You kick a rock out from under your foot and watch as it hops away from you and into the road, twisting your leg side to side absentmindedly before moving back and resting your head and the sole of your shoe against the wall behind you. The sky is clear and blue, and a sigh falls from your mouth as you hear footsteps walking up beside you.

Standing outside the gate of this hospital in broad daylight was something you'd gotten used to doing months ago, and had stopped doing weeks after that. You weren’t surprised that you’d gone today; it had been expected with all the things that happened yesterday, but it still felt a little bit weird to do again after so long. You were glad, really, that Todoroki had gotten into visiting his mother regularly. It was an improvement. One he'd needed desperately. And it wasn't like you minded waiting for him anyway. If you were in the same situation, you were sure he'd take the time out of his day to be a stoic but steady emotional support—even if it was from this distance. You two weren't childhood friends for nothing. 

You set your foot down and stand to full height as Todoroki walks up to you, school bag in hand and face as blank as usual. 

"You ready?" You ask as he stops in front of you. He always has a relatively blank expression on his face. It was his trademark look at this point, only changing slightly with drawn eyebrows or lips tightened into a thin line. A good glare if he was really feeling angry. 

But every time he gets back from seeing his mom, he has a particularly blank look on his face. You've known him since childhood so you can easily discern what’s changed. The slightest furrowed brow, the edges of his lips turned down the bare minimum of not being a frown, and the lowering of his eyelids— like he was trying to stay awake. 

Todoroki Shouto loved his mother more than he loved anyone, but being around her obviously tired him out. The UA sports festival had tremendously changed him, so much so that right after it he met with his mom for the first time in years. He was significantly more social, though still introverted to a point. The boy visited her every weekend, and that’s when your job of Emotional Support Carrier Person began. Todoroki was still nervous to go alone even though he never showed it, and yet he wasn’t nervous enough to have you go inside with him. Which you were glad for, anyway. Meeting Todoroki’s mother felt… weird. Like it wasn’t really your place. And you didn’t really mind waiting anyway. You could tell the difference these visits were making in him. Todoroki had never tried as hard as he has now to build relationships before. He even started writing his mom letters after he couldn’t find the time to go see her anymore. 

"Yeah, let's go." His voice was small but rough with emotion, like he'd been crying. As he begins walking away, you follow. His eyes stay low to the ground and you lean forward as you walk to get a good look at his face, then nudge him with your shoulder. With just that little bit of prompting, he explains, "She saw...all of it. We talked about it. It got…weird, for a second.” You watch as his Adam’s apple bobs. “She was very cool about it all.”

You move your eyes back up to his downcast ones. Knowing what he was talking about without him even having to say it, you ask, “And that’s a bad thing..?”

“No. It’s just,” he stops walking. You stand to attention, giving him a serious look despite his eyes being to the ground. “It looks like she's forgiven Endeavor, even if she won't say it, and that's..” Another silent moment goes by and he starts walking again. You walk beside him, the wind moving his hair side to side. He says slowly and in a quiet voice, “Frankly, I don't understand her. And I don't think I ever will. I think.. she forgave him a long time ago, even before yesterday."

You nod with a discontented look on your face. 

"Oh,” He says blankly, finally meeting your gaze with raised eyebrows. “She also said she'd like for you to say hi next time around."

"I don't think I will, actually. It's too… intimate."

"Yeah," he trails, looking back down. Rocks crunch under his feet as he walks, and he looks up again. "She thanked me for the letters."

"You thinking about visiting her more?"

"Now that my supplementary classes are over, I finally can again. But after today, I don't know if I want to for a while. Maybe when this all blows over." He looks forward, taking in the sight in front of him. The street is surrounded by trees and more and more stores appear as you walk farther away from the hospital. There’s a street vendor selling ramen and a nice-looking bread shop with its door wide open, letting out a stream of fresh bread smell. Three middle schoolers in black gakuran are hunched over on the side of a grocery store, presumably reading something naughty. 

You speak up, matching his low tone. "... I mean, if you want me to go with you next time, I will." Intimacy be damned.

