Puppet Master

Happy Birthday, Izuku!

"We're h- home."

Yuma smiled. That wasn't Eijiro's voice. That was Izuku's. Over the past few months that Izuku had come to live with them, the greenette had opened up quite a bit.

A month ago, Izuku started to attend speech therapy and this... this was a testimony to both his improvement and his increased comfort level with them.

"Welcome home, boys," she chirped, walking into the living room. Izuku looked up from where he had just locked the front door.

Locking doors and windows were still somethings he had yet to grow out of.

Izuku nodded to her as he went to go check the windows in the kitchen. He was so nonchalant about it. Yuma would think that he didn't even think about doing it if he didn't check each lock at least twice.

"How was school?"

Eijiro flopped down on the couch. "Loooong." She giggled. "Sounds like it. I'll get some snacks prepared. How does that sound?" Ei turned his head to her. "Thanks, mom."

As she was entering the kitchen, Izuku was exiting the garage after checking the locks in there. The door to the garage was at the end of the kitchen. "All locked up?" she asked casually. He nodded. "Y- yer."

"Say, Izuku, could you get me the apples out, please?" It was almost strange how normal and unusual their interactions were. And yet the silence wasn't uncomfortable. Izuku slid the apples over the counter to her. "Thank you very much, kind sir," she joked. Izuku deadpanned. She felt like she had won that reaction. Izuku slid against the lower cabinets to sit on the floor next to her, leaning against them.

"So," she started, "school will be out in a couple of weeks. How have you liked it so far?" Yuma looked down because as much as Izuku had improved with speaking, most of what he 'said' came from body language.

Izuku rested his head on his knees. She smiled softly.

"P- people," he whispered. "S- so many peop- le." She nodded and continued to cut up the apples. "Yeah? But you have friends right?"

He lifted his head to rest his chin on his crossed arms. "Frien's?"

Yuma nodded. "Like Ashido, Hino, and Furuya? They are your friends, right?"

Izuku furrowed his eyebrows. "Yer." he said decisively. "A- an' Mori then?" Yuma looked down at him. "Who is Mori?" He shrugged. "'e's in my Foods class. We ta- 'e talks to me." Yuma swallowed a chuckle. Izuku knew full well that he didn't talk back to whoever this Mori boy is.

"So you have friends then," Yuma repeated. "So not everyone is bad there, right?" Izuku looked up at her. He huffed and stood up.

"Yer," he said as he left the kitchen.

Yuma smiled. I win.

Yuma hummed as she put together a puzzle at the table. She glanced up at her calendar. Two more weeks and then school is out and then... Her eyes widened. She turned her head to look at Izuku who was currently sitting on the living room floor with Ei as they ooo'd and awww'd over a hero video.

A week after school let out was July 15th, Izuku's thirteenth birthday.

Should we celebrate it? We usually throw a party for Eijiro but how would Izuku react? Izuku still wakes up to nightmares, jumps at sudden, loud noises, and by all means, still has a phobia of humans whether he can put up with them for school hours or not so surprise parties are out of the question. Actually, despite him being afraid of people, Izuku is close to a certain few. I could try to get them all over but most of them are Pro Heroes and have tight schedules.