Chapter Text
Kyouka proposes in August, completely out of nowhere and right in front of Shouto. Thinking back to it, Shouto is surprised that he hadn’t seen it coming. At the time, her and Momo were very...intimate (with no regard to his presence ever, it seemed), and the question was spontaneously popped into discussion over dinner. Momo had a piece of bread hanging out of her mouth, which Kyouka removed with the kind of fond, delicate touch that Shouto knew he shouldn’t be witnessing - he still remembers how she looked him square in the eye as she wiped the crumbs off of Momo’s lip.
He had excused himself fairly quickly.
A month before the ceremony, Momo asks him for help with arranging things for the wedding. He pauses, hesitance flickering its way into his mind, but Momo has always been quick to notice those kinds of things.
“It’s okay,” she reassures him, “you’re the only one I’d ask. It’ll be simple.”
He swallows back his doubt and tries not to think of the marriage between his mother and father.
“Yeah,” he tells her. “I’ll do it.”
The woman’s hands wring through the washcloth - she rinses off the blood and sweat from her skin, mouth quivering as the faucet shuts off.
“Promise me you’ll be happy,” she says. Her hands clench into fists; water squirts from the cloth. She tosses it away. It’s stained red.
“Mom...?”
“Promise me, Shouto. That you won’t make the same mistakes I did.”
He knows four days after the fact that he has made a mistake.
She had been telling him about how she still needs to order flower arrangements for the quickly approaching ceremony, so he pulled up the location of the only floristry in their town and offered to accompany her.
“Shouto,” she says quietly, as they stand in front of the doors of the shop, his hand resting on the doors’ handle. “Are you sure you want to come in?”
Shouto raises an eyebrow at her. “I’m already here,” he tells her. Her lips press together; her gaze on something behind the glass. “What’s wrong?”
Momo’s eyes close and she sighs. “Nevermind me,” she tells him, and then blinks up at him. “Let’s go.”
Shouto shrugs, and pulls the door open.
“Oh,” a voice pops up at them, and Shouto feels the fine hairs on his body prickle. “Welcome-”
The worker hiccups as their gaze locks onto Shouto’s; suddenly, Momo’s apprehension makes sense.
Standing behind the counter at the local florists was none other than Midoriya Izuku.
Shouto remembers high school clearly.
He wishes he didn’t - there is too many things for him to mull over and regret. He likes to keep all thoughts of his three years at Yuuei squashed to the back of his mind.
The thoughts scratch at his throat. He swallows.
“Midoriya,” Momo greets, walking up to the counter. “I didn’t know that you worked here.”
Izuku pulls his eyes off of Shouto at Momo’s presence; it’s too obvious and awkward, and Shouto thinks he can still feel his heavy gaze looking right through him.
“I’m just an apprentice right now,” Izuku says, his shoulders tense and lip twitching. “But the owner will be out for a few months, so...”
“They must trust you,” she says, and Izuku laughs nervously. Shouto’s body tenses up again.
“I suppose so. Oh - congratulations on your engagement. I’ve been meaning to call.”
“Momo,” Shouto cuts in, and they both turn to look back at him. He does his best to ignore Izuku’s analytic gaze. “The arrangement.”
“Of course,” she says, and Shouto ignores the hard, sympathetic look that she throws at him. She should know better than that. “I need to order arrangements for the wedding.”
“Ah,” Izuku says, and his eyes flicker between her and Shouto again. “Y-yeah. I can show you a catalogue now, if you’d like, and there’s also the arrangements in the window - but you’ve probably seen those already-”
“Midoriya,” Momo cuts in, and Shouto recognizes her tone as the one she takes on when she starts to get irritated. “No reason to rush into it now. I just want to set up an appointment to discuss it at a later time.”
“Oh,” he says; he looks back up to Shouto again, flush coloring his freckled cheeks. His gaze is strong - Shouto feels like he’s being pinned down, unable to move and look away. There’s a tinge of sadness in that gaze that clenches at his chest, wrings through his mind. “Okay,” he adds on, but he’s still looking to Shouto - like he’s trying to convey something to him, but Shouto isn’t sure what to make of this moment. It’s awkward in every meaning of the word; his lungs feel void of air, as if he’s been plunged underwater, and he doesn’t like it. He feels trapped.