"Thanks." He says it like he’s exhausted. 

"I can buy you some cold soba?"

"That'd be nice." He says it like he means it.

"C'mon, I'll buy you some. I know a place."

You lead him in the direction of the shopping district while walking in comfortable silence. A large hedgehog-faced man is handing out flyers. On the other side of the street, a child is begging for their mom to buy them ice cream, pulling on her arm as she drags the kid along. You watch as life flows around you, as you step up onto a sidewalk and walk under the shade of a thin but bushy tree and then back out into the sunlight. The air is fresh and warm, and your homework is done and you have good grades and you feel good. You’re walking next to your best friend and you feel..good. You wish Todoroki could feel it too. 

After a while, he speaks up again. "I don't think I can just forget everything that Endeavor did to me or my family.” His face is calm but his left fist is clenched. “I can't imagine forgiving him after all this time. I mean, he made my childhood a living hell. I can't stand seeing him face to face but… is it strange," Todoroki clenches his fists tighter. So tight you think he could bleed. His voice gets desperate, and you haven’t heard him get like this in a long time. "Is it strange..that when mom talks about him the way that she does, and when people talk about him on the street, and when I see him on the news, that I think he looks kind of… impressive?"

You raise an eyebrow. 

"That I feel like.. a part of me feels like it's already forgiven him?" His brows furrow deeply as he tries to sort through his feelings. "And I haven't. I know I haven't.” 

You want to do a good thing, but you aren’t sure if you can. You can feel it in your heart, how it beats to the rhythm of your steps, how your face warms in the sun, that this could go bad very quickly and not in that way. You never feel that way. Not the way others feel. But you want to assure him, and the best way to do that in this exact moment is to take the chance that he might get the wrong idea or pull back. You take one long look at how tight his hand is, and with that it's already decided. 

You take his hand in yours, and squeeze it. He looks up at you, surprised, but you tighten your lips into a line and nod. He relaxes, his shoulders dropping and his brows lowering, and he squeezes your hand back and goes on to say, “There's just something about seeing everyone else's reaction to him; How people are starting to look up to him for guidance, and how none of them know how he really is.” He furrows his brows. “That gets to me. It's like I'm in another dimension or something. One where he's not a complete . It’s like I'm the one in the wrong for hating him."

"You're not."

"I know I'm not, but I still can't help feeling like I'm being tricked somehow.” His eyebrows relax and his face goes strangely blank. He squeezes your hand again. Your Emotional Support Mode activates and you squeeze back. “In the end he got what he wanted. To be number one. And here I am having just finished retaking the provisional licensing exam and supplementary lessons."

"You feel gaslit." You nod in understanding. 

"I feel what?"

"Gaslit. You know, when people are gaslighting you?" 

He stares at you. 

"Gaslighting. It's when someone makes you feel like you're the one lying when it's really them trying to use you as a scapegoat. Or something like that."

"Huh. Then yeah, that." He looks back down at his feet. "It feels like I'm being gaslit by all of hero society. There's just a complete gap in the Endeavor I've been seeing recently and the one I know.”

“You feel a disconnection between the Endeavor that mistreated you and the Endeavor we see on TV.”

“Yes, exactly.”

“I think that’s normal,” you say, and he gives you a peculiar look. “It’s like when your friends come over and your mom puts on a nice personality when really she’s one to yell about stuff.”

He comes to an abrupt stop. “What? Does your mom do that to you?”

You pull your hand out of his and put your hands up in defense, shaking your head. “Wait— no, I just realized—“

“Do you wanna talk about it—?”

“No, it’s just a thing I’ve seen on TV! It’s not about me.” Of course he wouldn’t understand that analogy. You sigh. “Ok, let’s try again. You know how you know certain food is bad for you but you eat it anyway? Like that.”

“How is that like my situation at all?”

“It’s not. But it's the same feeling. Cognitive dissonance, I think it’s called. Endeavor was different on TV yesterday because you only see it second hand. Talking with him is a whole other story.” You point your index finger at the sky. He looks at it as you both continue walking. “Of course when he’s fighting his focus is on the fight, not on being a jerk. And there’s also taking into account the bias that the media always has in the way they edit and comment on things. Camera angles, focus, everything.”

