down the hall, opposite the bathroom with another room—the master bedroom, supposedly—further onwards. 

Hitoshi stands at the threshold of the doorway awkwardly, snivelling at the room as he surveys how it furnished just enough to be considered welcoming, bare of personalization but an extension of their apartment all the same, warm with the same tones and a space Hitoshi could comfortably… sleep in. Exist in. Alone, without others, just he in this space with a bed that looks like it could be akin to a cloud with the softness it promises. The closets are half opened and he catches a peek at a variety of items left in storage but even still the space is large enough to keep his clothes. The desk with a lamp near the (unbarred!) window would be a welcomed place to do his studies. 

(Temporary, just temporary, he repeats in his head.)

It sure is a bedroom. One that had been clearly used for storage that Aizawa haphazardly cleared when Yamada made the bed. It’s a bedroom, a guest bedroom, and there’s a numbing relief felt when Hitoshi realized he wasn’t unceremoniously kicking either Aizawa or Yamada out of their own bedroom because they’re adults being responsible by keeping an eye on him because of a stupid quirk.

Aizawa strides past to put the garbage bag on the bed. Yamada asks Hitoshi if he wants help unpacking. Hitoshi stands by the doorway with the shoebox heavy in his hands and a brain still desperately trying to compute the current situation. Their apartment, ‘his’ room—staying.

Just—the night. Weekend. Next week. Until the quirk wears off and no after effects are recorded and Hitoshi is cleared with a clean bill of health. 

He blinks. Tears streaming down his cheeks, of course, standing at the doorway like an imbecile, of course. Aizawa and Yamada both stand in the room and look at him appraisingly, and it is then that Hitoshi realizes he has let the silence drag on for too long.

“It’s,” he sputters in his effort to cease being rude. “N-nice. T-Thanks.” 

Yamada offers him a smile. Aizawa beckons Hitoshi into the room with a tilt of the head, and Hitoshi stumbles inward, effectively tripping on nothing. He’s almost surprised when he doesn’t completely implode as soon as he breaches the threshold, as if stepping through an invisible barrier. 

Considering the two adults are still present (and very obviously tracking all of Hitoshi’s movements), Hitoshi does not immediately shove the shoebox into the dark recesses of the bed’s underside so it can never be seen again. He instead settles to lay it on the bed itself, wishing to dip forwards and submerge himself into the sea of the duvet and disappear.

Yamada, after an excruciatingly awkward moment wherein Hitoshi looks at the floor because looking anywhere else in his—the room is going to cause him to collapse of heart failure, decides to grant mercy by saying he is going to go make some tea, and then leaves.

Aizawa has no such sense of pity. He just stands where he is like some sort of gargoyle and silently assesses Hitoshi. It is only when Hitoshi finally raises his head to peek at the man through his tears, that he speaks.

“I really think you should stay the week, Hitoshi.”

Really, the man should just strangle him instead.

The result is the same either way, as air escapes Hitoshi violently enough he starts coughing. Before any of that—the room, staying the week, being called ‘Hitoshi’ by Aizawa—all collectively crushes him under the weight of a collapsing mountain, Hitoshi fervently grabs onto the first thing he can think of, as to escape Aizawa’s unblinking stare.

“Do you and Y-Yamada,” he thumps his chest, remembering the room down the hall and unsure if more bedrooms exist in the apartment. “S-sleep t-together?”

Aizawa huffs, corners of his lips turning upwards just as the words Hitoshi spoke make themselves known in all their horrible glory to his stupid brain.

“I mean,” Hitoshi says, several octaves higher than his voice should be, flushing red. “I—s-share a room? I—”

“We’re married.” 

It’s spoken so plainly. Aizawa’s baritone carries it so effortlessly and Hitoshi stares.

And the man is smiling, not one of his usual too-toothy menacing grins that only promise a world of hurt, but something soft, which is almost uncanny considering the man’s hard edges.  

“M-Married?” Hitoshi feels his face screw up, a new barrage of tears that has him lifting his hands as to wipe his face. “That’s. So sweet.”

It’s a good reason to cry. It must be, because Hitoshi can’t stop his broken breaths because Aizawa and Yamada are married. Something melts inside him, causing a warmth to cascade throughout his veins like the blossoming of a full field of flowers. It feels a little something like hope.

Before he can over analyze that, a weight is softly pressed to his hair and Hitoshi’s breath hitches. 

Aizawa cards his fingers through Hitoshi’s hair, and his vision becomes completely ruined. How many hours of this does he have left? He is starting to suspect he cannot actually survive this, as a long whine exits him.

“Think on it, alright.” Aizawa murmurs, and he doesn’t need to elaborate on what ‘it’ is because the idea of a week hangs loosely like a noose still. “In the meanwhile, you can unpack. Come down when you’re ready. The tea will be waiting for you.” 

Aizawa’s hand drops to pat his shoulder. He watches Hitoshi scrub his face as the teen shakily nods, before he takes his exit. Aizawa leaves Hitoshi in a room that, oddly enough, is no longer as suffocating as before.

The tea, warm and the world’s greatest relaxant, is a blessed reprieve when swallowed.

It is made infinitely sweeter, because Mochi, the grey tabby who made himself known first, is currently staring at him with curious greenish-brown eyes from where he sits upon the cat tree. Hitoshi imagines he must make quite the sight for the cat, a sudden new, and loud, addition to his territory, a snivelling ape that surely sets the poor feline’s ears to ring.

Hitoshi would really like to employ a calm, slow blink in the cat’s direction as to show he isn’t a threat and also really, really wouldn’t mind if Mochi decided to come closer. Preferably in petting distance. Or, should the stars align and grant Hitoshi with a blessing, even for the cat to bestow him the great honour of laying in his lap. 

As it stands, Hitoshi’s efforts are made insurmountable because the mere sight of the cat brings with it a deluge of tears, and he can only hopelessly blink profusely at the cat. He infers that Mochi doesn’t know morse code, because he’s pretty sure he is signalling S-O-S right now.

Sashimi, a calico, peeks her head from one of the cat tree’s hiding places. Her emerald eyes feel like something very sharp has pierced his heart. He feels his lip wobble perilously.

Aizawa is seated next to him on the couch, idly watching Hitoshi weep at the sight of his cats like it’s a very fascinating on going car crash with multiple fatalities. Yamada busies himself in the kitchen, which is perhaps a small mercy, because Hitoshi is pretty sure his body would desiccate if both adults and cats surround him simultaneously. 

Aizawa told him that their third cat, Hag, a brown geriatric ('Senile,’ said Aizawa. ‘Aged like fine wine,’ countered Yamada. ‘The product of a bygone era, decrepit and obsolete,’ finished Aizawa) tabby has withdrawn herself into their bedroom and most likely won’t make an appearance as she’s getting her beauty sleep. 

Which is fine, Hitoshi would never encroach on any elderly’s—human or otherwise—space and time. The two cats currently in front of him are already doing enough in punting his tear ducts into overdrive.

“Y-You have,” Hitoshi tries when Aizawa offers him a tissue as snot drips from his nostrils. “B-beautiful c-c-children.”

Wheezing laughter from the direction of the kitchen nearly rattles the walls.

“Don’t I know it.” Aizawa says dryly, before gesturing to Hitoshi’s school bag that leans against the couch at their feet. “Now, I know you have homework, kid, crying doesn’t give you the excuse of skipping out on your academic responsibilities.” 

Hitoshi scoffs, but shakily attempts to retrieve his schoolwork. “O-Okay. But y-you’re going t-to explain why my worksheets a-are wet t-to S-Sensei.”

“You can take as many breaks as you like, Hitoshi. Crying can grant you some leniency.” Yamada peeks his head from the kitchen as he dries a mug with a kitchen towel.

“You shouldn’t underestimate him, Zashi, it’s belittling.” Aizawa dismisses his husband, but not unkindly. Oh, that still causes his chest to tingle. They’re husbands, ah.

“It’s called being accommodating, Shou-chan.”

Mathematics homework safely secured onto the table and without tear stains (for now), Hitoshi readies a tearful retort at them both, but is halted when he spies a blur of movement from the direction of the cat tree.

Mochi, clearly sensing some amount of productivity was about to get done, decides it is his duty to disrupt it. He does so in the most efficient way, clearly demonstrating that he is the smartest creature in the room.

He jumps onto Hitoshi’s lap, and any train of thought is thoroughly derailed into a fiery demise.

“Fine, we can do your homework after dinner.” Aizawa’s voice barely reaches Hitoshi, because he’s currently expending all his strength into not howling an outright waterfall. 

“No one’s morally opposed to having katsudon tonight, yeah? Because that’s what for dinner.” Yamada’s voice calls, and it must be how angels sound like, considering it automatically reminds Hitoshi, in full force, that he hasn’t had anything but breakfast and some cookies for the entire day. 

Yamada busies himself with preparing the meal and Hitoshi, saddled with a cat in his lap and therefore in accordance with accepted standards of conduct, cannot move. Regardless, a blunt sense of guilt is drilled into the center of his head as he is not in the kitchen with Yamada helping the man, but—cat. But he should earn his meal, shouldn’t he? But—cat. It’s their cat too, he cannot possibly be expected to disturb Mochi, surely, and Yamada hadn’t called for him to make himself useful. So. The cat is clearly the boss here. And the cat is so, so soft, his hands are literally full.

His thoughts are interrupted when Aizawa speaks.

“Why were you out at midnight last night?”

Hitoshi finishes the thought that he could prepare them breakfast in the morning as both apologies and thanks for their support against this quirk, before he realizes he should probably answer the man next to him.

“Huh?”

Mochi’s weight on his lap is grounding, but it doesn’t help Hitoshi in pulling a proper response from the murky alphabet soup currently swirling in his brain. He blinks at the man, who is casually sifting through Hitoshi’s maths and chemistry homework.

“When you bumped into Koufuka-san.” Aizawa answers, flipping through Hitoshi’s worksheets and notes without looking up.

Hitoshi squints at Aizawa’s blurred image. “Who?”

Aizawa gives him a blank stare. “The reason why you’re currently crying.” 

Clarity slowly emerges, both visually and mentally, and the image of a startled woman in business attire takes focus in his memory.

“Oh. Right.” He raises a shaky hand to caress the back of his neck. “I was jus’. Getting groceries.” 

“At midnight?”

“I think it was like... 2 AM, actually.” 

Aizawa sets the homework into a neat pile on the table, leaning back on the couch to regard Hitoshi with his full attention. “Is getting groceries at 2 AM a regular occurrence for you?”

“Nah,” Hitoshi sniffs, wiping his nose with his sleeve. “I’m not usually a-allowed outside.”

Mochi repositions himself on Hitoshi’s lap as Sashimi stretches from her perch, still on the cat tree. Hitoshi watches the felines with just an ounce of envy; to be able to laze so contently without a care and all needs met, it must be magnificent. But such are the dues rightly given to cat-kind.

Peripherally, he thinks this could be a bonding moment between he and Aizawa, because he knows with utmost certainty the man also dredges to the convenience store at ungodly hours.

“... because you have a curfew, yes? So you’re not allowed outside when it’s dark?”

Hitoshi watches the man’s blank expression, digesting his equally blank words. 

“... Yes.” Hitoshi says slowly, recognizing too late that it was said suspiciously slowly. It isn’t a lie; because of course Hitoshi has a curfew. It’s just whenever the home’s door shuts behind him.

“And last night was different because…?” Aizawa deliberates.

Hitoshi wrinkles his nose at the man beside him. He knows his scowl does little to the man, even when he isn’t pouring out waterworks, but he has to keep his standards, some semblance of self respect, since no one else on this Earth will provide him with the same courtesy, apparently.  

Hitoshi huffs. “Kanemaru-san is old, A-Aizawa, a-and I-I was already a-awake. The s-store isn’t far, I-I’m not a baby, I can get groceries, even when it’s dark.”

Hitoshi resolutely ignores the tears streaming down his face. Aizawa does not grant him the same mercy.

“Sure, you only get hit with a stray quirk while you do.” Aizawa says mildly as if he isn't just asking his mentee to betray him in the very near future. “Definitely a crybaby, also.”

Hitoshi, suddenly lacking in any sense of self preservation, flings his arm out to thwack the man on the shoulder. “Y-You should help Y-Yamada. Mochi is a-already making me c-cry, don’t need you.” 

“Are you really trying to boss me around under my own roof, kid?” Aizawa spares a quick glance to where Hitoshi hit him, the corners of his lips twitching upwards.

“He does make a compelling argument, Shou-chan.” 

Hitoshi snorts at Yamada’s statement which was, true to form, delivered in song.

Aizawa rolls his eyes. “Someone has to make sure the kid keeps drinking. Here.” 

At least there are no qualms of the functionality of Hitoshi’s bladder, as he takes the offered glass of water and takes a sip. 

“G-gonna die of o-overhydration,” he muses as he sets the glass on the table, hands returning to their rightful place of petting the cat situated on his lap, curled like a particularly cozy looking croissant.  

“The crying balances it all out.” 

With that, Aizawa and he lapse into a moment of silence. Hitoshi continues his delicate work of caressing Mochi with the care he imagines cat worshipping cultists of ancient civilizations would regularly employ. State sanctioned cat worship—why did that ever go out of style, anyway?

“You can ask for permission to go outside, though, yes?”

Aizawa continues to stare, which obviously he does, because staring is literally the man’s forte. He’s so good at the act of staring that it feels like Hitoshi’s skin is actively peeling off.

Hitoshi shrugs, looking back downwards at the safety of the cat. “I like s-staying inside. T-to study, I like s-studying.” 

Again. Not a lie. Hitoshi is good at lying, a second tongue spoken just as easily as Japanese, but—

With Aizawa staring, it’s like the man has activated his quirk even though he hasn’t; any attempts of falsehoods die on his tongue. 

“You know, kid.” A slow, deliberate raising of the eyebrow, hardly visible through the man’s dishevelled fringe but the presence is felt nonetheless. “Avoiding the question is an answer in itself.” 

“Please no interrogations, we don’t want to spoil his appetite, Shouta.”

Hitoshi does not have favourites between the two adults. Most of the time it is definitely not Aizawa that holds that title. And it definitely isn’t Yamada currently, as the blond throws his head back to give his husband an exasperated look from the kitchen.

Yamada, because apparently he is the most powerful being in the known universe, causes Aizawa to let out a laborious breath and summarily drops the subject.

“Just keep crying, Hitoshi.” Aizawa drops a hand on Hitoshi’s head, giving such a ruffle it feels like he’s trying to unscrew the teen’s head off. “Everything will turn out just fine, you’ll see.” 

Aizawa is categorically the least favourite, because he causes Hitoshi to release such a sob that it prompts Mochi to vacate his lap.

The katsudon can really only be described in one word—sublime.

And also all its synonyms, as Hitoshi tries to savor the taste as best he is able to when his throat is spasming with hitched sobs. He thinks, in the corners of his mind, that he is a walking choking hazard. Not even due to the fact swallowing is a conscious effort with how he is crying, but likewise the speed at which he inhales the food is hardly doing him any favors. 

Whatever. He is sitting across two Heroes, they know the heimlich maneuver. 

“Going off a whim here and assuming you like it, right, little listener?”

Yamada’s voice is laced with amusement, and when Hitoshi looks up from his imitation of a pig, he sees both men watching him with varying degrees of mirth. He swallows; cheeks puffed full and the food goes down with a wince, but he hardly regrets it. He can’t exactly squander such hospitality. 

Although, on that same thought, heat rises to his shoulders and slithers like a snake upwards to his neck. He does have table manners, despite current appearances, and he dredges it forth like recalling an anchor at sea. He resettles in his seat and duly takes a pause to soothe his stomach, and he clears his throat.

“I-is, is good, Y-Yamada,” he mumbles, words unwieldy on his tongue. But because the man in front of him is deserving of the highest praise for granting Hitoshi such a warm meal, he flourishes his answer with a thumbs up.

“Why, thank you, young sir.” Yamada replies with a bow and twirling his hand.

“And I’m going off an educated guess in assuming you skipped lunch, didn’t you?”

Usually, such words would bring with them a (admittedly well deserved) sheet of ice to form across Hitoshi’s skin. 

Aizawa’s voice is free of any of the stern undertones that suggest that the ground beneath Hitoshi’s feet would soon crumble away. But it isn’t exactly affable either, like Yamada was; rather the words are spoken firmly, already knowing the answer and not exactly pleased by it.

Hitoshi feels the need to physically swallow the growing suspense, but he has no food in his mouth currently so that’d be too obvious. He shifts in his seat and then, with a slow sweeping gesture, he very explicitly points to his very wet and very blotchy face.

“Should have said something sooner.” Aizawa sighs. “Could’ve gotten you food at school.”