The only thing he can do is escape.
“I’m going outside,” he says, turning away from Izuku quickly. “I’ll wait for you to finish making your appointment.”
Momo stares at him like she was expecting him to say those words - knowing her, she definitely was. “It won’t be long.”
Shouto doesn’t look back once as he makes for the door. “Right.”
In high school, right when Momo and Kyouka had first started dating, Shouto realized his growing feelings for Izuku.
It was the moments when he watched Momo and Kyouka together that he first noticed. When he saw them together, his heart ached, and without realizing, he thought, I want something like that as well.
It took a while longer for him to register that it was Izuku that he wanted it with. Izuku was warm and kind, awkward and shy at worst, but determined and strong at best. Izuku, with his caring words; the way he tried his best even when he felt his worst. He went to great strides to help out his friends - something that since the beginning of Shouto’s first year, has made him stand out amongst everyone else.
Foolish. This is a critical time, Shouto. You have no time for distractions.
Those words echoed in his mind every time he saw Izuku. They were hard, threatening; spoken in his father’s voice.
It was almost enough to bring a smile to his face. In this way, he was still getting back at his father. He was satisfied to simply watch Izuku from afar - watch him smile, learn, and grow. It’s a strange thing to watch someone you admire as they run through life. Strange, but not unwelcome.
He spent so much time watching that he didn’t have a chance to calculate his own feelings.
In the middle of their second year at Yuuei, Izuku started dating Uraraka Ochako.
Izuku’s fingers tremble as they clutch onto the fabric of Shouto’s uniform. His eyes are cast downward, and Shouto can hear him breathing. Thinking.
“I don’t,” he heaves, and when he looks up, his cheeks are flushed. “I don’t understand.”
Shouto doesn’t know either. He doesn’t understand Izuku. He’s out of breath, skin warm and body trembling - he doesn’t get it at all.
He looks away, and pulls Izuku’s hand off of him.
“I’ll see you around, Midoriya.”
Momo is outside within five minutes.
When the door to the shop shuts, and the bell chimes for the last time, she makes a point of giving him an unimpressed stare. “That was embarrassing.”
Shouto shrugs, but his nerves are bundling up in his chest again. “Sorry.”
“Not for me,” she says, and she sighs, starting to walk away. Shouto nearly looks back, but controls himself and follows after her. “I mean for you. Midoriya is worried about you, you know.”
He’s sure that he is. Izuku is the type to worry after anyone. “Oh.”
“You should talk to him. He told me that he misses you.”
Shouto stops, and Momo does as well - like she was expecting it. Her eyes are analyzing, but not in an intrusive way. Momo has known about Shouto’s feelings regarding Izuku for a long time. Suddenly having to come across him for the first time in years...it wasn’t just shocking for him.
She’s trying her best to get her own feelings across.
“It’s okay, Momo,” he tells her, but he knows that his heart isn’t really into it. “It’s fine. It would’ve happened soon, anyway.” Better now than at the wedding , is what he wants to say, but that would only serve to worry her more, so he keeps quiet about it, sparing nothing but a glance in her direction before he sets his eyes before him.
It’s a nice day. People mill about around them, walking, talking, shopping. It’s warm enough to shed off a layer of clothing.
Momo creeps up in Shouto’s vision, and then she’s a step ahead of him, head turned to toss him a smile.
Spring is just around the corner.
That night, Shouto dreams of lush sakura petals, and a light spray of freckles across round cheeks.
Shouto looks at his hands. The deep red that marks them burns its image into his mind.
The woman in front of him kneels down. He looks up at her, and her eyes reflect nothing but darkness.
“You’ll understand soon,” she says, and clasps his hands with hers. “Someday, my dear Shouto.”
He’s standing in front of the flower shop.
He doesn’t really understand it either, except he does, and it’s so shameful he feels the urge to turn around and run back home. It’s only been a few days since he was first here - surely Izuku would find it all too coincidental.
This is a mistake, he tells himself. He repeats it a few times, looking inside the window of the shop. He doesn’t see Izuku - he hasn’t seen anyone yet. Which is fine. Great, even.