Todoroki knew all about the media. News outlets are always all over UA, and after Kamino, they’d gotten their fair share of him as well. 

He looks down at his hand. It was warm. It was always warm. When he was a child, he used to put ice in his left pocket so he wouldn’t always be reminded of him, but, unsurprisingly, it never worked. 

“So does it count as forgiveness if it's not really him I'm forgiving?” He clenches, then unclenches, his hand. “Or rather, instead of forgiveness... is this vague feeling I have just me no longer caring any more? Whether I like him or hate him?"

“I think the real question is, do you—” You chew on the inside of your cheek for a moment, wondering if you should even ask. “...Do you want to forgive him?"

And he looks at you for one strong moment, surprise once again appearing on his face then slowly sliding off as he looks back at the ground. "..No. No, I don't."

"Then don't." And you look forward, twisting your neck left and right to get a nice succession of pops.

More time passes, this time the air more stiff from Todoroki’s loud thinking. You can tell his mind is wheeling. It’s times like these that remind you of that kid in your class. Midoriya, you think. Todoroki mentions him a lot. They’ve been hanging out a lot more, along with the Engine-Leg guy and Fly Girl. 

“I keep thinking about that kid on the news. The one that kept screaming for everyone to look at Endeavor.” He speaks up again. This is the most he’s spoken in a while, you think. Since he first started seeing his mom. “What he said bothered me the most."

"His reaction was the exact thing you feared." That kid adored Endeavor more than the man's own son. 

"That too. But he was right. Yesterday, I couldn't look away. I found myself praying that he would win and come out OK." He shakes his head in disbelief at himself. "Thinking about it last night, I couldn't believe it. I had been rooting for him. The guy I've hated since I was a kid, who put my mom in a hospital, I was rooting for his success. That's what bothers me."

"You have a lot to think about." You tilt your head to the side to once again get a look at his face. He's gripping the strap of his school bag with his right hand pretty tightly, but he seems calmer than he was earlier. 

"Yeah…" he trails, then goes silent for a few seconds before saying, "I could really use that cold soba."

"You got it, dude."

He tilts his head to the side, rolling his blue and brownish grey eyes up and to his right in thought. "And also," He takes his hand off the strap of his bag and motions to you with the other one closest to you, palm face up. "Would you hold my hand again?"

He doesn't sound or look particularly nervous as he says it. He's not blushing or straying from eye contact. But even with all those assurances, you still ask, "It's platonic, right?"

"Yeah. It's the only way we feel it."

You grab his hand. "Did you just come out to me?"

"Maybe."

"Oh! Ow! Be careful, Mr. Hand-Crusher!"

This time he does blush, only slightly. "Ugh, they told you about that?"

 

In the shopping district there is a shop with anime souvenirs in the window. As you walk in you’re surrounded by bright colors and figurines. T-shirts with famous symbols on them litter the racks and as you walk further in, straight to the back, there’s a swirling staircase that leads to the underground shopping district. Down there are the more edgy and niche shops, complete with goth fashion, Indian food, stylish shoe stores, and the like. 

In the far right half of the outlet is a tiny little soba shop run by a dark-skin man from Nagano with a thick country drawl. You take Todoroki inside.

The walls are pale brown and straw-patterned and the tables are tightly fitted. It’s a bucolic little shack of a place, but it’s comfy. Rural. Traditional. It has the same feel as Todoroki’s place. The owner waves with a bright grin as you walk in and sit at a nearby table, calling out for a cold soba. 

In the corner there is a TV hung up playing the news for the patrons to watch. Coincidentally, they were reporting the events of yesterday. 

“Yeah, it is weird seeing your dad be…celebrated.” You grimace.

“I’m surprised we were able to get here in one piece without running into the paparazzi.” 

“Oh, don’t worry. I bet we’ll have to sneak in through the back just to get back to the dorms.”

“I’m sure.”