Technically, he was given food, because Yamada gave him those cookies, but Hitoshi doesn’t think Aizawa would appreciate him being pedantic. It’s a split decision of either saying ‘Could’ve offered sooner’ or ‘Wasn’t hungry,’ when Yamada speaks instead.

The blond points his chopsticks in Hitoshi’s direction, looking at the teen over his glasses. “That’s what we call being a hypocrite, Hitoshi. Because as we know, Shouta’s diet is primarily fake food.”

“Do as I say, not as I do.” Aizawa takes a mouthful of rice and waves a hand nonchalantly. “The jelly packets are convenient. You know I get all the essentials through them.”

Yamada turns, very deliberately, to strike Aizawa with a piercing gaze, the look made more effective as both of his eyebrows are raised to his hairline incredulously. By the looks of Aizawa’s withering expression and the slumping of his shoulders, the oncoming conversation is one that has already happened. Multiple times, and Hitoshi’s pork that was en route to his mouth suddenly halts mid way, with his mouth still hanging open.

(It’s sharp, the very sudden seizing of his heart as if the organ has completely shrivelled up and disintegrated in the effort to pump blood to his limbs in preparation to retreat elsewhere, anywhere—becoming a ghost and silently taking shelter in the next room, the closet, under the bed, creating distance between himself and the impending shouting. 

But no raised voices reign down upon them, and Hitoshi watches, fascinated like he’s an anthropologist studying an uncontacted tribe, as the ‘argument’ proceeds with clear theatrics.)

“I cook—” 

“Zashi.”

“ — and I slave in the kitchen to give this man proper meals —”

“If you would read the ingredients you would know I—”

“—I make him full, delicious bento boxes for work and still —”

“Stop whining in front of the kid.” Aizawa makes a broad sweeping motion towards Hitoshi. “Look. He’s already crying.”

His tears, of course, have always been a forgone conclusion. But as both men turn to look at him, without any sense of indignation warping their expressions or postures, something new stirs before suddenly springing forth like an elated rabbit.

He can’t stop it, but then he wonders if he wants to, before he instinctively closes his eyes and bows his head as giggles erupt. They rattle against his ribcage before bouncing up his throat and leaping past his lips, short, airy snickers that really have no place existing considering tears still stream down his cheeks.

He’s gone certifiably mad, is the only reasonable explanation. Sitting with Eraserhead and his husband at their dining table with the smell of katsudon tempting his taste buds. Not even nine year old Hitoshi could fathom such a thing.

When the giggles begin to recede into something more manageable, he wipes his face, cleaning his tears but also hoping to dust away the ebbing embarrassment that lingers at realizing what a fool he made of himself. 

Hitoshi shakes his head to clear it, and looks back upwards at the men seated across from him. In truth, he cannot name the expressions they wear—Placid? Peaceful?—but he finds he enjoys that it is being directed at him.

“Y-you’re a, a good cook, Yamada.” He bows where he sits. “T-Thank you, for f-feeding me.” 

And for welcoming me into your home, but that is still a weight too difficult to dislodge. 

“At least someone appreciates me. My husband could learn a thing or two.” Yamada pouts, taking a bite of his pork as Aizawa rolls his eyes, the gesture appearing to be done almost lovingly, if such a thing were possible.

By virtue of having a voice activated quirk that strips others of their autonomy, Hitoshi is quite proficient in the art of self study. He has long grown accustomed to hesitation, suspicion and downright distrust being the natural response whenever anyone has the unfortunate fate of having to interact with him in any capacity. A reality long understood, and one only cemented by the time an eight year old Hitoshi still feebly attempted to navigate the impossible maze of suddenly having to live with children and adults he didn’t know with his parents visiting, no longer residing under the same roof.

Building enough courage to ask a home staff member for help on a homework assignment was always a fruitless endeavour; he was a child quick to throwing explosive tantrums who had a penchant for biting, spitting and stealing cigarettes, add in an aptly described ‘problematic’ quirk that he had a delay in controlling and it was easy to understand the aversion of those around him. Hitoshi can not, and does not, blame people’s functioning survival instincts, he knows he wasn’t a particularly pleasant child to deal with (still isn’t, arguably), the transferring from quirk specialist to specialist then to one institution to another was proof enough of that.

That is all to say—Hitoshi is content to study alone. The fact he was able to get accepted into UA means he’s also good at it. 

Obviously, Hitoshi still has functioning ears and a reliable comprehension of his mother tongue, so he understood that Aizawa was purposeful when he used ‘we’ when referencing doing Hitoshi's homework. But such a thing is hardly a team effort, and both adults clearly have their own paperwork to complete and grade and whatever other responsibilities teachers have after school hours. They’re in their home, having just eaten dinner and are settling in the living room, and. Well. Hitoshi isn’t supposed to even be here. Aizawa and Yamada undoubtedly have some sort of evening routine that Hitoshi has completely wrecked by his mere existence.

So, sue him, for wanting to give Aizawa and Yamada the courtesy of an only mildly disturbed rest of the evening by withdrawing into his own little bubble in the living room and mentally apologizing for each and every sniffle that disrupts the quiet. 

He starts with his English homework, because that seems most appropriate considering—everything. And finishing it first will dispel the war flashbacks that are currently flickering behind his eyelids of how he ruined today’s class quicker, as he stares down at the English text.

He immerses himself into his self made island on the table, English textbook open to the appropriate page and notes at the ready, prepared to have the time spent becoming a mere inanimate fixture of the couch; something totally ignorable. 

Of course, the entirety of this day has only been a continuous, seemingly deliberate, destruction of Hitoshi’s expectations, because Yamada saddles himself next to Hitoshi on the couch and cheerily chirps, “Ready to finish today’s lecture, little listener?” 

Usually, when Aizawa takes him to dinner after training at whatever cafe or restaurant, Hitoshi decides to at least start some of his studies at the table. Aizawa—and Yamada, when he tags along—tell Hitoshi that if he ever needs help with his homework, that they’re available. The invitation was always open and one Hitoshi always verbally gave his thanks to, but one he never took because, while appreciated, wasn’t needed.

Which is probably why now Yamada changes his tactics, because Hitoshi cannot exactly—decline such an offer, now can he? Not when he’s under the man’s roof, having eaten the man’s food. The only correct answer to give, after Hitoshi could only blink dumbly at the man sitting beside him, was to have his breath hitch and eyes well up, nodding as he muttered a pathetic ‘uh-huh.’  

Turns out, having an English teacher’s singular attention forgoes the need of using online translators and trying to mimic the diction of random English spoken videos. His impromptu tutoring session proceeds… surprisingly well, crying notwithstanding, with Yamada leading the lesson like conducting a symphony. Hitoshi’s work is stained with teardrops (gee, who could have seen that one coming?), but luckily Yamada hardly needs an explanation for why that is.

The same cannot be said for the state of his maths homework in the very near future.

Aizawa, who at this point had been nursing a cup of coffee (that Hitoshi eyes with envy he doesn’t bother hiding) while grading assignments into a bloodbath with red marker, had taken it upon himself to replace Yamada when the blond left for the bathroom. Hitoshi dimly wonders if mathematics is even something Aizawa would want to help him with, considering the differential equations currently sitting on the table might as well be hieroglyphics with how little sense they make. 

Hitoshi is not bad at mathematics, this he can confidently assert. He is, in fact, perfectly average in his class. 

But his nose is currently running with his eyes red rimmed, and Aizawa saying something about logistics models is currently frying something important in his head, as Hitoshi can do little else but—stare. Whatever Aizawa is saying, as he points to Hitoshi’s worksheet and presumably explains what needs to be done to solve for x, goes through one ear and out the other. Having the man slump next to him and automatically go on a spiel about his homework should, by all rights, be completely infuriating. He does not even ask Hitoshi if he wants help, he just starts. It’s infantilizing, as if Hitoshi hasn’t literally been perfectly fine—

He’s been fine—

—Alone—

For years. Hitoshi is entirely capable of reading his notes and textbooks and deciphering what needs to be done to complete his homework sufficiently. In the age of the Internet, he has a literal endless bounty of resources at his disposal to aid in his studies. He doesn’t need to be sat and talked to like a preschooler.

The words ‘I don’t need your help’ do not come. Instead, Hitoshi stares at Aizawa as if reality has been set in slow motion, and Hitoshi suddenly realizes that he actually has a full stomach.

It’s an odd, seemingly completely irrelevant, realization to have. But it’s true. The katsudon is a pleasant feeling in his belly. Not bloated, not still panging with the remnants of more greed, but rather a perfect sense of contentment. As if Hitoshi is currently lounging directly in a sunbeam, his body possessing the consistency of jelly and far too relaxed. His mind trudges backwards to muse upon the dinner had, the dinner shared; and it would have been completely sensible (deserved) for Aizawa and Yamada to have firmly, yet kindly, assert that Hitoshi was not to eat with them. Or to eat, at all.

They’d be plenty justified, Hitoshi wouldn’t argue otherwise. Getting hit with a quirk, that in itself is worthy of chastening, and then effectively trespassing into their home? Their nights in their home are meant for a meal for two, not three, and Hitoshi would have understood and quietly accepted if the pair wished to dine just as a couple with the teen made to sit patiently in the living room. Hitoshi knows how to ignore hunger. Hitoshi also knows to take what he has earned. 

And yet.

He ate some really good katsudon. Sat at their table, spoke freely, giggled like he was a delirious clown and is now sitting in their living room with Aizawa talking about… his maths homework. He doesn’t even teach maths. At least Yamada is an actual English teacher. Why does Aizawa even inconvenience himself like this? What, was he in the mathematics club when he was in school?

Yamada had aided him in his English homework like it was the most natural progression of the evening, explaining the lesson and then reviewing Hitoshi’s work before announcing happily that everything seemed to be in order. That Hitoshi did a good job. Yamada’s smile was its usual blinding self with his face so infuriatingly happy as he stated easily that Hitoshi did a good job. He’s reminded of those stickers the man gives on well done assignments. All smiles and thumbs up and words of encouragement. 

Hitoshi does not need his hand to be held. He does not need help with his maths and he didn’t need help with his English. 

(But he’s been fed, he’s in their living room, his belongings are unpacked in his—the room, they have cats, plural. Both adults are ready to sit with him and assist with his homework as if Hitoshi almost, could even, maybe—

Belong?)

A cat, Sashimi he thinks, rubs against his leg just as repeated finger snapping in front of his face startles Hitoshi in his seat.

He blinks rapidly at Aizawa’s blurred image, appearing like a dark smudge against the fuzzy background.

“You in there, kid?” Aizawa asks.

‘I really think you should stay the week, Hitoshi.’

(But could he? Belong?)

Something shatters, and Hitoshi could be convinced it was a physical object, when he drops his head to the table and releases the mass of stones that clog his throat. He expunges far too many fluids in too short a time period, a terrible concoction of tears and snot and saliva, all wrought upon his defenseless maths homework that he used to cushion his face when his forehead made contact with the table.

Hands cup his shoulders, holding him as sobs wreck his body from the inside out. A hand lightly pats his head, and Hitoshi mindlessly marvels at how Aizawa grew an extra arm before the actual owner of said appendage speaks.

“Aw, don’t worry, Hitoshi.” Yamada’s soothing voice says from above him. “Calculus has made plenty of people cry!”

The hands gripping his shoulders slowly push him upwards. “You’re getting snot on your homework. Lift your head, kid.” Aizawa says.

Hitoshi acquiesces and sinks into the couch’s backrest, head thrown back and giving Aizawa and Yamada’s neighbours plenty of reason to file a noise complaint. Aizawa pats his shoulder, rousing his attention as the man holds a handful of tissues for Hitoshi to take.

“Take a breather.” Aizawa calmly says as if Hitoshi didn’t just have a sudden nuclear meltdown. 

Hitoshi just nods like an idiot, hoping that if he scrubs his face hard enough he’ll turn into dust that can be swept under the couch. He hears Yamada hum something about how he’ll sort out Hitoshi’s newly made travesty of what was once his homework, as Aizawa decides that Hitoshi hasn’t cried nearly enough yet. Aizawa uses the arm still slung across Hitoshi’s shoulders to propel the teen to lean against his side and revives the tears like an asshole.

It was a tactical retreat to shower.

This day has felt like a century. Hitoshi washes away what feels like a lifetime’s worth of filth under water that is far more scalding than it needs to be.

Hitoshi stares at his reflection through the fogged up mirror. He dons his cat patterned fleece pajamas, the small hole present on his right knee suddenly feeling like he wears only a loincloth before he remembers that he is currently under Aizawa’s roof; the man who regularly dresses like he’s been homeless for decades. 

Hitoshi mindlessly catalogues the deep bags of his eyes, made more prominent after the shower as if the surrounding skin has become more transparent. His pale complexion resurfaces the memories of the (un)affectionate nickname ‘Zombieboy’ bestowed upon him back in junior high school, alongside the more flagrantly antagonistic title of ‘the Corpse’ gifted by his classmates who decided they had vendettas against his entire existence. His hair is still damp and ruffled from his towel drying, slowly springing to its natural, gravity defying state.

He stares intently as he watches strands of hair bounce upwards, and remembers when Aizawa said his unruly rats nest of a head was most likely the result of his quirk; just as Aizawa’s hair floats when he activates his, Hitoshi’s hair is untamable because his quirk is effectively always active. Running as background noise in his subconscious, always at the ready and untangling the mental strands of all those who speak with him for Hitoshi to yank.

And it was so, so childish, but the idea that Aizawa and he could—share something, even if only a side effect of having a mental quirk, was refreshing, like drinking water in a desert. Something to hold a silly sense of pride towards, something to shield away the memory of the classmate who thought it was hilarious to take a pair of scissors to Hitoshi’s hair when he was distracted one lunch period two years ago that he still can’t seem to forget.

Hitoshi sniffs. His eyes, glassy as if belonging to a porcelain doll that should be thrown out, twinkle at the corners with tears at the ready. He continues to stare at this reflection with his body a dead weight, too tired to even curl his lip in distaste at his sunken eyes and gaunt face, and it's too easy to imagine his reflection within the confines of a casket. Something simple, one made of bamboo, efficient in its use and easily burned when he will be cremated. He doesn’t want something ostentatious, not a funeral with grand altars and meticulously arranged lilies and chrysanthemums with a priest leading a chant. Just—something inexpensive. The basics. The bare bones (hah). He needn’t be a burden even after death.

He thinks, staring at his corpse, that his parents would not know how to arrange his funeral. That they would have something picture perfect with all the right arrangements followed to the letter; the expected wake and funeral done by grieving parents. And. They would grieve. Cry as grotesquely as he has done for the entirety of this day. They’d have to.

He thinks—Aizawa and Yamada would, too. Hopefully. Maybe even visit the Shinsou family grave on occasion, but maybe that’s asking too much, because Hitoshi realizes he can’t remember where that even is.  

(The thought comes unbidden and hits him like a slap to the face, the image of a shrine made to honour Hitoshi after death in the Aizawa-Yamada home in a dedicated nook somewhere in the living room or even in his—the guest bedroom. Lighting incense and giving a prayer and telling Hitoshi that they’re—)

(Proud? Miss him?)

He takes a sharp intake of breath, chest shuddering as something sharp stabs him through the ribs, like he’s been stung by a monstrous hornet or dozen. In his reflection he sees his face twist as tears slip to trail down his cheeks and it spurns him to turn on the faucet and splash his face with some needed ice cold water, shocking his body into a painful awareness.

He scrubs his face with the face cloth and mutters some choice curses directed at himself. His stare, now more accurately a glare, is directed downwards at the sink as the sight of his reflection generates a viscous oil of disgust to swirl in his stomach. He itches to throw his fist through the glass and revel in making himself bleed, to squeeze red from the gaps of his fingers formed in a tight fist, but he takes a measured breath to vent the urge. He’s not a child anymore, he isn’t beholden to every wayward impulse, and he frowns at the sink with his hands gripping the countertop. 

He wants to take a deep, all encompassing inhale, then exhale outwards all the clutter that currently resides inside his skull. Drop into autopilot and fast forward or, shit, when did the idea of disassociating become so appealing? He could skip everything that way, hold no memory and wake up with the quirk gone and—

Escape the night, the weekend, next week. 

‘I really think you should stay the week, Hitoshi.’

Spoken so gently. The tone of voice Hitoshi imagines someone employs when encountering a spooked horse ready to either bolt or kick someone’s brains in. A lifebuoy thrown for Hitoshi to take as his body struggles to stay afloat in treacherous waters, and Aizawa really said that. Really thinks Hitoshi should stay the week. Even if the quirk is gone and there is no actual need for Hitoshi to stay.

It’s such a crushing weight, like all of Hitoshi’s bones are simultaneously splintering, to know with certainty that despite Aizawa’s penchant for logical ruses, that he’s actually honest. He really, actually, thinks Hitoshi should stay the week. In his home. With his husband and his cats and in his guest bedroom. And the thing is:

Hitoshi really, even desperately—like he’s being buried alive—wants to be deluded enough to believe Aizawa might want him. To stay. Yamada likewise.