He’s a disgrace. Running away only to come walking back. He wonders what Momo would think of him if she knew - or worse, if she saw him -
“Todoroki?”
Shouto’s entire body becomes rigid. There’s an unsure, awkward manner in which his name is spoken. He knows who it is before he forces himself to turn around.
“Midoriya,” he says, dumbly. Izuku is looking at him with an eyebrow crooked upwards, a smirk twisting at his lips, and Shouto can feel himself blushing. He considers whether spontaneous combustion is a plausible human feat. “I wanted to get flowers,” he adds on, and then grinds his teeth together.
“O-oh,” Izuku replies, having the decency to not giggle at him, but it doesn’t erase his smile. “Well, I just - ah, came back from lunch.”
“Oh.” No wonder why he didn’t see anyone. He even completely disregarded the Closed sign on the shop window. Great.
“Yeah...”
Izuku stares at him, and he feels like he only thing he can do is stare back. His eyes are a bright shade of green today. They match his shirt.
“E-excuse me...I’m sorry, you’re standing right in the way of the door...”
Shouto coughs, and slides out of the way. “Sorry.”
Izuku smiles like he isn’t sure how to reply - it’s hesitant and crooked, and makes Shouto sigh.
It’s hanging between them. Shouto knows it from the looks Izuku gives him, the carefully-placed hesitation between his words, but most of all from himself, because it isn’t something that he’s been able to simply forget. Coming here - it was a mistake. He should’ve stopped himself when he had the chance.
It’s too late to run when Izuku unlocks the doors to the shop. Putting this off will only make things worse, Shouto reminds himself, and tries to crush his nerves as he follows behind Izuku inside.
“Are you getting them for someone?”
The question throws Shouto off, and he’s about to say, getting what, but then remembers where he is. “Uh.” He hadn’t actually thought about what he was going there for - getting flowers is the obvious excuse, but then...what would he do with them? He doesn’t even have a vase for them at his apartment.
“Todoroki?” Izuku presses, confusion edging into his voice.
“For Momo,” he says, and then nods - yes, that’s a great excuse for him to use. His lips tighten. “And Kyouka. To celebrate their engagement.”
“O-oh,” Izuku seems to brighten by that, and he walks back around from behind the front counter. “That’s nice. Do you have any types in mind?”
Shouto shrugs. “I don’t know much of anything about flowers.”
Izuku hums. “Come with me, I’ll show you.”
In the end, Shouto had no idea on which flowers you were supposed to give for any occasion, and after about half an hour of Izuku going on and on about bouquets, he decides to pick all of the ones Izuku was adamant on.
“So,” Izuku says, walking down the colorful case, “Tiger lily, lily of the valley, and...peony?”
Shouto shrugs. “Sure.”
Izuku turns his head to look back at him. He’s making a strange face that recognizes as the expression he has when he’s apprehensive. “I don’t know if that arrangement is exactly...conventional.”
He blinks at Izuku; ushers his thoughts away from the pink buds that seem to just bloom on his cheeks whenever he’s nervous, and then opens his mouth. “Let me see them.”
“Y-yes, of course, I’ll show you, sorry,” Izuku murmurs, and he pulls out three completely different flowers and holds them up to Shouto.
“Oh,” Shouto says, after a pause. The flowers were all different colors and sizes. They definitely did not seem like they would make a conventional bouquet. The colors and shapes were all completely different - and while sometimes that can be pleasing, the three different kinds of flowers did not compliment each other well. It vaguely makes Shouto think of a child splattering paint across a canvas: they don’t understand which colors look good together, how to blend or shape or define.
He thinks of Momo and Kyouka’s relationship. That, too, is kind of like that child’s painting - a mix of two very different people, but somehow, they come together in a way that just works.
Shouto’s made up his mind. “It’s perfect,” he says, and Izuku looks flabbergasted, mouth hanging open and small, confused sounds coming out. “How much will it be?”
Izuku manages to close his mouth, but then clears his throat and spits out, “Are you sure?”
“Do I look like I’m unsure,” Shouto says, which Izuku flushes red at. Shouto forces himself to look away from Izuku - he’s letting himself get too comfortable with him again. Keep it together.
