Solar Eclipse (TodoBakuDeku)

~7~

"Ochako asked me to prom!"

I smiled at her. "And you said?..."

"Yes! Obviously." She responded.

"That's great, Tsu. I'm happy for you." I told her honestly.

She seemed to get nervous at that. "I really thought you two would end up  going together. It's not gonna be weird, right?"

I nearly laughed at the question. "God no, zero weirdness. You two would look cute together."

"I know right?" She said with a wink before skipping off.

I sighed as she disappeared from my vision. I was left to finish the walk through on my own. There wasn't anyone with me until I exited the green house and wasn't entirely surprised when it ended up being Todoroki to my left.

"What do you want now?" I asked him, sounding almost as tired as I felt.

"Midoriya, we shouldn't be friends." He said with a deep frown.

I scoffed at him. "Really? That's what you say?"

Todoroki was silent.

"Fine." I said before stomping off as far away from him as possible.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was lunch the next day when Tsu asked the group "You guys want to go to La Push this weekend?"

"Totally!" Uraraka said while clapping her hands together with a broad smile.

Iida nodded in agreement. "Sounds fun."

I looked between the group in confusion. "What's La Push?"

Aoyama grabbed my arm while explaining. "It's a beach on the reservation, it's great for surfing."

I looked at my new friends with a raised brow. "You guys surf?"

"Tsu does, she's teaching the rest of us." The brunette said.

I nodded. That made a lot more sense.

"Ochako is the most promising." Tsu 'whispered' to me.

Iida gasped in offense.

Tsu rolled her eyes playfully. "You can barely kneel on a board."

"And I stood up once!" Uraraka exclaimed.

"For two seconds!"

"Still counts!"

I softly chuckled as I stood, moving to go get food.

While reaching for a protein bar, I bumped an apple. My breath caught as it started to roll, falling from the counter.

Guess I was eating a bruised apple.

But to my surprise, it bounced off someone's foot and into their hands. My eyes followed from the hands up to their face.

I couldn't be surprised that it was Todoroki. It always was, it seemed.

"Well that was cool." I said in mild awe.

He must have thought my response was funny, because although he didn't laugh I still saw the smile he was trying to hide. It was small, but genuine.

That smile almost made me forget that I was mad at him.

Almost.

"Your mood swings are going to give me whiplash." I said as I took the apple back.

He shrugged. "I said we shouldn't be friends, not that I didn't want to be."

I looked him up and down skeptically. "What does that even mean?"

"It means you'd avoid me if you were smart."

It was my turn to shrug. "Let's say for a second that I'm not known for my intelligence, what then? You'll talk to me? Tell me the truth?"

I watched him hide another smile. "Probably not. I'm more interested in hearing your theories."

I think he was trying to make a joke, but I had theories. "I've considered everything from kryptonite to radioactive spiders, but nothing seems to fit quite right." I told him honestly. In truth, his entire being was starting to annoy me with how mysterious he was.

His eyes leveled with mine in a challenging way. "Maybe because you're thinking of superheroes. Maybe I'm the bad guy."

I could have laughed at the suggestion. "There's no no way I buy that. Sure, you can be rude sometimes, but that's just... it's a mask to push people away."

He seemed taken aback at my words, clearly not expecting my rebuttal.

"Why don't we just, you know, hang out or something. Like normal teens." I suggested. This conversation was probably the longest we've had without him leaving. "A few of us are going to the beach this weekend, you should come."

Oh god. Why did I do that? He's going to reject me and think I'm weird as hell.

Todoroki softly smiled and took a small step towards me. "What beach?"

Or maybe not.

"La Push, I think?" I said with a slightly nervous laugh.

His face almost instantly fell.

"Is there something wrong with that beach?" I asked in confusion.

He shook his head. "Just a bit crowded is all." He said before walking off.

Well. Okay then.