(The week, just the week.)

Cook him meals, eat with him at the table, talk breezily with him, ruffle his hair, pat his shoulder, help him with his homework. 

(Just for the week, just staying the week.)

It’s just for the week. It’s not very long, and clearly Aizawa and Yamada (and the home) have all given their consent to the whole idea. Aizawa and Yamada can survive a week with him, they’re Pros. If they so desperately need to play saviour and see with their own eyes that Hitoshi is cured from the quirk, then fine. Fine! It was their idea in the first place, they can deal with the consequences. 

Hitoshi raises his gaze to scowl at his reflection, lip curled and with tears staining his cheeks. A corpse rising from the casket and in the midst of putrefaction. If Aizawa and Yamada want to waste their time, that's their problem. 

It’s a week under the Aizawa-Yamada roof and all that it entails. The quirk flushes out quicker when he interacts with them, and thus far they have been freely embracing him in a way that doesn’t make Hitoshi wish for thorns to erupt from his skin to ward away the touch. 

A week, but the quirk will most likely finish before then. They’d have him in their home but would have little reason to continue patting or petting or holding him; to continue making his body unwind in a way that should be impossible, as if he exists above the clouds and nothing could hurt him. 

He reuses the face cloth to clean himself. It would be logical, to not let the opportunity pass him by.

Whatever. It’s not like Hitoshi was meant to make it to sixteen anyway, he can have a moment of selfishness as a reward for surviving through spite this far. Take the bull by the horns, as the Yanks would say.

Hitoshi hobbles back into the living room like he only just learned how to walk. 

Yamada and Aizawa sit across from each other, divided by the table and Hitoshi suspects if this was a normal night without the baggage of the accidental teenager acquisition, the two adults might be seated together as—well, a couple. Doing married people things.

Hitoshi shakes away the budding guilt the thought sprouts, and brings himself to a stop by Aizawa. Yamada has Sashimi in his lap anyway, he’s clearly having the best night out of the three of them.

Hitoshi squints down at Aizawa, sniffing. Aizawa tilts his head in his direction, setting the phone he was previously occupied with on his chest, and it is then that Hitoshi realizes he’s been fiddling the hem of his pajama shirt like some pathetic little five year old. He immediately releases his hands to instead awkwardly clench and unclench his fists by his side, before raising an arm to wipe his face with a sleeve helplessly. 

Distantly, there are sirens blaring desperately in his brain, begging him to stop stalling. The jittery nerves that have suddenly sprouted and anchored his feet to the floor are gleefully explaining in excruciating detail how else he should continue embarrassing himself, by telling him to fall to his knees and redecorate Aizawa’s pant legs with a generous helping of fluids expelled from his face.

Hitoshi coughs, shifting his weight from one leg to the other. “A-Are you busy?” 

He really should have summoned a spirit or two in the bathroom so they could’ve possessed him. Whatever phantasm could’ve piloted his body and then chosen the right words, so then Hitoshi wouldn’t be actively cringing like he has a mouthful of dust, and it only would have cost him his soul.

He should have just nosedived into the man’s chest without any preamble then drowned in tears. Literally the only time such an action wouldn’t even be questioned, and here he is, squandering it, because he’s trying to be polite like a complete moron.

Aizawa doesn’t even deserve the civility, not even under his own roof, as the man tosses his phone to the side and spreads an arm over the backrest to invite space beside him. “Is that your way of asking for a cuddle?” 

Heat coalesces beneath his skin as if he stands near a roaring fire. This should be constituted as torture. The word ‘cuddle’ should never, ever, be uttered by the likes of Aizawa again, because it is giving Hitoshi such immense mental distress that it should be classified as a slur.

He scoffs in a vain effort to seem unaffected, an utterly senseless move considering Hitoshi has spewed enough tears to fill an ocean in front of the man already. He automatically brings his hand upwards to rub the back of his neck to self-soothe. 

Remembering quickly that Aizawa once told him that rubbing his neck was an obvious tell he was nervous, he instantly lowers his hand in what he knows was a grand display of self-consciousness that Aizawa has front row seats to. Hitoshi emits a growl, or tries to; the hiccuping ruins it.

Forcing himself to move so that his existential crisis in the bathroom wasn’t for nothing, Hitoshi drops onto the couch and curls against Aizawa’s side like a barnacle glued on a whale. 

“S-Shut up.” Hitoshi warbles against the man’s chest, voice suspiciously thick.

“Or what, you’ll cry on me?” 

Without even needing to see it, Hitoshi knows the man is smiling. Lips stretched callously into a cheshire grin and delighting in the teen’s misery.

Like a prophet foretelling the future, Hitoshi does just as the man said. He buries his face into the man’s chest and it’s a good thing he is wearing black, because there will be a definite stain in the shape of Hitoshi’s face when he’s done with it. It’ll need to be burned, when all’s said and done.

He burrows closer, the action done subconsciously. “O-or I’ll s-steal t-the cats.” He grumbles.

Aizawa’s arm falls from the backrest to pat Hitoshi’s back, causing the teen to shudder and release a whine that he is thankful is muffled. “You can take Hag, she’s free of charge.” 

Hitoshi hears Yamada scoff from across the table, practically radiating enough amusement to power a city and it is too easy to imagine the man holding a camera to document Hitoshi’s disgrace as he coos. He doesn’t turn his head to confirm the suspicion, but if Yamada decides to harbor blackmail against him then Hitoshi is more than happy to release a nest of spiders into the man’s boots.

“We all know Hag is your favourite, Shou. You’re going to cry when she sings her final song, don’t even try to deny it.” Yamada snickers.

“Hence why I’m trying to get Hitoshi to catnap the useless furball.”

He really needs to meet this fabled feline and shake her paw sometime. But she is clearly a cat with standards, as he hasn’t seen a peek of her this entire time during his busy schedule of crying like a little toddler uncontrollably. 

Hitoshi has no witty retort on hand to sneer because he’s too preoccupied using Aizawa’s shirt as an oversized tissue. He hopes this was one of Aizawa’s favourite shirts, as Hitoshi’s resolve crumbles like a poorly constructed sand castle. His hands, that had previously been tucked under his armpits, shakily untangle themselves to paw at Aizawa’s shirt, fisting the fabric to further meld his body onto the adult’s.

Aizawa’s arm is curled upon his back, feeling like a weighted blanket and he can only assume he is shaving years off of Aizawa’s life. Causing grey hairs for both of the teachers. Getting snot everywhere. That’s just the consequences of their actions since they’ve decided against the sensible action of pushing away Hitoshi and his knack of spoiling everything he touches, and instead actively inviting it. 

Hitoshi turns his head from where it was flattened against Aizawa’s chest, remembering to breathe. His eyes are glazed over, staring at nothing as tears continue their freefall like he’s a wet rag being wrung dry. Yamada's voice swims through the air, chattering about—something. It is as if Hitoshi exists under water, sound obscured and indistinguishable and he doesn’t have the energy to expend to manually discern it. He imagines it’s some teacher babble, because Aizawa responds intermittently, his voice vibrating against Hitoshi’s body and carrying the teen safely to shore from rough waters.

Time might as well not exist as Hitoshi sits there against Aizawa. He lays against the man as a burden, an actual corpse, and the man continues to sit there and allow it. No sneer of disgust or discomfort and shifting out from under Hitoshi or outright elbowing the teen in the face to free himself. 

He is settled against Aizawa, snug—cuddling, fuck—under the man’s roof with Yamada sitting across from him and both adults maintaining some sort of casual conversation over his head. And Hitoshi thinks:

Is this how it feels like? To know safety?

He supposes from an objective standpoint, in the presence of two Pros he is, indeed, very secure. But that doesn’t feel accurate—not entirely, anyway. Like it’s something more than that.

Even under the incessant crying and ongoing embarrassment, there is a small (very small) sliver of something glowing in his chest, something that can even be constituted as—nice, almost. Aizawa is a steady presence. An indestructible pillar for which Hitoshi knows he can trust the foundation of. 

He is reminded when Yamada held him (so secure and unshakable and so, so—) when he fell apart before they had any idea it was a quirk. And that. That has to mean something. Everything. That he was held, rocked and spoken so gently to, even when not knowing the cause.

God, he’s not a toddler but it felt so, so—

Safe. 

And being curled against Aizawa feels the same.

“You itching to crawl on my lap like you did Hizashi?”

Leave it to Aizawa to ruin the moment.

Hitoshi instantly flushes red when he is brought back to reality. His survival instincts have him rehide his face against the man’s shirt as he sputters.

“Y-Yamada felt like sleeping on a pile of bricks.”

He hears Yamada give a mock gasp. “Slander.” 

Really. It would only be fair to subject Aizawa to the same fate. And it would be all too easy to strike down that smug tone of Aizawa’s by shuffling like an octopus into the man’s lap.

He is not (okay, maybe a little) ashamed to admit it is something he wants to act upon, if only to have Aizawa eat his words. But it is significantly harder to do the action consciously than it was unconsciously.

Before Hitoshi can properly psyche himself to move, Aizawa becomes a mind reader.

“Here,” Aizawa shifts and armageddon begins. “Let me make you more comfortable, kid.”

An actual squawk, not too dissimilar to a crow, escapes Hitoshi when Aizawa, with a hand on Hitoshi’s back and one under his knees, effectively dumps the teen onto his own lap.

Not fucking fair. Hitoshi was supposed to be the one to control this instance of complete and utter mortification. 

Hitoshi instantly burrows his face into the man’s shoulder, tucked under Aizawa’s chin and gripping the man’s shirt as if he sprouts claws from his fingertips. His body is plastered against the man as he sits sideways on his lap like a curled up pillbug.

“I hate you.” He grumbles with the effectiveness of a wet kitten. 

“The crying says otherwise.” 

So, so smug and so, so—right.

Hitoshi has no answer. The only appropriate response is to proceed to bawl his eyes out with reckless abandon. 

Aizawa pats his back before delicately stroking his spine. “There we go. Cry about it, I’ve got you.”

There’s nothing else that can be done. The concentrated force of a tornado escapes Hitoshi, leaving no survivors.

A day, week, year, decade, a lifetime. He’s probably fully decomposed and his bones have been pulverized through the process of fossilization. He no longer exists in a way that matters, simply floating like some spectre who is anchored to the sanctuary that is Aizawa’s embrace.

He may have passed out. Mostly likely did, with how it feels like an anvil has replaced his head. Considering he apparently lost some length of consciousness in both adults’ laps, he may be onto the cure of insomnia with this nonsense. 

As awareness slowly returns as if being fed through a drip, a rhythmic melody flutters against his ear still pressed against Aizawa’s chest.

Thump, thump, thump.

Hitoshi is entranced by Aizawa’s heartbeat, a siren song, as he lies limply against the man and collects consciousness like scattered puzzle pieces. He breaks out of the trance slowly, counting Aizawa’s heartbeat like counting sheep. After a moment of re-remembering how to be human again, Hitoshi slowly raises his head to peek at Aizawa, who has his head reclined against the backrest with his eyes closed. 

Yamada and Aizawa must be fundamentally different on a molecular scale, genetically engineered even, to have the ability to sleep while a teen is contorted on their lap. No way is it comfortable. Just begging for back problems. 

He supposes Aizawa is clearly an expert in sleeping in unconventional ways considering he carries a sleeping bag on his person seemingly 24/7. Hitoshi shifts to poke the man in the chest. 

“A-Aizawa?” 

He’s been transformed into a warty toad, because he croaks the word out with a too-raspy voice.

Aizawa turns his head slightly to acknowledge him, not opening his eyes. “Hm?”

Hitoshi feels his shoulders hunch as he turns to nuzzle his face into the man’s collarbone. 

“Uhm.” He starts. “Is it, um. I-is it okay to—ugh.”

He scrubs his face with his hand, voice stuck in his throat like he’s swallowed barbed wire. Confidence is but a far off fantasy that quickly becomes brittle and breaks apart, and so Hitoshi quickly huddles even further into himself.

A hand lightly pats his back. “Take your time.” Yamada’s soothing voice drapes over him, and Hitoshi quickly realizes that the English teacher, at some point, has come to sit beside Aizawa. Curled sideways as he is upon Aizawa’s lap, Yamada is seated behind Hitoshi.

An infinite well of patience that in turn spurns the infinite well of tears that Hitoshi possesses. 

After some particularly pathetic sniffling that is further encouraged by Yamada’s stoking, Hitoshi finds his voice like he’s wrestling an alligator.

He mumbles against Aizawa, feeling heat sneak across his cheeks in sudden embarrassment. “...Can I... S-Stay the week…"

Automatically, he squeezes his eyes shut. It’s a childish instinct, and wholly unnecessary, but even though the memories of Aizawa himself suggesting he should stay the week are fresh in his mind, he still feels the need to shield himself against the mere idea of either adult rolling their eyes in annoyance at the request.

The response comes without hesitation.

“Sure.” Aizawa yawns, effectively shocking Hitoshi to blink dumbly at nothing.  

He hears Yamada shift where he sits, most likely pantomiming as he speaks. “You know, we have the TV in our bedroom but it’d be a piece of cake to shuffle everything around and set it up here instead. I know how you young’uns like your TV shows and movies. Got any favourites, Hitoshi?” 

Obviously, Hitoshi has already been given blanket acceptance to stay the week. So of course Hitoshi’s meek little plea would be answered in the affirmative. He already had permission, but, just—

That easy?

The week. The whole of next week. Under the Aizawa-Yamada roof. In a room of his own and dinners shared at the table and with cats.

‘Tears of Joy,’ what a complete farce. The quirk is definitely making him live through some frightfully vivid delusions. 

Yamada’s question completely evaporates from existence, not that Hitoshi would have been even able to answer it; the TV at the home was always occupied by any of the other boys and Hitoshi doesn’t have an interest in any of the mass produced schlock thrown on television. 

And there’s a thought, that springs spontaneously: the lot of them rearranging the living room to incorporate the TV and together sifting through a collection of shows and television with Yamada yammering recommendations, before Hitoshi deliberately chooses some horror movie with the sole purpose to get Yamada to hide under the blankets as Aizawa is already asleep by the opening credits. 

The evidence continues to mount that Hitoshi has become completely insane, probably irreversibly so. Fuck. They’re willing to rearrange their home for him. Yamada would have recommendations based on Hitoshi’s interests. Fuck.

There isn’t much else he can do but give out some pitiful hiccups. He inhales painful breaths and thoroughly slumps, having not even realized he was holding tension. The week. Like that. Just that easy.

(What about a month? Half a year? Until he becomes a legal adult? Would it be easy?)

It feels as though a balloon is being inflated in his throat and obstructing his airway, a continuous pressure that makes his throat become unbearably tight. His dismal whimpering morph into some misshapen thing that hollows out his insides. His body practically liquifies, just some slab of meat that rots where it sits, as he somehow collapses while actively curled in Aizawa’s lap. 

He’s wailing, and it’s enough to get Aizawa to straighten in his seat to tuck Hitoshi under his chin with a quiet ‘hey’ as he pats Hitoshi’s back like he’s trying to burp an infant. Hitoshi, through his racket, hears Yamada murmur a little ‘it’s okay’ before planting a way, way too earnest ‘talk to us, Hitoshi, something wrong?’

He wonders, peripherally, what it is about this specific instance that tells the adults his crying may be more than just the quirk. Is he just that extra pathetic right now?     

He heaves, vision beyond the realms of distorted with tears as he just stares at nothing as his face is half obscured into Aizawa’s chest. “W-Why?” 

It’s a paltry blubber that he gurgles, low and desperate. 

“‘Why’ what, little listener?” Yamada carefully asks, rubbing one of Hitoshi’s shoulders. 

“I, I, I—don’t get it.” Hitoshi mumbles into Aizawa’s chest. “W-why, why, are you d-doing this?”

A pause. Physical in its weight. It is obvious that both adults understand that Hitoshi isn’t referring to the quirk.

Yamada lets out a laborious exhale and Hitoshi feels him shift in his seat, most likely rubbing his eyes as he does so. 

“Oh, baby.” Yamada starts, and Hitoshi peeks at Aizawa’s head moving in his periphery, knowing both adults share some sort of meaningful look over his head. “Shouta and I are more than happy to have you in our home. We—we just want what’s best for you, darling.”

Present Mic, famed radio host and extrovert extraordinaire, should not sound like that. Words faltering and burdened with—something. Something that contorts his speech into something thick. 

Something that makes Yamada sincerely refer to Hitoshi as ‘baby’ and ‘darling,’ and somehow not coming off as completely patronizing. Those words coming out of Yamada’s mouth shouldn’t be kindling some precarious, and very, very embarrassing, feelings to flare inside him.