An image of the Number 2 Hero: Hawks shows up on screen, the volume too low to hear properly, as a video in the background of fire rushing towards the clouds plays. 

“That’s Hawks’ town, anyway, right? What was Endeavor doing there?”

“I suppose it was a Team Up.” Todoroki, who had been blatantly trying to ignore the TV, finally looked up at it. 

“Endeavor? Teaming up with someone? By himself?” You scoff. “And aren’t Team Ups for when they already have a plan set to attack? They couldn’t have known that a Nomu would appear or else they would have had reinforcements.”

“So then they’re friends?” Todoroki says and immediately finds the idea ridiculous. Endeavor didn't have friends. He was the lone wolf type, with an awful personality to back him up. 

You let out a soft laugh. “Funny, Shouto.” 

The owner walks over and places the bowl of cold soba before Todoroki. 

As he walks away, you rest your cheek in your palm and let out a deep breath, “But I do wonder about it.”

Todoroki is already sipping up his noodles with fervor, his eyes wide and the bowl held up to his chin. He’s like an assembly line. You smile to yourself. 

He looks up at you, having been completely engrossed in his food for several seconds before swallowing his chunk and lowering the bowl slightly while sitting up straight. “You didn’t order anything? Do you want some?” And he gestures the bowl to you. 

You shake your head and put up a hand. “I’m good.”

“Are you sure?” When he sees your nod, he goes fully back into his soba, practically jumping in and swimming in it. It was ridiculously easy to get this kid’s spirits up. He looks up suddenly. “Oh. Thanks, by the way.”

“No problem.”

“I’ll treat you next time.”

“Oh! Are you gonna cook for me?” You perk up. Todoroki’s cooking is God-worthy. His skills weren’t only in fighting, that’s for sure. If he weren’t trying to be a Hero, he could definitely be a master chef. Or both. Todoroki: Half Hot Half Cold Master Chef Hero. 

“I could. Is that what you want?” He raises his eyebrows in genuineness. 

“I mean, if you want to. You don’t mind?”

“Not at all. Then it’s settled.” He looks down at his bowl and takes another bite. “What would you like?”

“Ah. I’ll think about it and tell you when the time comes.”

He nods, sips up more noodles. 

“Ahhh, it’s been awhile since I’ve had home cooking!” A shiver of delight runs up your spine. “I’m so excited..!”

“Is it that good?”

“Better than my family’s.” You stretch out your arms, glad that no one was sitting behind you for they would surely have gotten hit with how close these tables are. You two were the only ones here. You had a feeling this place wasn’t very popular. Even though it was nice, it was too small. “How’s the food?”

“UA level.” Another bite. “I’ve been complaining, but your dad too, right?”

“My dad’s a complete piece of crap, thanks for asking.”

“No filter, huh.” He says blankly. 

“You’re one to talk.”

“Right.”

“He only supports me cause it’ll make him look good.

“Mm.” He nods, sips. 

“And he treated us like nuisances until now.”

He nods, sips again. 

“At least we have better living arrangements. My family is more well off now.”

“That’s good, at least. I’m sorry I couldn’t do more.”

You wave your hand flippantly. “What are you talking about? What could you have done? It’s fine, that’s all in the past now.”

He looks back down, not very convinced. “Yeah…”

“Yeah.”

Silence envelops you and you go back to watching the TV. Footage from the UA sports festival last year is playing and for a split second you appear on screen. It was your standoff with Tokoyami and Dark Shadow when you were trying to get the bandanas off each other’s heads. You had transported out of his way, you remember, but in the end your team didn't get enough points to pass. The second passes and Todoroki is on screen, his ice sliding behind him while he fights against Bakugo during the final stage. It was right after that that Todoroki started seeing his mother again. 

“If it weren’t for that battle, we wouldn’t be here now.” You murmur. 

“It wasn’t that one.” Todoroki says and you turn your attention back to him. He sets his bowl down and scoots up in his chair. “It was the one right before.”

“Right. With what’s his face.”

“I can’t believe you haven’t memorized his name by now.” He says with no inflection whatsoever, his voice naturally low and smooth. 