“Of course not,” Izuku mumbles, and he turns his body away from Shouto. “You can wait in the front while I arrange your bouquet for you. It...” Izuku hesitates for a moment, and Shouto his breath exit harshly from his nostrils. “It’ll be five thousand yen.”
From behind, Izuku looks smaller. His shoulders are bony and stiff, and Shouto thinks of high school, when Izuku would get so upset that those small shoulders of his would shake with frustration when he cried.
Shouto blinks, and that image has faded - Izuku is no longer the small, frail boy from all of those years ago.
He bows, despite Izuku not being able to see it. “Thank you.”
With bouquet in hand, Shouto walks to Momo and Kyouka’s apartment. It’s a very short walk from the florist, and it only takes him about five minutes to realize that he’s fucked up.
Surely, with a bouquet of flowers clearly stamped with the name of the company on the wrapping, Momo would be suspicious of him. Unfortunately, he realizes too late, because when he’s standing outside of her apartment complex, Kyouka is outside, and does a double-take when she spots Shouto.
“Shouto,” she calls, readjusting the plastic bags of what looked like groceries in her hands, and jogs over to meet him. “What brings you here?”
He swallows and accepts defeat. “I have a gift for you and Momo,” he says, and waves the bouquet at her, before he drops his gaze to the bags. “Need help?”
“I can handle this much,” she says, rolling her eyes at him, and Shouto shrugs. “Thanks, though. You can take one of them if you want.”
He reaches out and grabs a bag full of various snack foods. “It’s fine. Where’s Momo?”
“She’s inside,” Kyouka replies, and there’s a bright flash in her eyes that Shouto doesn’t really know how to interpret - but he knows it’s trouble, because it’s Kyouka. “Come on, let’s go.”
When the two of them entire the apartment, the sound of running water and music tells them of Momo’s place in the kitchen. It’s some sort of hip-hop - Shouto isn’t really sure, because he doesn’t listen to it. He was pretty sure that it wasn’t what Momo preferred, either. He side-eyes Kyouka next to him as she pulls her key out of the door and slams it shut.
“Momo!” She calls, and saunters down the hall to poke her head into the kitchen. “Shouto is here!”
“Shouto?” He hears her yell back, and the faucet turns off with a squeak. She steps out of the kitchen, and blinks at him. “What brings you here?”
Shouto exhales, trying to ignore the loud beat of the music that surely was vibrating through the walls into their neighbors rooms. “I brought something for the two of you.”
She glances at the bouquet, and her mouth hangs open. “Kyouka,” she calls out, a bit louder so her fiance could hear from where she walked off to. “Can you turn the music off?”
“‘Kay.”
Shouto holds up the flowers higher so that she can see them properly. “I’m not exactly sure what they mean, but-”
“Shouto,” Momo says, and there’s a hint of a smile crossing her lips, but it isn’t exactly happy. “You visited Midoriya?”
He shrugs, trying to make it look as nonchalant as possible, but he’s awfully aware of how warm his face is, and the knowing, somewhat sad look on his best friends face. “Yeah.”
They stare at one another for a long moment - Momo trying to analyze his reaction, surely, and Shouto doing his best to cover up the anxiety that has been bubbling up in his chest. Momo is an excellent reader. She knows him better than anyone else - which is why he knows that he’s caught, no matter how much he chooses to ignore it.
Finally, she shakes her head. “Thank you for the thought, Shouto,” she tells him, and then sighs. “I wish you would think before doing things.”
“I do,” he says, handing her the bouquet. “Most of the time.”
“Most of the time,” she agrees, and then frowns as she looks down at the flowers. “This is quite - uh, interesting.”
“They made me think of you and Kyouka,” he responds, and despite the clenching in his chest he’s able to smile.
She raises an incredulous eyebrow at him. “Really now?”
“Yeah.” She looks at him with such a wide, skeptical expression that he stifles a laugh, and shoves his hands into his pockets. “What were you making?”
Topic effectively changed, Momo retains her normal posture, and sighs. “I was just about to start dinner. Would you like to help?”
“Only if I can eat it,” he says, and takes a step towards her - she smiles, and turns around to lead him into the kitchen.
“I’ll make sure Kyouka doesn’t kick you out this time.”