He hates it. The confusion. Akin to being mauled by a pack of rabid dogs and scattered throughout the mountains in mangled pieces. There’s a growing pressure mounting above his brows, a steady hammering that slowly increases in noise as a migraine begins to blossom.

Aizawa moves; the dawn of him shuffling Hitoshi off his lap or simply readjusting, the teen doesn’t know and ultimately it matters not, because Hitoshi effectively halts the movement by clinging onto the man with a renewed intensity. 

He supposes that action alone is symptomatic of Hitoshi’s larger faults; parasitic. A poison.

Aizawa huffs a breath. Hitoshi feels the man’s broad chest shuddering against him as the teen continues to leech. When the man speaks next, Hitoshi fixates on the feeling of the vibrations sent against his body before he comprehends the actual words themselves.

“Sugiyama-san suggested that you stay the week, gave us all your belongings and permission; we have no objections—none—to you staying with us. The quirk currently still affecting you and ruining my shirt has told us, quite explicitly, that you are attached to us.” A hearty pat to the back, reminiscent of a knife thrust through his ribs and mutilating his heart. “Which neither Hizashi nor I are offended by.”

How is the man even physically able to say such things. It’s—a mastery in cruelty, wringing out such bleak whimpers to claw out from Hitoshi’s throat.

Yamada speaks next as if corroborating Aizawa’s statement. “Oh yeah, Toshi-chan. It’s a real honour. I think we make a pretty good trio, don’t you?”

Hearing his given name spoken without a hint of difficulty like it could be a commonplace occurrence already felt like a punch through the gut. Hearing a nickname, one sculpted in gentleness rather than from disdain, is actively causing him to heat up and disintegrate like a meteor breaking apart as it enters the atmosphere.

Thump, thump, thump. 

Hitoshi focuses on Aizawa’s steady heartbeat, because otherwise he’ll become lost.  

“Is, is it o-okay? Really?” Hitoshi mutters wetly. Absurdly, the urge to chew on his nails surfaces in some sort of paltry effort to relieve the shame.

Yamada slowly strokes the length off Hitoshi’s spine, and the teen idly wonders if this is something the man took literal training for, since the action could have Hitoshi sleep for an eternity.

“Shouta and I are…” Yamada starts, seemingly chewing on his words carefully. “Hitoshi, the two of us, we’re… fond of you. You're a good kid, a great kid, that's been dealt an unfair hand in life and we want nothing more than to see you succeed and reach your greatest potential. We both know you will become a remarkable Hero, and we'll be with you every step of the way.”

‘Fond’ is a very strong word. Strong enough to make the entire planet vaporize like being consumed by a black hole. 

A shudder strikes Hitoshi’s body like he’s fallen off a cliff and subsequently reached the violent end of splattering on the ground. Gasp, choke, sob.  

Yamada’s voice breaks through. “Maybe we should have the big emotional heart to heart after the quirk is done with its little jig, yah?”

No, no, no—that assumes Hitoshi has to continue existing when he leaves the sanctuary of Aizawa’s lap. That he has to actually acknowledge that he’s cried in both their laps. The mere idea of discussing this whole debacle when his eyes are dry and accepting the reality that this even happened is inspiring thoughts of Brainwashing both adults and then trying to engineer a way to make them forcefully forget the last twenty-four hours.

Aizawa huffs a breath. Firmly, with the determination that tells Hitoshi he can’t change his imminent fate, Aizawa reorganizes the both of them. Hitoshi is slid off of the man’s lap and summarily sandwiched between both adults on the couch. Hitoshi blindly takes the tissues Yamada offers and blows his nose hard enough he becomes dizzy. He supposes, objectively, it is a relief to properly stretch his back after being hunched for so long (the choir of his vertebrae clicking certainly attest to that), but the loss is felt all the same. He blames the quirk on that. 

He deposits his hands limply into his lap with his eyes closed and hoping that the outside world ceases to exist. As he gags on his own breaths, Aizawa speaks.

“Hitoshi.” The man says, sturdy and reliable like solid ground. “Can you look at me?”

And that’s just heartless, really. Phrased as a question but obviously an order, reinforced with the man’s hand on Hitoshi’s shoulder urging him to turn and face him.

Trapped as he is, Hitoshi does what Aizawa asks like a marionette pulled on its strings. 

He blinks dully at the man, Aizawa appearing in two as Hitoshi’s vision doubles with his eyes feeling as though they sink downwards into his cheeks due to their weight. 

Aizawa’s unblinking stare could render his entire body numb. As it stands, Hitoshi’s own gaze eventually focuses and his mentor’s image becomes clearer under the man’s scrutiny.

Aizawa speaks, his voice unwavering. “We do what we do because we care about you. Don’t overthink it. It literally is just that simple.”

Hitoshi stares. Then the obvious happens. 

Or, more appropriately: the obvious happens, the same way dynamite explodes when the fuse finishes burning.

He may no longer be seated upon the man’s lap, but Hitoshi falls into Aizawa regardless, and Aizawa—he catches him.

Hitoshi sinks, his face buried into the junction where Aizawa’s neck meets the shoulder as strangled whines pollute the air around them. He may as well be vomiting on the man, with how thoroughly revolting he is; just some wretched thing masquerading as a human that corrupts all around it like a virus. Aizawa curls an arm around Hitoshi’s shoulders, encouraging the teen to continue making a mess of everything.

Yamada is likewise despicable, leaning closer to stroke Hitoshi’s arm that is still limp with his hands clasped uselessly in his lap. Nestled between the two adults, there’s little else that can be done except surrender into becoming a prisoner. He laments with a body that has been rendered completely hollow.

Just that easy. Just that simple. And he knows there is a ‘but’ somewhere in there waiting to strike like a circling shark.

As a general rule of thumb, Hitoshi hates to be made small. Broken down into something lesser and trampled beneath the heel of contempt. Stripped bare with all his vulnerabilities put on stage for cruel scrutiny.

And being between Yamada and Aizawa, embraced by them with touch that would never leave bruises, Hitoshi is small. So, so small but never regarded as an insect or a stain that needs removing, never by them, just—small. And held. Sheltered. 

And—

Maybe Hitoshi has thought about it. Had idle, errant thoughts, and maybe he has even indulged in the idea when he couldn’t sleep and just stared at the ceiling, when he spent hours at a time gazing out the (barred) windows of the home just wondering, thinking, fantasizing. But such is part of the human condition, so therefore no one can blame him, because involuntary, intrusive thoughts is something everyone must deal with.  

So it’s not his fault, when the thoughts, fantasies, whatever, come to him suddenly now. He’s hardly of sound mind to combat any of it. The thoughts of this.

That when the school day ends he could return to a home he could effortlessly call his own, an actual home—one deserving of the title—and know he was welcomed. That there were no doubts of his inclusion under the roof, that his presence could be an easy fit like the finishing of a puzzle. That he could eat a warm, filling meal while freely sharing banter. That he could have a room of his own and indulge in privacy.

That, that, that—that he could live with an adult, or two, that didn’t only hold the title of ‘guardian’ but something more. 

(Of course, Hitoshi has parents. A mother and a father that are still very much alive and who saw it fit to no longer visit him. He remembers it well: being sat down and told that due to work, family matters, distance, their visits would grow sparse. And so it was, like he was being weaned, that weekly turned monthly turned to every other month, then bi-annually, then. Well. He knew not to throw a fit when he was told the news. At least, not when his parents were present because he had—foolishly, evidently. Foolishly, still—hoped, dreamed, that he could show that he was a child that was disciplined and composed enough to warrant him being sent back under their care someday.

But he had earned the title of problematic; problem behaviour, problem quirk, the very embodiment of a problem. He supposes it isn’t out of the realm of possibility that the home sent behavioural reports to his parents when he instigated fights, and was caught smoking, and used his quirk on a staff member after an argument which resulted in him being moved into the home he lives in now. Practically sending large, glaring neon warning signs to his parents to actively keep their distance from the problem they created.

A father with the quirk of instilling emotions into others through verbal commands and a mother with a mind-reading quirk and maybe they should’ve known better. There are literal consultants who can mitigate against this very thing, just like genetic testing; determining the likelihood of what type of quirk the child could manifest by considering the matchup of the parents and then discussing how to properly prepare for it, if not outright being cautioned against procreating.

He wonders: are they still together? Divorced? Too afraid that creating another child could spawn another villain?)

His parents did leave a voicemail when he was accepted into UA. Sent to the home’s main line as he suspects they no longer have his cell number, and he took a video recording with his phone next to the home phone receiver before it was deleted, saving it for prosperity. He heard it once, the first and last time, and he hasn’t opened the file since. Not after hearing the obligatory congratulations and declarations of being proud cultivated nothing to take root inside him. An all too familiar feeling that has become inherent to the thought of his parents. Like the droning of TV static.

Hitoshi is selfish, he knows this; a veritable black hole that consumes all too much but he wants, he wants his parents to clear a day in their calendar and actually exist physically in his presence. They’d see that he attends UA but more so they would recognize that he strived for Heroics, he has a mentor, so that despite everything, Hitoshi is—something. Someone capable of good.

When they are asked if they have children, do they even mention him? If they watched the Sports Festival, did they grow sick with tar in the stomach at the sight of him Brainwashing his schoolmates, seized with nauseating memories of when he did the same to them?

Sometimes. He thinks it might’ve been easier if he was a literal orphan. For his parents to have gone out in a tragically cliché car accident. At least then it wouldn’t have been his fault. He does not wish them harm let alone death but then their absence could be a wound that would have the chance to heal.

(Though, there was that one time he accidentally Brainwashed his father when he was driving. The story of Shinsou Hitoshi nearly ended at the ripe old age of five, if it wasn’t for his mother jostling his father out of it from the passenger seat.)

Or, sometimes. He thinks it might’ve been easier if he was quirkless. Then Brainwash would never have so thoroughly ruined his life. Ruined his parents’ lives.

But. And there is always a but. Then he would have hardly had the chance to meet the men who invited him into their home, even after he spread his snot and tears all over them like some sort of cretin, and who gave him a warm, filling meal and a room of his own.

And.

Hold him—gently, delicately, like he could be something precious.

So he’s thought about it before. About the likes of Aizawa, then Yamada, filling that suspiciously parent-shaped hole in his life. And he knows it’s wrong and a multitude of inappropriate, but they feed him, they gave him a room. They have cats. Meddlesome, uncontrolled thoughts that spread like a disease because his brain actively works against him at every waking moment were practically guaranteed.

He wants it. Not even a full day in their residence and already Hitoshi is like a virulent little bloodsucker ready to gorge itself fat. And he wants. Because he’s selfish and greedy and so, so disgusting but it will only be a few scant years before he becomes a legal adult, which used to be a beacon of salvation but now looms as an ever present shadow seeking to smother him. He’ll be released from the home with only a garbage bag to his name and he doesn’t know how to write a resume, doesn’t know how to apply for boarding other than aimlessly walking into a shelter and praying they’ll allow a villain a bunk to sleep in, doesn’t know how he’ll be able to get into any sort of university because school and studying has been the only solid foundation in his life.

He can be quiet and unobtrusive and he’ll even settle for just the closet, if it means he’d be able to return here, even when the week has passed. He even wants their discipline, whatever it is, no matter how much of an affront to his self-preservation it may be; extra chores, writing lines, essays, revoking of food privileges, groundings, being taken over their knee or whipped, it doesn’t matter because punishment is another form of caring, isn’t it? It has to be, because that is how an adult can guide a child and Aizawa said they care. And, frightfully, terribly, Hitoshi knows he could trust them both to know his own limits, that they would never leave any lasting marks.

(The muzzle—quirk regulator—the muzzle is still stashed in the emptied garbage bag that has been tied with a double knot and shoved to the corner of the closet as an inconspicuous heap. Maybe they know of it, maybe they don’t, but if it isn’t spoken of then Hitoshi will not mention it. Incidentally, if the bag is mistaken for trash and is thrown out, then oh well. Accidents happen.) 

Nonsensically, he wants this, what occurs at the very moment. That he can become small enough to be cradled in the arms of an adult or two that he knows and trusts to be synonymous with safety. To have tender words whispered into his hair and soothing touches nurse that deep, terrible ache that spreads throughout every inch of his body like an all encompassing bruise. Just—preferably without the adage of guilt rising like floodwaters ready to drown him at the mere thought, but instead be something he can fantasize as being freely given, if not something he can even be entitled to.

Fuck. A psychologist would have a field day with him.

He’s slouched against Aizawa with his head resting against the man’s chest, his body ten times its actual weight and seemingly about to sink through the Earth. At some point he’s brought his legs up onto the couch to once more curl against the man like a particularly stubborn pest. A distant ringing in his ears acts as a consequence of his latest meltdown, face slack with his eyelids drooping unevenly as he breathes through his slightly parted lips, nose still clogged and his face wretched. The silence born is one that would be suitable enough to drape across an empty graveyard. 

He hiccups, and then releases a ragged breath. When he swallows next, he feels phlegm traverse down his throat and instinctively coughs wetly. 

The man he is contorted against pats Hitoshi’s shoulder in solidarity. “You with us, kid?” He asks, his voice—which really should be exasperated—is drawled with a sigh and spoken with only light weariness.

It’s an impossible question to answer. Hitoshi needs another shower, or multiple, to feel human again. He responds with a pitiful grunt, hardly a reaction but one that fully encapsulates his misery regardless.

He speculates on the chances of Aizawa allowing Hitoshi back on his lap so the teen can properly knock himself out for the next century, when Yamada makes his presence known from beside him by lightly patting his shoulder and rousing Hitoshi’s fading attention. 

“You ready to head to bed, Toshi-chan?” Yamada asks lightly, voice soft and reassuring. 

He is unsure of the hour but that hardly matters; Hitoshi is on the precipice of collapsing in on himself like the cosmic breakdown of a dying star. His body feels as dense as a white dwarf already, too heavy to move and he wonders if either adult would deign himself to actually carrying the sorry sack of a teen.

He thinks—involuntarily, intrusively—that being hoisted carefully in the arms of either Aizawa or Yamada could actually be somewhat… pleasant. A very reliable form of transportation. Aizawa is definitely the type to toss a child over his shoulder in a fireman's carry but Hitoshi finds himself relatively confident in the assumption Aizawa would instead settle for a princess carry in this instance. Hitoshi wonders if that means he’s vain. 

He hears Yamada speaking, attempting to coax Hitoshi up as to shuffle to bed, with a promise of hot chocolate also sprinkled within. Aizawa begins the motion to recline away from Hitoshi as to get the teen to move; but it only causes Hitoshi to cling tighter, to press his face further into the man’s chest with a small, pathetic whine.

He’s a bad person. The words exit him too easily for how they constrict his throat like he’s been garroted. The utterance is small and broken and comes like swallowing shards of glass.

“My parents don’t love me.”

It’s hardly even a whisper. Spoken with words that shake and a pitch that rises on each syllable as his Adam’s apple bobs dangerously with the advent of his oncoming downfall. It is as if an eel, oily and slick, has writhed through the tense confines of his esophagus before erupting from his mouth to turn all the air of the apartment into ice, a physical weight wrought upon the shoulders of each occupant. 

The words are muffled against Aizawa’s chest. But they are barbed, and it uses its thorns to climb upwards like a prickly spider to still reach the ears of the two adults regardless.

He’s bad. He’s so, so bad. Evil. Wretched. Villainous, because why else would he say such a thing? He has no excuse, except maybe that he’s a glutton for punishment, and that he needs to hear the likes of Aizawa and Yamada reassure him that his parents do love him, that of course they do. That as they are his parents, the very reason he even exists, their love is unconditional. And to question such an indisputable thing is to spit on the very people who gave him life and nurtured him until they reached a breaking point. 

They never hit him, they were never indecent, and the yelling was sparse and only done when he was being difficult and even then they had always apologized afterward. They loved him enough to recognize their own care turned insufficient when he was placed in alternative care. They love him enough that when Hitoshi becomes a Hero they can, and will, smile effortlessly as they claim proudly to all that he’s their’s, they’d have to. Because the love between a parent and child is unmatched with no equal, a fact as obvious as how people need air to breathe.

Hitoshi is but a vessel for shame.

It is a sudden silence that follows, one that is paradoxically loud, as Yamada’s voice comes to a stuttering halt and Aizawa ceases all movements.

He really is always ruining everything.

“Hitoshi—” He hears Yamada’s voice crack and guilt fractures across his body like fissures.

Hitoshi readies for the reprimand. A scoff, a tut, a command for him not to be ridiculous and stop being so stupid. The point being emphasized with a smack to the upside of his head as the scolding takes proper root in reminding Hitoshi he needs to be respectful, and that his words are an outright affront to anyone’s sensibilities. Put him on the right path, tell him to stop acting out to get attention, that one should always honour their parents.

A hand squeezes his shoulder and Hitoshi’s body has become slack with defeat. 