“I had it earlier! Freckle-boy. Arm Breaker.”

“You’re getting closer.”

“I know Bakugo’s!”

“Is that the only one?” He asks. “Everyone knows Bakugo.”

“Yeah, he’s a pretty skilled fighter.”

“Rather than skill,” He looked to his right. “I’d say it’s his explosive personality.”

“Was that a joke?”

“No.”

“Well, he beat you up pretty bad. But then he got kidnapped—“

Todoroki’s flinch doesn’t reach his face but you notice it nonetheless.

“Never mind.” You instantly feel bad. Really bad. The kidnapping was all over the news. It messed up UA’s good reputation and furthered the bad guys. Even worse, it was indirectly related to All Might's retirement. But none of that, none of it, made you feel as bad as the fact that you didn't go. You didn’t stand by Todoroki’s side when he said he wanted to rescue Bakugo, and that would haunt the back of your mind forever. It really made you question why you wanted to be a Hero in the first place. Todoroki didn’t fault you for it, but you wish you had been there. Just to see Todoroki’s eyes light up in respect when you got there. It must’ve been really scary. For the home team AND Bakugo. The boy had never been very fond of you. Said you reminded him too much of Deku—“Deku! That’s his name! I got it— In your FACE, Shouto!”

“Good for you.” He meant it genuinely but his voice always came out sarcastic. He stirred the leftover soba in his bowl, a little down. He was in his head again. 

“Hey, no, we came here to get rid of all that negative thinking.” You point at him. 

“Did we?”

“Yes. But since that doesn’t seem to be working,” You stand and pay for the meal. Saying goodbye to Owner-san, you take Todoroki by the arm and lead him out of the shopping center. 

 

The sun will start dipping soon but it's not curfew for you yet. You keep that in mind as the sky turns a sandy linen color. You reach a vacant playground as the wind blows your way, splashing both of your faces refreshingly and restoring your energy and good mood. You reach a dome climber and teleport to the top, leaving Todoroki, confused, looking up at you from the bottom. “We used to hang out here, remember?”

“Yeah, I remember.” He looks down at the bottom step, wondering if you expect him to climb up to you. “We used to sneak over here whenever I was having a particularly bad day at home.” He puts one foot on the bottom rung and a hand on another, then slowly pulls himself up. 

“Everything else here has been replaced,” You look at the new swing sets and monkey bars, a few items layered around the field that you’ve never seen before. “But they still have this old thing.”

“It’ll probably be replaced soon, too.” He takes another step up. 

“We came here for positive thinking.” You remind him. “Anyway, we were talking about the guy. The freckle guy.”

“You forgot his name already..” Todoroki sighs, head bowed after climbing one more rung. 

“And Bakugo. They’re childhood friends too, right?”

“I wouldn’t call them friends.” He looks up at you, only a few rungs down from you now. “I remember this being a lot taller when I was a kid.”

“I’m surprised Bakugo had any kind of friends in the beginning of the year, seeing how—“

“—Kirishima and Kaminari.”

“Yes, thank you. How they warmed up to him almost instantly.” You say and look up at the thin green trees in front of the road beyond the park. “Bakugo always gives me the cold shoulder and talking to our classmates is...well, it isn’t hard, per se.”

Todoroki sits next to you, having finally reached you, and says, “Then don’t.”

“Okay, hardy har har.”

“I’m not joking. I barely talk to anyone and I still manage to have friends.”

“Like…” You look at him and wait.

“...Like Midoriya and Iida—“

“Yes, them! Yes.” You smile gleefully as he sighs again. “You’ve gotten pretty close with them lately.”

He sets one arm up on his knee and looks down at the grass between the bars. “Sometimes...just being there is enough.” His white and red hair moves in the wind, curtaining his left eye and the red patch under it. 

The sky is gradually turning from sandy to abrupt orange. “Like actions speak louder than words. That sort of thing.”

“Also soba.”

You let out a laugh. “That was a joke..!”

“Yeah.”