Yamada’s voice is strained, weighted with—something. “Oh, baby, we’re here for you. Always. Always.”

That’s not the script. Yamada’s voice is also absent of any sense of chiding, and very obviously not about to build up into a hearty lecture. Maybe this is a dream? The disorientation certainly fits the bill.

Hitoshi is accosted with a sudden dizzy spell when there’s abrupt movement and then blinks, multiple times over, when he is suddenly face-to-face with a stern faced Aizawa gripping him by the shoulders.

Something dangerously close to a whimper leaves Hitoshi as he feels his eyes well up.

Aizawa is resolute. “I cannot, and will not, speak on behalf of your parents. If they decide to restore their relationship with you, then they need to put in the effort and do so themselves so they can earn your forgiveness. ”  

Blink. Blink, blink, blink. ‘Forgiveness’ denotes there was some sort of trespass against him that could warrant such a thing. In the wild, animals will sometimes cull their own troublesome offspring, oftentimes cannibalizing them. It’s natural for a parent’s survival instinct to supersede the parental; there are plenty of cases of human parents ending the lives of their children and really, Hitoshi’s lucky. Besides, what is his ‘forgiveness’ (use finger quotes here) possibly even worth.

If Hitoshi had the ability, he would say as much. Frame it in a scoff of disbelief but as it stands, his voice box has been replaced with a useless rock. He stares dumbly as his vision blurs.

“But I can speak for myself—and Hizashi, as I can assure you he feels the same—so I want you to listen carefully, you got it?”

Gawking. Before he realizes he should answer. He shakily nods.

“If Hizashi and I were given the option to have you stay—indefinitely—you would be moving in with us.”

So—

Definitely a dream. And one unspeakably cruel at that.

The words don’t make sense. Clouded, as if seen through the gloom of deep, dark, murky waters with only the faintest of silhouettes seen in the distance. Therefore, it must’ve been misidentified through the obscurity, misheard and lost while traversing the spiral of his ear canal and completely scrambled by the time it reached his useless brain.

It is a moment wherein he cannot move and simply stares, before Hitoshi turns his head. Swivelling as if his skull is perched on a rusty nail, he looks helplessly at Yamada. He huffs quickened breaths through his mouth as his throat twists into a knot with his face uncomfortably wet.

Yamada, through Hitoshi’s blurry vision, gives him a small smile. The man lifts an arm to brush his knuckles across Hitoshi’s cheek, stroking away what must be an unhygienic amount of tears, causing the teen’s breath to hitch.

“You’d fit right in, Toshi-chan.” Yamada starts, voice hushed but holding the weight of the world. “Already got you all sorted: we have all your things, the spare bedroom already has your name on it, and as Shou mentioned a while back, we do live a lot closer to the school. Works out for everyone!” 

The brief giggles that leave Yamada are clearly done on instinct in some attempt to breathe in some levity. He glides his hand through Hitoshi’s hair, making the boy shiver, before he gently cups Hitoshi’s cheek with his palm, making the boy want to melt like snow in the summer.

“W-Would you like that, Hitoshi? To stay, with us?”

The raw hope that bleeds through the man’s words leave Yamada completely inelegant. 

The night, the weekend, the week, indefinitely. There had to have been a mishap with someone’s time alteration quirk because there is no way this amount of complete upheaval could only happen in the span of a single day. 

How is it that the apparent domino effect of crying like a baby leads to—to this.

In the realms of maladaptive daydreams and delusions, the helpless thoughts of, of (an English teacher and mentor becoming something more) intruding upon his consciousness could make sense; as they were born from something desperate in moments of weakness. Hitoshi is not ignorant that the logical conclusion of absentee parents is… imprinting, on the nearest stable adult.

Because when the despair and anger that has him contemplate fashioning a noose recedes there still exists that ache, the want. The visage of his parents are indistinct and made inconsequential in his mind’s eye, because it’s simple and easy and it feels good to replace them with the image of the two adults he trusts the most, the ones who currently sit by either side of him as he renews another debilitating meltdown like it’s an Olympic fucking sport.  

It’s hardly even the quirk that spurs it. He’s drowned in enough shame throughout the day that he can freely admit as much.

He bends at the waist from where he sits and grabs fistfuls of his hair so tightly that a sharp pain blossoms throughout his scalp and he erupts.

It’s years worth of pent up bullshit straining against his flesh like an overburdened plastic bag splitting apart and spilling all its innards outwards. Suffice to say, it’s very ugly.

Through the whirlwind, Yamada has managed to bring Hitoshi to shatter against him, reminiscent of how he cradled the teen back at UA. Hitoshi’s chest convulses with each laboured pant like each breath is going to be his last. His brittle wails quake against the walls of the apartment and the onslaught is endless, a deluge that breaches over the dam walls. 

Words bubble in his throat before spilling, his skin too small over his body and the cyclone of emotions too big, and babbling just bursts from his lips.

“I-I dun wanna be b-bad,” because if he attended UA and became a Hero then his parents would have all the reasons to love him. “I wa-wanna b-be good, I-I wanna s-stay,” because he wants to be a child worth claiming, a son worth keeping and—

It’s wrong, he knows it, but the well that supplied his ability to care has run completely dry.

He wants to be someone’s son, but not by those who share his blood. He’s a slave to it:

He can’t help the things his heart longs for. 

They want him to stay, they want him to stay, they want him—

His stomach is a writhing pile of worms in a boiling pot of mud. His sobbing stutter into guttural hacks as saliva pools in his mouth. Both adults speak, or at least try to; no words reach Hitoshi as he turns to gargling. 

He gives a dry heave, wrenching his eyes shut.

“‘M gonna t-throw up,” he warbles, feeling the hot bitterness of bile creep up the back of his throat.

As if he chanted a summoning spell, suddenly there is a wastebasket placed in his lap. Yamada pats his back soothingly (despite having turned his head away and squeezing his eyes shut at the mere mention of ‘throw up’) as Aizawa holds Hitoshi’s shoulder to keep him steady as he retches. The evening’s katsudon curdle within his gut in palpable chunks as they swirl as a tempest inside him. 

He heaves; gagging on each breath and dreading the spewing of his dinner like a water faucet. He heaves; sharp acidity invades the recesses of his throat and he is given a brief preview of what the word ‘malice’ would taste like as the fluids of his stomach churns up his esophagus. He heaves; a string of drool trapezing down his chin is the only eviction into the wastebasket.

Small mercies. He doesn’t vomit. His half digested dinner climbs upwards and glimpses the outside world through the window of his mouth before descending back to where it belongs, trailing a burn through the maze of his gut in its wake.   

Hitoshi releases deep gasps, coughs, hacks, before quietening. His breathing is ragged and done through his mouth, interspersed with pitiful sniffling as Yamada weaves comforting words through the air between them ( ‘oh thank god,’ Yamada whispered to the ceiling at the sight of an empty wastebasket, his own hands trembling). It isn’t quiet, but compared to the cacophony of his prior meltdown, it’s downright peaceful.

He gulps, staring despondently into the wastebasket clutched weakly in his lap. It possesses a mound of used tissues which—of course it does.

“S’rry.” Hitoshi mumbles, sniffling as he slowly becomes acutely aware how clammy and moist his face feels.

Yamada strokes his back. “We’re not mad at you. Not annoyed, not bothered, not at all upset with you, Hitoshi. We care about you.” Fuck. Shit. Hitoshi automatically closes his eyes and attempts to count his breaths before a restart of the meltdown occurs. “We care about you, Hitoshi. We do.”

“He’s right, you know.” Aizawa drawls. “And he’ll keep repeating it until it gets through your thick skull.” 

Hitoshi would rather have his skull caved in so he could sleep.

Sluggishly, and with great effort, Hitoshi leans back and away from the wastebasket. He drags his head to the side to look in Aizawa’s general direction. Eye contact is too much of a hassle at the moment and it’s been a long, long day. A dull ringing is bouncing in his ears and a deep exhaustion settles upon Hitoshi’s body as delicately as a sudden landslide that razes an entire city with all its residents.

Both adults watch him intently, like Hitoshi might scatter to the wind. Or that he could still throw up.

He opens his mouth, fails at any discernible language, and closes his mouth. He tries again:

“I should go to bed.” Hitoshi utters hoarsely like his voicebox has been completely fried to embers. 

The adults may share a look, maybe even attempt words at him—in fact, they definitely try to speak with him because Hitoshi feels the background buzz of his quirk untangling. But Hitoshi has become numb to any external stimulus as his brain is very quickly entering an emergency shut down. His vision swims as a kaleidoscope as someone else pilots his body. Blink. The wastebasket has been taken out of his lap by Aizawa. Blink. A cool, sudden freshness caressing his face almost makes him think frost accumulates on his skin, but it is Yamada with a wet wipe cleaning his face. Blink. He is being steered with each adult on either side of him as he stumbles on limp legs.

Blink. The bed feels very, very nice. He’s gone in a matter of seconds.

The stark silence born from the sudden absence of crying is nearly oppressive in its weight, a denseness as if walking through snow, as Shouta and Hizashi lumber in their living room. Sashimi, seemingly very content that the noise has finally ceased, punctuates the quiet with a small ‘mrrp’ as she takes her place in the cat tree.

Shouta stops when he reaches the kitchen and watches as Hizashi trails glumly after him. His husband takes the invitation for what it is and unceremoniously thumps his face into the nook of Shouta’s neck.

Hizashi indulges in some well deserved nuzzling, before speaking.

“That was so, so exhausting.” Hizashi mumbles against him, leaning his weight against Shouta.

Shouta gives a sympathetic pat of the shoulder. ‘Exhausting’ is the nice way of putting it. “You love babysitting.” 

“And my battery has been drained, Shouta, I’m running on fumes here and ready to lay on the floor.” Hizashi whines as he retracts, pulling out a chair from the table and slumping into his seat. “And if I’m tired, that means that Hitoshi is completely kaput. Maybe even, actually dead. I’m praying this means the kid will sleep through the night without hiccups.”

Hizashi releases a theatrical sigh, and Shouta turns to the counter to prepare them both a well earned cup of coffee. Black. Definitely multiple servings. Hizashi still has the evening show to do at the station and Shouta still intends an evening patrol.

Normally, Hizashi has a scheduled patrol this night alongside him on the other side of the city, but that was before Hitoshi nearly drowned all three of them in tears. 

“I’ll check on him before going on patrol.” Shouta turns from where he scoops beans into the coffee maker, raising a brow at his husband staring a hole into the table. “You okay?”

Hizashi pauses, which is rarely a good sign. “I don’t think it is possible to come back from this.” He intones slowly, which is likewise rarely a good sign, but understandable given the context; Shouta wonders peripherally if he should look up if excess crying can actually be lethal.

He hums, letting the coffee maker spring to life as he retrieves the Present Mic branded mugs; he reserves the oversized one for himself. “Was trying to pretend this never happened even an option to begin with?”

It wouldn’t have made much of a difference even if the quirk blew over more quickly or if Hitoshi didn’t spill his guts out about his parents (Shouta uses the term lightly); regardless if the kid was quirk free by the end of the school day the significance of this whole ordeal would still remain. That Hitoshi is undeniably fond of them both which gives Hizashi the ‘warm and fuzzies!!!’ (quoted from one of Hizashi’s text messages) and Shouta the… nondescript feelings of what might be something in the same family as tenderness.

Grant it—the quirk was hardly needed to ascertain as much. The kid may be very proficient in maintaining a blank face with an equally blank voice but Hizashi and he are both Pros for a reason; the kid’s eyes brightening, posture relaxing and mouth quirking slightly upwards around their presences was easy to notice and catalogue. The quirk merely made the fact undeniable and also very, very loud. 

Hizashi sighs and leans back in his seat. He says, "Scared me half to death when he started sobbing in class. Wanted to order all the other kids outside and sing our little Toshi a lullaby. He can keep a high note, that's for sure. I would have been proud in any other context."

Shouta scoffs, watching the inky black of the coffee begin to drip. "Your favoritism is showing."

"Oh, because you're oh-so innocent when it comes to bias, Mister the-kid-is-literally-my-protégé.”

Big words for a man who had, when Shouta was still completely wrapped in bandages, pretended to wonder out loud with faux-innocence that Hitoshi was the perfect candidate for a Hero course transfer, detailing the boy’s promise and tenacity and ‘a deep compassion buried under those eyebags’ all while staring directly at Shouta as he helped changed his husband’s gauze.

“‘Kindred spirits,’ as you so eloquently put it.” Shouta drawls, pouring their coffee before treading towards the table and taking a seat opposite Hizashi. “Is it not the role of the teacher to bring out the best in a student? It would be illogical to have the kid’s potential go to waste. A disservice to the future lives he’ll save.” 

“Aw. He’s made you a softie.” Hizashi coos and then sputters his coffee when Shouta kicks him under the table. The blond gives him a half hearted glare before continuing. “Now that we’ve both established that Hitoshi is perhaps just a teensy-weensy more than just a student to the both of us, let’s get down to business: he’s essentially been given to us.” 

It’s Present Mic in front of him now, specifically the serious, force to be reckoned with, version that peers over his glasses at Shouta with little humour present on his face.

Shouta luxuriates in the bitterness of the coffee and releases a small sigh of contentment as it traverses into his stomach. “Just for the week, technically.” He quips.

Hizashi leans forward. “And how eager would you say Sugiyama-san was to toss one of his charges at us?”

Sugiyama—Hitoshi’s home director and the boy’s emergency contact—is a wiry, nervous man with blue skin and a quirk that makes him float when he holds his breath. Shouta became well acquainted with said quirk when the man floated to the ceiling of his office the time Shouta visited the home to discuss Hitoshi’s training, thinking instead that Shouta had called for an appointment to disclose that Hitoshi had been expelled. It brought the man to such a panic that had him stop breathing. Shouta used Erasure before he even had the chance to introduce himself.

From the start, Shouta knew the man would be a headache; Sugiyama could speak in lengthy, unbroken tangents about each and every child under his care with regards to their interests and their personalities except for Hitoshi, whose name alone makes Sugiyama twitch like a prey animal. The man had whispered conspiratorially at Shouta that if Hitoshi hadn’t been enrolled in UA, the child would’ve most likely ended up in a detention center for troubled youth, so prone to misusing his quirk for malicious deeds like the growing criminal he is. 

When Shouta had asked, it turned out the last record of Hitoshi using his quirk for anything that could be construed as such was in the last home he was placed in, when he was twelve. But Sugiyama was clear he made up his mind on the matter, that Hitoshi inevitably would become dangerous. And that he, as Hitoshi’s primary guardian, was doing what was necessary for the safety of the teen and for all those around him, to keep the kid under a tight leash and know his whereabouts at all times lest he wandered off to join a gang. The kid’s school blazer has a tracking device on it and his Internet search history is routinely checked, Sugiyama-san had proudly claimed. 

And Shouta had brushed his hair and wore a suit for the meeting. Wasted efforts. 

It’s the fact that Shouta has Erasure—specifically—that convinced Sugiyama to not only to give him permission to train Hitoshi after school hours, but also to take Hitoshi in for the week. 

Shouta feels the pull of an unfriendly and humourless smirk. “Eager enough that he’ll be very cooperative should a pair of Pros prospect the desire to foster.”

It starts with Hizashi snapping his fingers and declaring: “Okay. Potential risks, go.”  

The discussion is this: when (because it is indeed a when now, no longer danced around as a theoretical) Shouta and Hizashi take Hitoshi into their custody, what are the hurdles facing them. 

The conversation weaves together like a quilt made of patchworks, starting with the most obvious: the boy’s parents and the fact that should they decide to take back custody, welfare officials would side with them regardless if it’s in the boy’s best interests or not. A dangling knife that could drop at a moment’s notice, and one accompanied by the fact that his parents also have the power to pull Hitoshi out of UA if they so desire it as the Shinsous—as far as Shouta and Hizashi are aware—do not live in the prefecture.

It is a healthy fear to possess but one mollified by the fact the boy’s parents are evidently content to pretend their own son doesn’t exist. It is a safe assumption to make that neither mother nor father have shared actual words with Hitoshi in an infuriatingly long stretch of time.

It opens a separate can of worms to sift through, that being the idea of visitation, which releases the bigger pile of writhing worms, that being the idea of reunification. Objectively, yes, the boy’s parents reinstating contact and making the effort is—good. The desired result would be for Hitoshi to return to his parents, as every welfare office on the planet would posit, but the key phrase is ‘making the effort,’ and both teachers will continue to assert as much. If the Shinsous reach out—through the proper channels and not attempting to coerce Hitoshi behind their backs—Shouta and Hizashi will arrange something. If Hitoshi requests it or any other way demonstrates, verbally or otherwise, that visitation would be beneficial, Shouta and Hizashi will arrange something. If it isn't needed—then it isn't needed.

(If visitation is arranged but many a cancellation occur, Hizashi has volunteered to give them some ‘gentle persuasion’ in person.)

The discussion branches inwards and Hitoshi is his own complication: what guilt will be dredged up when he changes homes. Thinking his presence is an intrusion, thinking himself as undeserving, that he’s a burden, that any and all other children in alternative care should have a chance before he is even considered. What will happen to those alleyway cats he feeds that he sometimes sends Shouta pictures of.

Neither adult is under the illusion that the transition will be smooth. Hitoshi, especially during the first few days, weeks, months, year or years, will require a constant stream of reassurances to right the wrongs of the boy’s youth and have him understand without any uncertainties that he belongs. That both adults care. Unconditionally. 

It’ll be an uphill battle, but at least then Hitoshi will be able to emotionally regulate and properly communicate without bawling. Hopefully. Parenthetically, ‘the Talk’ (capital T, as Hizashi emphasized) will occur as soon as possible, when the quirk is done and over with and the boy will be sat down and explained how all three of their lives will be fundamentally changed forever, together.

The plan decided is relatively simple, all things considered: appeal to Sugiyama’s fears and explain in great, excruciating detail, that under the ever watchful eyes of two Pros, Hitoshi could never fall to scum and villainy. Expanding their foster licenses will not be resolved before the allotted week is done, so the boy will become a ward of UA in the meanwhile, with Shouta and Hizashi designated as temporary guardians until they establish the proper paperwork to authorize the formal changing of custody to them and then officially, finally—

Bringing Hitoshi home.

(The topic of kids is not a discussion that is especially common between them but always present regardless; in the empty guest bedroom, in the silence of their days off wherein they sit at the kitchen table and nurse the ache of something missing, in the fact they’ve long established the want to commit to the A-word—adoption—before surrogacy.

Hero and teacher duties alike have rendered their lives nearly unsuitable to the task of childrearing. Neither of them particularly believe in the idea of fate, but Hitoshi could make either of them stop and question if destiny is written in the stars.

It was never spoken aloud but whenever either decided to breach the kids quandary, one that had grown more frequent sometime after Shouta became the boy’s mentor, the implication was loud enough regardless. Hitoshi’s name was never verbally spoken but the amorphous, fuzzy idea of a (their) child had a face and specific shade of lavender hair. 

To bring the kid under their roof was something meant only to exist in hypotheticals that felt like on the edge mourning. Perhaps, in due time, they would have done things in the proper way within the proper lapse of time instead of having all the suppressed parental instincts surge all at once overnight.

Neither of them have quite fully grasped the fact that it’s happening. Truly and undeniably happening and both of them need the other to slap them in order to assure themselves they aren’t dreaming.)

They’ve both finished their second cup of coffee when all is said and done. No longer seated at the kitchen table, instead wrapped in each other’s arms as they stand—literally and metaphorically—as a unified front. Mochi rubs himself against Shouta’s leg as both Heroes hold each other until their heartbeats sync together.

Hizashi retracts from where he had been nuzzling his face into the side of Shouta’s neck, arms curled around the Erasure Hero’s waist in a perfect fit. He bestows Shouta with an expression that Shouta instantly commits to memory, storing it alongside all the other disgustingly sentimental faces Hizashi gives only his husband, before he slips his arms outwards to instead cup Shouta’s face. 

Sunshine, Shouta muses internally. My little sunshine, as the lyrics go and Hizashi could have a hypnotizing quirk with how he lulls Shouta into a deep state of calmness with only a small, gentle grin. Shouta feels the expression mirrored on his own face.

So of course Shouta expects a kiss. The logical expectation. 

Instead, Hizashi’s grin turns wide and toothy.  

"Did you know that Todoroki thinks Hitoshi is our biological son and that we were teen parents? I think he’s convinced the whole of 1-A." 

It’s a talent, really, his husband’s ability make Shouta either want to kiss him breathless or throttle him.

Shouta levels him with an unimpressed glare. Hizashi’s smile just grows wider as he continues. "And that you were the one that gave birth to him—?"

A quick smack to the back of the head blissfully interrupts Hizashi’s nonsense, but only for a scant moment. The man quickly recovers with a snicker as Shouta steps away to collect their empty mugs and depositing them in the sink. 

"Of course, we can all see the family resemblance—"

"Another word out of you and I’m selling the stupid saxophone."

It’s the clicking of the door being opened that snaps Hitoshi into a sudden, vertigo-inducing awareness from where he is lying tangled in the bedsheets. He stiffens automatically and adrenalin is supplied to all corners of his body as his mind quickly catalogues everything that is wrong, and his frenzy mounts as the list continues longer and longer.

Not his bed, not his room, none of the boys he rooms with are here, not the home, where, who—

He had been laying on his stomach and isn’t even cognizant of when he lifts himself, half risen out of the bed with a choice insult about the—intruder, kidnapper, who-the-fuck-ever’s—mother seated upon his tongue and at the ready so he can prompt a response as to utilize his quirk. 

(Damn. One of his roommates even joked that Hitoshi was ‘prime kidnapping material’ after he watched the Sports Festival. Put that down on the ‘bullshit that only happens to Hitoshi’ bingo card. Typical.)

A figure peaks through the doorway, their dark ensemble making it difficult to discern where their shape begins and ends in the surrounding shadows. Hitoshi’s eyes rapidly adjust, and he recognizes long, scraggly dark hair, an oversized white scarf, a jumpsuit, blink, wait, blink, that sounds awfully familiar, actually—

“Easy. It’s just me.” Aizawa’s voice eases through Hitoshi’s blind panic-turned-confusion-turned-recognition like a knife through butter. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

The man even has a hand raised in a placating matter like Hitoshi is a spooked horse. Hitoshi stares dumbly and eventually his arms give out from under him, his face caught by the pillows and once more re-acquainted with the mercy of the bed sheets as all the misplaced tension drains outwards like a deflating balloon. 

He scoffs at the man. Blinking away a sudden but unfortunately familiar onset of tears springing in the corners of his eyes.

“Y-you didn’t scare me.” Hitoshi mutters very convincingly, as the thumping of his still too-fast heart vibrates through his veins.

His brain, recovering from the abrupt turnaround, sluggishly starts piecing together memories. Specifically, of why he is here: a stupid quirk mishap, crying, Aizawa and Yamada, more crying, too much crying, being taken into their apartment, crying, crying, crying.

Just the memory of the meltdowns is like a boulder is seated upon his back and squashing him. He wrinkles his nose in distaste, and luckily Aizawa continues before Hitoshi’s brain can harass him with more particulars of the last twenty-four hours and their associated misery.

“I’m just checking in.” The teacher says mildly. “I’m heading off for patrol, then I’m clocking in at the school. Hizashi is home and will stay with you because neither you nor he are going to school today. Go back to sleep.”

Easy for him to say, Hitoshi muses with a snort, the man falls asleep on command wherein the teen is practically guaranteed to lay awake mindlessly. 

Seemingly able to read his thoughts, Aizawa continues. “And if you can’t sleep, just lay in bed and rest your eyes.” The man turns to leave after imparting the particularly unhelpful advice, but halts midway his departure to face Hitoshi once more, this time accentuated with a point in the teen’s direction. “That means no playing with your phone even if you’re bored. That’s bad for your eyes.”

As if. The Internet forums he browses occasionally—threads dedicated solely to cats, random meme pages and cough maybe an Eraserhead fanpage cough—would most likely be too quiet at this time of night/morning anyway. And it isn’t like he has anyone to text, his contacts are bare except for the essentials such as the home’s contact and the Gen-Ed group chat that is used to coordinate schoolwork and one he was only mildly coerced into. Aizawa is literally the only one he texts on a regular basis. That’s… probably pathetic in some way, but there’s no use dwelling on it. 

Hitoshi rolls his eyes and turns away, facing the wall and further cocooning himself in the bedsheets. “Whatever, old man.”

He hears Aizawa huff out a breath, a small chuckle. “Brat.”

Hitoshi expects the latch of the door closing, but a grunt from Aizawa signifies something has changed, and a new weight settling at the edge of the bed indicates a new guest has quickly weaved through the adult’s legs to take residence.

Lifting his head, Hitoshi focuses on the mass of fur curled near his feet, all scraggly like a matted towel.

“Huh.” Aizawa says. “She usually only sleeps with Hizashi or me and isn’t friendly to guests.” A shrug. “Congrats, you have the Hag’s blessing. Don’t take the privilege lightly.” 

The man takes his leave, setting the door slightly ajar for Hitoshi’s new bed partner. The boy watches the thoroughly ancient looking feline that looks more muppet than cat as she bathes herself, and he finds himself content to play observer until the sun rises.

Any semblance of rest is broken into a series of micro naps that definitely never enter REM sleep and Hitoshi capitulates to the usual routine of staring listlessly at the ceiling or walls or, the new addition, the peacefully slumbering cat he definitely isn’t jealous of.

The lack of any reliable unconsciousness means it is far too easy to dwell, then spiral, about—everything.

The evidence has been very stark, something very plainly demonstrated to him throughout the course of the last twenty-four hours, that one could say it’s beyond any doubt at this point. That Aizawa and Yamada want him. Sharing their home, sharing their food, sharing their time, sharing their cats, all done willingly because it’s all something that both adults actually, unequivocally want. Despite it being—Hitoshi they want to share their lives with. Troubled teen always flirting with the title of delinquent.

This cannot possibly be real. It is very much real. It can’t be real, but Aizawa said they want him to stay, Yamada said they both care about him, they both cradled him in their arms and made, makes, Hitoshi feel completely safe. How is anything going to turn back to normal after this?

It’s a continuous mantra that repeats in his head, endlessly echoing and bouncing off the sides of his skull and totally inescapable; they want him. They want him? They want him. Not a dream. How can it not be a dream? This is real.

Muted pinks paint the sky as the sun breaches the horizon, and it’s a good enough signifier that Hitoshi should get his lazy ass up. Moving dusts his thoughts, as he rises and carefully makes the bed in a way that doesn’t disturb Hag (who is very gracefully contorted in a way only a cat can manage and looking more corpse than sleeping cat) before treading towards the closet and automatically reaching for his school uniform.

Realizing his mistake only after buttoning up his dress shirt, Hitoshi quickly sheds his uniform to instead don a pair of jeans and a striped long sleeve shirt. Cat print socks stare up at him as his gaze is lowered to his clad feet from where he sits on the bed, hunched and gripping the pant legs of his thighs.

His skin prickles uncomfortably; the sun continues to leisurely hike upwards into the sky and yet here he merely sits, like some useless sack of meat stinking up the place. An itch encompasses his body urging him to go to the kitchen and ready breakfast like he’s supposed to but a literal barrier stops him before he can even start: the door.

It’s not quite closed. But not open either, having drifted practically shut during the night from where Aizawa kept it ajar. It’s not latched but no gap exists and therefore it must be moved to be opened and that is the crutch of the issue. Because it’s rude to enter rooms that have their doors closed and it’s disobedient to exit a room he’s been shut in.

Usually, such a thing wouldn’t spring a crackle of nerves to sparkle underneath his skin, nor is it a rule he followed consistently, but because he currently resides under the Aizawa-Yamada roof and has had it repeated to him that they care— Well. He actually wants to behave, is the funny thing.

It would just be infinitely easier to do so if he knew the rules. He imagines, if Aizawa and Yamada stick to their word and don’t throw out a ‘just kidding!!,’ that the explanation of whatever the rules are under their roof will be done today. Which is a relief, because trying to navigate… the week (indefinitely is a very heavy word all of a sudden) without knowing the specifics of what is expected of him is a nightmarish scenario.

Despite Hitoshi’s ‘issues with authority,’ which he imagines with relative certainty is written on his file, the teen does actually like knowing the rules and the associated disciplinary actions that would be taken if he’s being stupid, no matter how much of a pain in the ass they may be. So he needn’t have to guess and operate solely on assumptions with regards to whatever the present standard of behaviour is. He just needs to know. And then he can quietly bend said rules when he needs to.

They’re teachers, so: in the classroom a student needs to have permission to leave, he’ll assume it likewise at the moment unless told otherwise. Yamada is probably still asleep. Exhausted, because yesterday was anguish for all parties involved, and so he wouldn’t want a teen to lumber around in his apartment, navigating the kitchen and conjuring some measly excuse of breakfast. Especially considering anything Hitoshi could make, Yamada can definitely outdo ten times over.

So. Hitoshi can wait. It’s fine. He has a cat to keep him company. 

They. Want him. And Hitoshi can be good, and the window—which is three stories up—isn’t beckoning him to take flight, even with the risk of breaking his legs. A desperate bid to avoid the inevitable, one that looms like a lion ready to ambush him. The window is an escape that is slowly becoming more and more appealing.

(It is undeniable and it is something that Hitoshi succumbs to cowardice against: that while Aizawa and Yamada may want him—there exists an expiration date. If Hitoshi’s actual parents couldn’t bear him, then what chance do Aizawa and Yamada have?)

He sits. And waits. He registers the sound of footsteps with a sharp increase of his heart rate, even as they pass the room. The faint sounds of the kitchen being rustled through take shape. Deep in his swirling, muggy thoughts that he is, Hitoshi nearly doesn’t register that his eyes aren’t actually leaking.

Then, the thought springs spontaneously: Aizawa and Yamada would make good parents. 

The corners of his eyes are now moistened. He released a shuddering breath.

As if on cue, there’s a light knock on the door that prompts a shock to strike Hitoshi’s body.

“Hitoshi? You awake, darling?”

Darling, he’ll never get used to that. Yamada’s voice is subdued and gentle and, weird of all, being spoken through the door as the man hasn’t opened it.

Hitoshi clears his throat. “Yeah, I’m up.” His eyes mist over but his voice is blessedly stark, almost normal. But, should he say sir now? “Yamada.” He tacks on by way of greeting, because it’s the safest option. 

“May I come in?”

Hitoshi feels his brows furrow, staring at the door that remains still. 

After a moment, he says, “It’s your house.” 

Apartment. Whatever. 

“I’m aware, my little listener.” Yamada gives off a small chuckle. “But I’d rather not intrude on your space not unless I have to. If you’d rather be alone a little while longer, that’s fine, you have the day off after all. Breakfast is almost ready, we’re taking a trip up north and visiting the birthplace of what I teach with a full English breakfast complete with bacon, sausages, eggs, mushrooms, baked beans and toast! Giving ya tastebuds a little vacay to somewhere exotic, how’s that sound?”

Damn, okay. That’s a lot of words first thing in the morning. He blinks at the door, which for some reason is still closed. It sounds like an involved breakfast, more so than the onigiri he usually has in the mornings, so it makes sense Yamada would keep the door closed so Hitoshi doesn’t distract him.

“It sounds good.” Hitoshi says honestly. But that’s paltry, so he tries again. “Uh, really good. Thank you for the food, Yamada. I’ll do the dishes.”

A snort. “Well, if you really want to, then I won't deny the kindness, but it really isn’t necessary.” A shift behind the door, and Yamada retreats. “I’ll leave you be. Be down in ten minutes.”

The thing is—

Hitoshi does not know how to ask. The words are simple, of course: ‘can I come out,’ or, more appropriately because people don’t like it when he asks questions: ‘I want to leave the room, please.’ 

But those are stuck behind his throat, so he instead settles on: “I can help with breakfast.” 

Because they want him, and he can be useful

“Then come on down, my little helper!” Yamada cheerily says. “Oh, and Hitoshi?”

“Yeah?”

“You don’t need permission to leave your room. You’re free to go anywhere in the apartment at any time.” 

Well, that makes things easier. Aizawa did give him a weird look when he said ‘you know where the bathroom is. You don’t need to ask every time you want to use it’ yesterday. Hitoshi supposes he should have used the context clues from that, but crying is exhausting, so.

Hitoshi just blinks at the door as Yamada’s steps recede.

It’s not real, it is real, it can’t be, it very much is.

It’s surreal, is what it is. The whole, ‘this is the literal definition of ‘too good to be true’ and therefore must be an elaborate and vivid dream so he must be in a coma’ is still a theory that holds weight. But—sure it’s greedy and senseless—Hitoshi finds himself with the startling realization that he doesn’t want it to end. If he’s living a false life in a coma then, do not, under any circumstances, wake him up.

The trek towards the kitchen was one that was almost ominous with how much tension his body held, as if subconsciously expecting an attack at the end of the hallway instead of the hearty aroma of bacon wafting through the air that activated his salivary glands. His shuffling was awkward, as if his body was too big and at risk of knocking something over at any moment, and automatically he had to blink rapidly at the onset of tears when he caught sight of Yamada.

Yamada smiled warmly at him. “Quirk still bugging ya, huh?”

Hitoshi wiped his eyes. “Not as bad as before.” 

It’s true. The tears did not spill over nor did his voice crack. Aizawa and Yamada’s tissue supply will live to see another day.