“I hope no one else in class is buying you soba. That’s my job.”

“More like I’m the one giving it away.” He murmurs.

“Oh!...This isn’t like,” You furrow your eyebrows. “a romance thing? Is it?”

“No,” He says in a breath that sounds kinda exasperated, or amused, maybe tired even. “You remember when the news came out about the Yakuza group and that little girl at the festival? Well, before all that, Midoriya was having a hard time, and at lunch I gave him some of my food and he started crying.”

“Ahh, I get that.” So that’s one thing they all have in common. Trauma. 

“Yeah, I don’t think,” He lifts both knees and settles his arms on them to place his chin on, then says, “that’s my thing.”

“What?” You look down at him, leaning back on your hands. 

He takes a good few seconds to answer. “...Romance.”

“Oh.” A second passes. You straighten up. “Oh!”

“Ever since you told me..about yourself,” He looks at the swings, then the slides. “I’ve been thinking about it. I’ve never really liked anyone, and maybe that’s because I didn’t get the chance to when I was a kid because of..everything. But I’m not really interested in having crushes in the future. Maybe I will, but for now… I dunno.” He shrugs and looks at you. 

“Well it’s really just about feeling the attraction. Even with everything going on, there’s still chances where one could see a person and think I like them, I want to date them, kiss them, do stuff, whatever. But it’s more a feeling than a thought. I mean I wouldn’t know, I’m one to talk, but…”

He looks back at the grass, in deep thought. “The thing is, up until the sports festival, all I had on my mind was beating Endeavor. Every waking thought was about getting stronger than him and winning against him. And after that...once I started thinking about myself, I still had that urge to get stronger, but I focused all that energy into my school work and building relationships. Ah, friendships, exactly.” He looks back at you and you nod. “And when you talked to me that day, I realized why Kaminari and Mineta’s babbling never made sense—“

You burst out laughing, completely thrown off by his last statement. He stares at you blankly. “No, I’m sorry, I’m not laughing at you. It’s just, ha, what you said, it was so surprising that I—!“ You let out another little laugh.

“Hey,” He says.    

“I’m very sorry.” You say, then let out a few chuckles. After a second of looking at you, he cracks his own smile. 

When you finish, you lean back on your hands again. “You know... It’s good to take these things slowly.”

“Yeah.”

“But, and don’t get weird about this, but I’m proud of you.”

And he smiles, and it looks like he’s tearing up, but he quickly rubs his eye and continues watching the grass dance in the wind. “Yeah.”

And you grab his hand, and he squeezes it once, and then he puts his head on your shoulder and you lay yours on his. 

And you sit there for a while; in your own little bubble. 

 

The sun is dipping under the horizon by the time you get back to the dorms. The sky is a deep blue across from the sunset, and the cicadas are chirping sleepily. It’s fall, and the evenings are colder. The breeze is fierce but welcome, because it makes Todoroki’s left arm feel nice. On the way home you both were troubled only once and not by paparazzi like you’d expected, but by some teenagers from a normal school that wanted pictures with you both. Before they could ask any uncomfortable questions, you grabbed your best friend’s arm and teleported away. Both training and battle had made it so that your teleportation took you farther and tired you out less. Getting that far was a breeze, and though it disoriented Todoroki a bit, it's not like either of you minded it much. You in particular had gotten tired of walking all day. Your legs ached and felt like they would knot up any second. You jokingly asked if Todoroki would slide you there using his ice. You weren’t expecting him to make the bottom of your shoes akin to ice skates, and you definitely weren’t expecting to fall so hard afterward. He looked at you shocked before he smiled stiffly, which was his way of bursting into laughter. You gave him a sour look, called him a bully, and then grabbed his leg and teleported him two feet in the air so that he’d lose his footing and fall down too.

As you reach the dorm building, you are greeted warmly with a wide grin, wave, and hey guys, we have meat buns! by the one and only Fly Girl standing on the porch. You and Todoroki glance at each other once before booking it to the opened door and into the savory scent of your home. 

 

Notes:

Pleasseee leave a commmennnntttt I need them to liveeeee