It was, as Yamada described, a very full breakfast. 

As was his routine, Hitoshi aimed to be quiet. And he mostly was, as Yamada took it upon himself to give them both a soundtrack by chattering about the time he visited England, specifically London, for a Hero conference about voice-based quirks that he had been invited to.

Yamada weaved conversation onward naturally and effortlessly, speaking of the sights of London and the fact he had been mistaken for American twice (Hitoshi gave his sincerest condolences) before gliding into a (admittedly one sided) conversation about famous British popular culture, specifically Sherlock Holmes of the pre-quirk era. Which then swung into a conversation of how Yamada’s favourite genre is mystery; the man keeps notes, as in an actual journal, when he follows along in whatever detective fiction he reads or watches about.

That tracks, Hitoshi thought. Present Mic literally had a manga miniseries wherein he solved (kid-friendly) mysteries of all sorts.

It was like white noise, really. Not in the way that Hitoshi deliberately ignored the man—quite the opposite, really, even if he couldn't follow along with what the man spoke about half the time—but more so in the way that the man’s voice eased the misplaced anxiety Hitoshi held. An easy calm, like wind gently coursing through the trees, and breakfast was a pleasant affair, teary eyes and all.

(Yamada is, of course, a natural born wordsmith when he isn’t on the verge of tears and choking on small hopeful words asking if Hitoshi wants to stay. 

Hitoshi is definitely not still thinking about that.)

Hitoshi even did the dishes. Insisted upon it, because Yamada made breakfast and Hitoshi wasn't ungrateful, and the English teacher acquiesced as if signing a treaty of surrender.

Yamada must possess some sort of secondary quirk that has him radiate a sense of tranquility because the day that then proceeded is almost disgustingly mellow. Barring Hitoshi being fumbling moron with little clue with what to actually do with himself—the Aizawa-Yamada home both a minefield and a sanctuary—the mandatory day off was carried out like he was on a serene hiking trip that has smooth and wide trails; Hitoshi still trips on his own feet but a trek otherwise completely feasible and an excellent scenic route.

(Yesterday is chained to him by the ankle and the weight of a mountain, the shackles twisting his flesh apart until the bone is exposed with every movement he takes. Yamada does not dredge it up yet but Hitoshi knows he should keep his eye on the clock and count down the seconds.)

To hole up in his room—his room, because Aizawa and Yamada have both said it was, even if the thought is still a foreign feeling—and to waste away or climb out the window was, of course, always a very tempting decision to make. But ultimately he orbited around Yamada in the living room (because of the quirk) and more importantly, the cats. 

Mochi and Sashimi, anyway, the Hag had just mysteriously disappeared to parts unknown. The itinerary of the day was replete with much cat bonding, mindless scrolling on his phone—the Gen-Ed group chat all collectively wished him well from his mystery ailment with the assurance that there was a designated student taking notes for him—and mindlessly tossing his phone to the side at the feeling of his eyes welling up.

Missing a school day is never ideal, but especially coupled with the fact he took flight after bawling in class and now Yamada is also taking the day off, which he knows his classmates will link together. He can only imagine the rumour mill. His skin is already preemptively crawling like he is submerged in a mound of mealworms at the thought of the certain stares he’ll receive come Monday.

He’s already enacted social suicide by showing off how loud he can cry in front of an audience, but maybe being seen as some big, miserable baby is marginally better than the title of villain-in-the-making. Left to speculate, Hitoshi surmises that a good handful of his classmates will not even believe him when he’ll tell them it was all due to a quirk. A quirk that merely threw his emotions out of rhythm because they don’t need to know the specifics.

Ugh, Midoriya would have too much to say about that, quirk analyst weirdo that he is, because he’ll definitely corner Hitoshi the next time he catches his scent like a bloodhound. Then it’s settled: Hitoshi will sit with the runt and his little posse the next time Midoriya accosts him, because accepting the offer will throw Broccoli Head off enough that he’ll forget how Hitoshi even cried in the first place.

A foolproof plan. He’s not out to make friends, just—circumventing any nosiness. And having an ally or two (not friends, it’s strategy) for when he transfers into Heroics is simply logical. 

Sniffle. Blinking away tears.

A bridge to burn when he gets to it.

“Hitoshi, look at me for a moment, yeah?”

He blinks blearily at the blond, rising his head from where he was meticulously stroking Sashimi in the most cat-agreeable hand motion with the feline comfortable in his lap.

Yamada is looking very intently at him from where he sits opposite the teen. The man gives a considering squint. Hitoshi has the distinct impression he’s being observed under a microscope.

Hitoshi raises a brow at the impromptu staring contest. “Something on my face?” He asks.

Yamada’s lips break into a wide, toothy grin as the man reclines in his seat.

“More like something isn’t on your face anymore, actually.”

A blink. His vision is suspiciously unblurry. The image of Yamada isn’t distorted or doubled nor is Hitoshi’s throat an uncomfortable tightness with his nose clogged. His head feels fully screwed on. He can actually breathe properly.

Hitoshi throws his head back against the backrest, raising his hands to drag them down across his (dry! Non-tear stained!) face.

The sigh of relief is like an earthquake shuddering throughout his body.

“If I ever cry again,” Hitoshi says in perfect, wonderful monotone free of any hiccuping. “I need you to mercy kill me.”

Yamada chuckles, and Hitoshi finds himself mirroring it.

After some rigorous testing—Yamada patting Hitoshi on the shoulder, Hitoshi playing with the cats—it is safely determined that the quirk has finally wilted away and died. It’s gone. Hitoshi’s eyeballs will never be the same again but his face is dry, so gloriously dry.

The well deserved reward is some senbei rice crackers and tea enjoyed together in the living room, with Mochi valiantly attempting to swipe some crumbs. 

It is, of course, during this reprieve that Yamada sees it fit to, essentially, waterboard him affectionately.

“Hitoshi, just to keep you in the loop and not spring it on you suddenly,” the man starts slowly after setting his tea down, harkening Hitoshi’s doom. 

Yamada clasps his hands together and rests his elbows on his knees, continuing: “When Shouta comes home, we’re all sitting down and having that big heart to heart I mentioned yesterday.” A pause. “If you remember that. You were doing a lot of crying when I said that. We’re just going to discuss, well, everything.” Yamada twirls his wrist to gesture at everything. “You’re not in trouble, there’s nothing to worry about. We just need to talk about you staying with us, alright? You understand?”

Nothing to worry about, it’s not a very convincing lie.

Hitoshi takes the moment to take a long, deliberate sip of his tea, maintaining direct eye contact with the man across from him. Yamada does not falter.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Yamada.” Hitoshi says after he sets his tea in his lap, palms cradling the cup and reveling in the radiating warmth. “I wasn’t crying. I never cried at all, yesterday.”

“Of course. You were just hydrating your eyes very enthusiastically.” Yamada snorts. His features soften, if such a thing were possible. The man’s going to transform into a pillow at this rate. “I know change can be very scary. But this is a good change, for all of us but especially for you. Everything is going to be fine, Toshi-chan.”

Don’t make promises you can’t keep.

Hitoshi shrugs. He’s the picture of nonchalance, face expertly devoid of any emotion and eyes their normal deadened appearance. His apathy is only betrayed by the quickened pace of his heartbeat reverberating through his ears.

“If you say so.”

It’s like traversing through a thick fog, while also attempting to navigate a slippery, icy road that sits beside a cliff’s edge that falls into the abyss filled with untold horrors that would delight in tearing him into little bite sized pieces, waiting for Aizawa’s inevitable return.

He’s a little nervous. The only time he’s been nervous at the thought of Aizawa was when he waited in the gym for his first training session with the man. But even then it didn’t rattle in his body enough to make him restlessly bounce his leg, as he does now from where he is sprawled across the couch, watching intently as Sashimi bathes herself on the cat tree. Yamada sits across from him doing paperwork, because a teacher’s life is dictated by paperwork, he’s come to understand.

The countdown eventually ends with the front door opening. 

Aizawa enters with a plain grey crew neck and—startlingly—hot pink sweatpants. Hitoshi wonders if Aizawa purposefully chooses such gaudy colours to give Yamada grey hairs or if he’s just that uncaring about his outward appearance. Probably a combination of both, as Hitoshi watches the man don his fuzzy green slippers after putting away the duffle bag holding his Hero gear.

Hitoshi had automatically straightened in his seat as soon as he heard the doorknob jiggle, sitting prim and proper with his knees together and hands clasped in his lap. He watches Yamada vacate his seat to greet his husband with a chaste kiss before taking the plastic bag rustling in Aizawa’s hands—beef udon takeout—and the blond treads inwards to the kitchen. Aizawa strides forwards, his steps slow as he drags a heavy hand down his face to presumably wipe away the exasperation of the school day, and then their eyes meet.

They stare at each other. Nothing else happens.

“Well, would you look at that.” Aizawa’s mouth breaks into a grin. “Christmas has come early.”

Hitoshi rolls his eyes, attempting to alleviate how he wants to bounce his leg, pick at his fingers, rub the back of his neck or rip his hair out while he runs to his room to hide under the bed.

Ultimately, he settles for sitting as still as a statue with his limbs taut. 

Aizawa gestures to the kitchen with a tilt of the head, where Yamada is sifting through the takeout. “You wanna eat first then talk, or talk now and eat later?”

His stomach is currently flipped inside out and actively crumbling into ash.

“I’ll hurl if I eat now, I think.”

Yamada instantly halts setting out the takeout on the table, and instead quickly changes course as he puts the food aside. He pours a cup of coffee in an oversized Present Mic mug, clearly a ‘welcome home’ ritual for Aizawa, before marching towards the living room.

“We’re having the talk now.” He declares, handing the coffee to Aizawa.

“I’m sure Hizashi has already told you, multiple times, that you have nothing to worry about, kid. This is a good talk to have.” Aizawa sighs after an indulgent sip. 

Both adults settle themselves on the opposite couch, and Hitoshi clasps and unclasps his hands in an effort to ground himself.

He could still run. The sudden departure would momentarily stun either adult enough that Hitoshi could probably ensure himself a clean getaway. Run off and embrace his destiny, living off the streets like he’s statistically meant to. 

“Yeah, well, tell that to my stomach.” He mutters as he shifts in his seat. “Not hungry anyway. Let’s get this over with.”

Aizawa runs a hand through his messy tangles of hair. “Making it sound like we’re planning on throwing you to the wolves. Calm down, nothing bad is going to happen to you.”

Maybe not right now. But eventually. It’ll happen eventually and it’ll be Hitoshi’s fault when Aizawa and Yamada reach their limits.

Hitoshi merely shrugs. He drops his gaze to the table as he fiddles with the loose skin around the nail of his thumb.

Breathe in, breathe out. Aizawa sets his coffee on the table and leans forward, causing Hitoshi’s heart to stutter.

“We want to take you under our care, Hitoshi.” Brisk and to the point and Hitoshi appreciates the absence of any unneeded fluff, but boy does his ribcage cave in as the man continues. “As in fostering you. Officially, legally, and all that it implies.” 

Their repeated verbal assurances detailing that they care and that they want him to stay, all made with palpable sincerity, should have implied as much. But actually hearing those words spoken out of Aizawa’s mouth without a hint of mockery spins Hitoshi into a daze.

Not a dream. Right.

Yamada speaks next. “The both of us have the power of emergency guardianship as Pros and teachers of UA. Your situation does not constitute an emergency—though I’d argue otherwise, anyway—but as we’ve already jumped through the hoops and juggled the paperwork that certifies us as responsible adults who can tend to children in crisis, it should be a more streamlined process to get the necessary qualifications to foster you the old fashioned way.” 

Hitoshi stares. He stares, and he forgets to blink and move and breathe.

Yamada gives a placating grin, choosing his words. “We know this is, to put it lightly, a very big change in a very short amount of time.”

The trapped air in his lung erupts in a sudden scoff. “Sure.” Hitoshi manages through a dry mouth. “Would’ve used the term ‘completely insane,’ personally.”

Aizawa scratches his stubble like this whole scenario doesn’t bother him in the slightest, like he isn’t literally speaking of bringing a whole other person into his home with his husband and cats.

Aizawa speaks. “As you’ve already essentially moved in, try—the operative word being try—to relax as the adults sort everything else. There shouldn’t be anything on your end that needs to be done, unless there is something you still need from the home or you want to say your goodbyes. If you have any serious concerns, now is the time to say them.”

“And if you can’t think of anything right now, because, again, this is a lot, don’t be afraid to come to either Shou or I if you want to talk about anything at anytime.” Yamada chirps. “And if you want to talk to someone else, just say the word and it’ll be arranged ASAP, Toshi-chan.” 

Pause. Staring contest. Hitoshi needs to manually remember to blink.

“You’re serious about this.”

Well, duh. Of course they are. They’ve only repeated as much multiple times. He’s really about to give the two of them the impression that he’s slow in the head, but even still— how can the impossible actually be possible?

“Of course we are.” Yamada says. “We care about you. We’ll keep saying it. Heck, I’ll sing it for you if you want me to, even yodel, if that’ll help ya understand it better, Toshi-chan.” He brings a hand upwards to cradle his chin. “There is research saying people remember things better when it’s in song form, y’know.”

Aizawa continues. “You already have a rapport with us. We know you trust us. We’re happy to have you in our home. And we’re committed to making this work.” He shrugs. Nonchalant. Casual. “It’s logical.”

Hitoshi looks between the two of them, back and forth. Yamada possesses one of his patented small, but gentle smiles whereas Aizawa almost looks—bored. Face blank with his eyes half lidded, seemingly on the precipice of taking a nap.

Suddenly, anger sparks a flame that flares through the pathways of his veins and he breathes in smoke. 

It can’t be that simple. As if he is some mangy stray picked up from the street, to be washed and fed but inevitably given away, thrown away, when the charitable deed is done with egos sufficiently stroked.

Keeping his breathing even, Hitoshi speaks slowly next.

“You’re making a very rash, life-altering decision just because I cried. That’s the antithesis of ‘logical' because you’re—you’re just responding emotionally, not rationally.”

He wants—so, so many things from them. Too many things, greedy and selfish that he is, but he doesn’t want pity.

“Aw Toshi-chan, have a little faith in us.” Yamada sounds amused and Hitoshi thinks peripherally that he should be offended. “It’s understandable you have cold feet, Hitoshi, and we're willing to discuss any objections you may have. But I can assure you this isn’t something we just decided overnight.”

Hitoshi is white-knuckling the fabric of his pants. He feels one of his eyes twitch. The anger that had sprouted is just as quickly doused and turned to embers at the words, because what could he mean not decided overnight? He’s only been crying since yesterday, and only stayed the single night. 

Yamada points at him. “And whatever thoughts you got going on in your noggin, that you think you’re not good enough to stay with us or that this isn’t real, stop it. You are good enough, you deserve a good home and this is real, capiche?”

Well. There’s that too. Insecurities festering beneath the skin and ready to pop like an overgrown pimple. 

(A born abomination, a poison, a scourge that only takes and not even just from the likes of Aizawa and Yamada; Hitoshi has survived to near adulthood and is likely enough to survive another decade—other children in the system are not so lucky. Other children in the system need a teacher or two to notice, and here he strips them away from that chance.

And worst of all: Hitoshi wants to still stay.)

Aizawa speaks. “This isn’t a decision we take lightly, Hitoshi. And it isn’t one done on a whim. It’s something Hizashi and I have discussed, at length. ”

“You’re important to us and we want to take care of you, Hitoshi.” Yamada finishes.

This isn’t real—

But. 

It is real. It’s not a dream. Static exists where his brain should be, and this isn’t a dream—somehow, someway—despite it being a dream he’s had before.

His voice is small when he finds it. “You really talked about… this? Before?” He sputters. “Why?”

Yamada looks like he wants to reach across the table and take Hitoshi’s hand. Hitoshi wishes he would. “Because you’re a good kid. Because you’re more than a student to us. Because we want to give you a home, Hitoshi, and we know we have the means to take care of you.”

Hitoshi’s eyes may be too dry for this, actually.

Aizawa savors his coffee, drinking slowly and letting the silence simmer. He sets his mug down on the coaster and gives Hitoshi a look that is blank but somehow still strips him to the bone.

“My parents didn't love me either.” Aizawa says simply. It takes the air out of Hitoshi’s lungs. “My father left when I was six. My mother kicked me out of the house when I was seventeen. I only had my school bag and slept on Hizashi’s couch for a while. I haven’t spoken to either of them since, and I don’t plan on changing that anytime soon.”

His words are delivered plainly, his posture relaxed and nothing makes it appear that the man is affected by the words he dredges up. But there must be something Hitoshi doesn’t see, or perhaps it is the perk of being the man’s husband, because Yamada reaches over to entwine their hands together. The blond brushes a thumb across Aizawa’s knuckles.

Oh, is all Hitoshi can manage. The long running jokes shared amongst his schoolmates about Aizawa being a homeless street urchin are suddenly tasteless.

“And wouldn’t ya know it, I’m adopted!” Yamada says far too cheerily considering his words. “Blew out my birth parents’ eardrums when I was born—and my own and the doctor’s, because I’m a keener—before I got snagged up by my moms.”

It’s an odd feeling. That he could share something like that with the adults in front of him. It feels unnatural, as if he skin cracks and molts off his body.

His throat nearly spasms, a desperate mass of spindly insects attempting to breach through the growing tightness of his esophagus, because he needs to know.

The both of them have always encouraged him to speak, to ask questions, and the sudden interrogation vying for freedom builds pressure against his ribcage:

How do you live with the shame, how do you reconcile with being thrown away—

He swallows it down, a rock settling in his stomach. He merely stares instead, feeling as though he is on the brink of splintering into something barbed.

Yamada’s gaze softens. “So we understand, Hitoshi. We really do.”

“I have chores.” He rasps, far too meekly to be a true challenge. “I start breakfast for everyone, I clean the dishes and vacuum and take out the trash, I—sometimes I help the younger boys with their homework. I have responsibilities, I’m the oldest, I can’t just… leave.”

Guilt is a heavy shroud that he’s become far too familiar with lately. A plastic bag put over his head and suffocating him far too slowly.

“Sure you can.” Aizawa shrugs. “You are not one of the caretakers, Hitoshi. The children of the home are not your responsibility. You yourself are a child and one whose guardianship is being transferred over to us. If you need to say goodbye, we’ll see if it can be arranged.”

Does he need that? It seems proper. The right thing to do. But likewise cruel, mocking children as young as five with the fact he, Hitoshi, got put under the care of trustworthy adults before any of them. He was analogous with the background anyway, a purposeful decision, because he’d never want to hurt a child, even the snot-nosed brats. Mostly.

Him vacating a bed means his roommates have more privacy, at least. There’s a silver lining.

Yamada smiles. “May I just say: your sense of duty is very admirable, Hitoshi. It’ll serve you well. But, please, allow yourself to be taken care of. Allow us to take care of you.”

“There are cats near the home that I sometimes feed.” He tries instead.

His rebuttal is weak. Even he hears himself wavering.

Black and Harlequin he could say goodbye to. Because he knows he can rest easy knowing that they’re essentially the pets of the community and belong to everyone. The knowledge that he isn’t the only one who feeds them is one that allows at least one tight knot inside him to uncoil.

“And we can visit them, if you want.” Aizawa says anyway, and Hitoshi knows the man is sincere.

He darts his gaze between the two men seated in front of him, both of them giving him their full attention and whose words this entire conversation have been too easy to believe as totally truthful.

“And when I’m eighteen?” Hitoshi mutters quietly, a small tilt of his voice verging on something pathetically hopeful. He’s torn a thread of skin off his thumb with his fidgeting.

Aizawa doesn’t hesitate. “You’ll still have our support and a roof over your head. That doesn’t stop when you’re eighteen, when you're twenty, if you move out of the country—our door will be open, always.” 

“We do really mean it when we say we care about you, you know.” Yamada adds.

That is such a dangerous promise, they have to recognize how risky saying such things is. Not even just the fact it is giving Hitoshi literal heart palpitations, but also actively encouraging Hitoshi to wallow in hopeless flights of fancy that can only result in a grisly downfall. That they could even think of dangling the mere idea that he could still belong even as a legal adult—even when their legal responsibilities concerning him have ended—is merciless. 

Because it practically compels Hitoshi to enter the realms of perilous daydreaming; that when Hitoshi is an adult in all forms, liberated from the shadow of his parents, there could be a possibility of Aizawa and Yamada claiming that title. Officially, legally, and all that it implies.  Signed with all their signatures.

“You don’t want me.” Hitoshi nearly pleads. “I’m—" a villain in the making, better off dead “—bad.”

They deserve better. If this is meant as a trial run on—guardianship (he can’t even say parenthood, they’re not, not like that, even if it feels like boring into an open wound to assert as much), then they should at least find a kid that they could actually make memories with, one that isn’t on the cusp of adulthood, and definitely one who doesn’t have a literal laundry list of infractions.

“You are not, Hitoshi. You are not a villain, you are not a bad person.” Yamada’s voice cuts through the air like a guillotine. “You feed stray cats and care about those around you, and even when life has treated you so, so unfairly—and it has, don’t deny it—you still want to help others which, as far as I’m concerned, already makes you a Hero. You've overcome so much, and Shouta and I are so proud of you." He can't say that. It feels like Hitoshi has been punched in the gut, he can't say that. "You have a good heart and you are a good person, and I’ll tattoo it on your friggin’ forehead if you try to fight me on it, don’t test me.”

He wants to be good. But even his aspirations of Heroics are stained and made rotten; never something he could confess out loud but a disgrace speared into his heart, that he aims to become a Hero largely out of spite. To prove the foregone conclusion that he’ll fall to villainy wrong, to prove everyone wrong, to prove his parents wrong.

Would Aizawa and Yamada still deign themselves to have this conversation if they knew that?

“And we do want you, kid.” Aizawa just says, like it’s easy. “What do you need us to do to prove it to you?”

Say it, a treacherous, ugly thing inside him begs. Say that you love—

“I need a moment.” His voice is monotone, and his movements robotic: he rises from his seat without even being fully aware of his body. “I’m going to my room.”

“Ah,” Yamada blinks after him, clearly wishing to say more but Aizawa squeezes his wrist. “Okay, Toshi-chan.”

His departure is swift and without an ounce of grace, done on stilts instead of feet and Hitoshi relearns how to breathe after the door is shut behind him.

He cradles weathered cardboard in his hands, glued together like a haphazard art piece. Assembled by the hands of an unskilled but motivated eleven year old Hitoshi, the battered Eraserhead goggles replica has its yellow paint faded and chipped, with one side of the elastic headband (recycled from swimming goggles) broken off completely from left side of the frame.

Really, it’s a poor imitation. The third attempt, in fact, the first two having found their end in the garbage when Hitoshi tried to understand the shape and structure of the goggles purely from a collage of blurry, amateur photography of the man in action or at a distance.

But he remembers it, all the same: the pride electrifying his veins and setting him to stand taller when the goggles were finished and placed on his head. He could hardly see out of the slitted lens, the openings cut in uneven strokes with dull scissors, frayed at the edges and acting more so as blinders than anything else. But none of that mattered, not when he wielded something of Eraserhead’s, his then newly acquired favourite Hero who was clearly the best at everything ever, and one he had aspired to eventually copy the jumpsuit and scarf of, to dress up as come Halloween. Although those ambitions never saw fruition. For better or for worse. Probably better.

It is a deteriorated hunk of cardboard that is actively falling apart, something so juvenile and deeply embarrassing to not only possess, but to treasure. Kept safe in what is practically a poor man’s shrine of a shoebox nestled under the bed.

Ugh. Hitoshi really is just a weirdo. 

(The goggles are falling apart and long past their prime but he knows he couldn’t get rid of them, not unless he was forced. And even then—he’s fought for this pitiful scrap of cardboard.

Well. ‘Fought’ is a generous word to describe it. Moreso threatened. In elementary school there was a specific trio, two boys and a girl whose names aren’t worth remembering, who were part of the alternating troupe of schoolmates who took turns seeing who could ruin Hitoshi’s day the most. Whether that meant putting thumbtacks on his chair, spraying him with a hose, putting gum in his hair, trashing his homework or whatever other creative little miseries they could conjure up, like it was a competition. The creation of the goggles meant another target. Their mistake was thinking it was an easy target.

He made it an effort not to use his quirk in school, even against those who started the fights, some vain attempt to be the ‘bigger person.’ It is said that actions speak louder than words but those that preach it seem to always conveniently leave out that not defending oneself against the cruel misdeeds of children only rewards bruises. But there is a limit to everything and lines that should never be crossed, and that trio found it when they taunted a young Hitoshi with promises of stomping the goggles into dust, tearing it apart or flushing it down the toilet.

It took only a low, icy growl of “Give it back” to have the ringleader sneer a response, resulting in Hitoshi taking full control before he even finished his sentence. The boy’s accomplices demonstrated quickly they held no loyalty, as any bravado had instantly evaporated and they fled, leaving their leader at Hitoshi’s mercy.

There were a lot of choices. Have him strip himself of his clothing and streak in public. Destroy his electronics by smashing them on the ground. Shave his own head.

Hitoshi settled on making a statement that had no room for misinterpretation: 

He had the boy stand on the school’s roof, precariously close to the edge, before releasing Brainwash. Hitoshi had watched from the doorway as the boy took in such a sharp breath that he started coughing, stumbling backwards and away from the edge before collapsing into a trembling, terrified heap of a very small, insignificant boy. 

Hitoshi would have never actually done it, or do anything similar now, but fear is a good deterrent against bad behaviour; he learned that in his homelife.

No words were shared. Hitoshi merely stared impassively as the boy was rendered petrified, choking on his own spit with his eyes collecting tears and wordlessly pleading, before Hitoshi quietly took his leave. He was left alone for practically a year afterwards, hardly a single student daring to so much as breathe in his general direction.

Probably not something Eraserhead would do. Or approve of. But it’s been years since then and what Aizawa doesn’t know won’t hurt him.)

Beaten and broken but still clinging to life, a pair of goggles with no use but one he still keeps. Hitoshi cannot help but hold an inordinate amount of sentimental value to the thing, what ever.  

He sighs from where he sits on the bed. He holds a replica of Aizawa’s goggles and he’s in the man’s home. The man is married to Yamada and both want to—foster him. It’s surreal. It will never make proper sense.

Maybe he should seek out Koufuka-san and send her a fruit basket as thanks for inciting this whole thing. 

Hitoshi does not know how long he merely sits there, holding cardboard with his eyes glazed over and thoughts distant. It is a lifetime before light knocking on the door breaks him from his reverie.

“Hitoshi?” Yamada tentatively calls through the closed door. “May we come in, sweetheart?” 

Sweetheart. Darling. Baby. So frustratingly saccharine and embarrassing but so soothing and reassuring. The ‘we’ is not lost on Hitoshi. Retrieving the shoebox from under the bed and stashing the cardboard goggles before hiding away his little pile of shame would be an easy endeavour. Something done quickly and also something he knows he could have the definite assurance wouldn’t be interrupted, because Yamada—and Aizawa by proxy, presumably—won’t enter his room without his permission.

At least for now. Which is why Hitoshi really should take advantage of that before it dwindles away, because the man’s whose goggles he holds some shoddy replica of is literally right outside the door. 

“Yeah.” He responds after a short pause, the cardboard still in his lap. 

The door opens, and Yamada is first to tread inwards with a gentle smile on his face. Aizawa trails behind, and Hitoshi can do little else but watch as Yamada’s gaze flicks downwards at the bundle of yellow and doing a visible double take. 

The hitch is hardly a second long and Yamada recovers as if it hadn’t happened, save for his face breaking into a wide, gleeful grin as he steps forward to take a seat next to Hitoshi on the bed.

“Oh. Those look awfully familiar.” Yamada snickers and Hitoshi grows red. “Wouldn’t you say so, Shouta?”

Heat has already spread across Hitoshi’s face, but it slithers downwards to his shoulders because Aizawa has stopped walking. He’s halted before the bed with his ogling pointed directly at the goggles, face—blank, obviously, which is inspiring Hitoshi with thoughts of throwing the cardboard into the nearest fire.

Yamada kicks Aizawa’s shin. It snaps Aizawa out of his apparent trance, because he quickly drops onto the bed, both adults seated on either side of Hitoshi.

“Where’d you get those?” Aizawa asks when he is seated.

Hitoshi’s voice is expertly made unaffected, despite his blush. “Made them when I was eleven.”

Impulsively, Hitoshi hands over the goggles to Aizawa. Honestly, it’s very presumptuous of him to even do so, but he’s just indirectly confessed that Eraserhead is not only his favourite Hero, but has been so since long before he actually met the man. It’s an awkward admittance to release, no matter how round about it was said, like releasing a defenseless baby bird into a world that would happily eat it whole. 

Aizawa takes the goggles with a delicate hold, clearly conscious of how frail the replica is. Seeing the care he bestows on the cardboard does something hazardous to Hitoshi’s chest, so much so that that clashing colours of yellow goggles against Aizawa's pink sweatpants don't make his eyes bleed. The teen clasps his hands together in his lap so as to not let himself rub the back of his neck.

Aizawa carefully inspects the goggles in the ensuing silence. He raises his head to look at Hitoshi. 

“There aren’t tutorials on how to make these, are there?” He asks.

Aizawa’s expression and voice, suddenly so world weary and infinitely tired, makes Hitoshi automatically huff a quick breath; a small chuckle he hastily holds at bay. 

Obviously, as someone who works Underground, the mere idea a child not only knowing of Eraserhead’s existence, but enough to fashion a bad cosplay prop, is an idea that means his Hero persona isn’t as obscure as he’d like. 

Hitoshi isn’t sure which is better: telling the man he has fanpages and with it at least one blogpost going into great detail on how to emulate Eraserhead’s getup, or admitting he had created the goggles with many bad reference photos before he found the aforementioned blogpost. 

Hitoshi settles for a grin. “Eraserhead has his fans.”

Hitoshi can feel Yamada’s insufferable smile, even if he doesn’t turn to face the man, instead focusing on Aizawa’s long suffering expression. 

“See, I’ve been telling you this for years, Shouta. Eraserhead is very marketable!”

Hitoshi decides to release that trapped chuckle, sprouting into a series of snickers that has his nose wrinkle in amusement.

Something lifts from his shoulders. A weight he wasn’t even aware he was holding, one that had settled for so long it was embedded into his very core. It departs suddenly, and consequently leaves him exposed like a tortoise without its shell, but despite this: Hitoshi knows he doesn’t want it back.

Wordlessly, Hitoshi understands. He knows Aizawa takes it as an honour. The small smile the man wears which reaches his eyes communicates that loudly to Hitoshi, leaving him without any uncertainty.

He is safe here.

To think that crying is what led to this.

From one dad, to no dad, to two dads. He should write a book.

(Shit, wait, he just called them dads, what the fuck—)

Hitoshi turns his gaze downward to his lap, quickly raising a hand to scrub his face to dispel away such thoughts, still too big to even consider.

He lets out a breath. His throat has grown tight.

“I had a dream about this once.”

He mumbles it to his lap. His hands fidget with one another and he focuses all his attention on the cartoon cats present on his socks, jovial feline faces staring back up at him.

A confession. Laid bare and flayed open for the world to inspect and judge with morbid curiosity or curled lips of disgust. A mangled, twisted thing that mirrors Hitoshi in his entirety: something broken. Something that can't be fixed and something that attempts to feebly piece together the scattered tapestry of himself by wallowing in the sad, miserable depths of his subconscious.

Yamada makes a considering hum. “Oh? The good kind, I hope.” He lightly bumps Hitoshi’s shoulders with his own. “You feel like sharing with the class, little listener?”

He swallows. Blinks. His vision is beginning to get blurry. Yamada's voice acts a bridge, the man freely and willingly connecting himself with the deep uncertainties of Hitoshi's heart.

“About—" Hitoshi makes a vague gesture, voice brittle and strained as it weaves through the slow choking of his throat. “You know. This.”

“Very descriptive.” Aizawa responds. “Though I’d wager we know what you mean; people tend to dream of the things they want the most.”

Hitoshi feels his throat bob. He releases a shuddering breath and squeezes his eyes shut while he gnaws on his bottom lip. Therein lies no judgement in Aizawa's tone, just simple understanding, a statement of fact. An act of mercy that gives Hitoshi a solid foundation to further tread upon.

“…Y-yeah.” His voice cracks.

His breathing begins to shake. He feels a slight shifting on the bed as Aizawa places the goggles safely to the side and leaning forward. He snakes a hand along Hitoshi’s back to fold an arm across the boy’s shoulders and pulls Hitoshi slowly inward. Slowly, delicately, allowing the boy every moment to escape.

Hitoshi allows himself to go limp, because he knows he'll be caught. The teen nestles his face under the man's chin, feeling his shoulders beginning to tremble as his breathing quickens. A pressure builds behind his eyes as a mass of tears accumulate, collecting in his lashes. Aizawa holds him effortlessly as an impeccable shelter, never faltering and always reliable. Hitoshi feels movement and then an opposite body coming closer: Yamada fills in the missing piece by leaning closer and completing the embrace, ensuring that Hitoshi is cradled between them both. He soothingly strokes the length of Hitoshi's arm, an easy promise that no harm could befall the boy.

It’s comfortable. Warm. So, so safe.

Hitoshi feels the tears breach and trail down his cheeks, but no shame kindles within him. Words build in his throat before marching resolutely outwards, and he breathes:  

“I want to stay.”