The city that never sleeps. Eri found herself doom scrolling through a page all about New York nightlife, her monitor having timed out hours ago, with the small phone screen lighting up her face, and the streetlights and full moon barely illuminating the rest of her room.
The differential of light made it hard for her not to get absorbed into her phone, like a moth drawn to a flame, her eyes were fixated on the hundreds of posts and videos she kept scrolling through.
Seconds passed for her, yet the clock on her phone told her otherwise, as she sighed, rubbing her eyes, and setting her phone down.
Getting changed into new clothes in the dark was already an ordeal, but trying to fish through her clothes in an unlit wardrobe was even more of a pain.
Picking out a t-shirt, some leggings and one of Izuku's old hoodies, she went downstairs, careful not to creak the floorboards. Ochako's door was closed, with no light seeping out from under it.
As she got to the bottom step, Eri almost slipped off it, keeling forward in pain.
"Ugh... still have the cramps... just great."
She didn't turn any of the lights on. After all, she'd been making this journey for a while now, though never this early at night.
Every sound jumped out at her. The wind caused the curtains to gently billow. The owls hoot from the distance. The tap leaked a single drop of water into the sink.
None of those sounds were anything compared to the auditory attack, hearing someone run up the stairs, their feet arrhythmically and rapidly slamming into the concrete, before she could even turn around, her back facing the dark, sordid hallway, it swung open.
"Eri?!" Izuku called out, panic rife in his voice, using his words rather than his eyes, as she sighed and turned around.
"You caught me, Batman." She joked.
"If I were Batman I'd probably swing through the balcony." Izuku replied, breathing heavily as he closed the door.
"You're tired from running up the stairs? Either you need to work on your cardio or Yaoyorozu already gave you a workout~" She teased.
"I'm not tired from either of those things, and she didn't give me a workout." Izuku said, his chest rising and falling, as he actually struggled to catch his breath.
"You sure don't look like it." Eri retorted, walking up to her brother, who just stood in the hallway, leaning against the wall. Turning the light on, she saw a glimpse of fear in his eyes, before it vanished and he put on his usual beaming smile.
"Did seeing me in the dark scare you that much? That's not very Batman of you now is it?" Eri asked jokingly, a flash of concern on her face.
"You think being in the dark scares me? You merely adopted the dark, I was born in it, moulded by it. I didn't see the light until I was already-" Izuku began, trying to deepen his voice for the quote, but was cut off.
"Okay, if you're gonna quote Bane, at least be as big as him." Eri said, taking another step closer, "Seriously, you okay?"
He took a second before responding. It wasn't like he could tell her the truth, not now, not this late at night when they should be asleep. A thousand images playing out like a slow-motion movie came to his mind, all of which ended in the same image of the moonlight from his room.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Just shaken up from coming back so late, and seeing a hooded figure in my home." He said.
"Our home" Eri corrected.
"Until you start paying the bills, it's mine." Izuku teased, noticing the hoodie she had on, "Is that mine?"
"Y-yeah, I put the one I was wearing before in the wash"
"Did you miss your big brother that much?"
"You wish, I just find your hoodies comfortable, they're not trimmed down in the waist."
"Why would they be- Oh... right."
"I cannot believe you're this clueless about women and you have a girlfriend."
"I mean I did take after mum, I got her hair and her eyes."
"Well, I got her smile."
"You got her gender."
Eri couldn't think of a snappy enough comeback in time for their tennis match of banter, as she just bristled and stepped out onto the balcony, as the two of them had been slowly walking and talking.
"I really did get her gender, huh?" She said, facing away from Izuku, wincing and trying to keep a straight face.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Izuku asked, walking up next to her.
"Nothing... just... cramps." She admitted, not exactly too comfortable explaining, even if it was her own brother.
"Do you want a hot water bag? Or some Tylenol?" He asked.
"I'll live. It started this morning so I'll be fine by tomorrow." She replied, without her usual upbeat tone.
"Which is when the headaches start. And Tylenol helps." Izuku pointed out.
"I have some in my room, it's okay." She said reassuringly.
"Okay." He said, deciding to drop the subject, "Were you coming down here because you couldn't sleep?"
"Yeah..." She lied.
"Insomnia's flaring up again, hm?" Izuku asked rhetorically, "Wanna talk about it?" He asked, still looking out at the city's skyline.
"It's nothing, I was just bored. And it's not even that late." She replied.
"Not that late? It's almost midnight." He pointed out.
"I've been awake later than that." She refuted.
"You're really not helping your case here." Izuku said with a smirk.
"Anyways." Eri said changing the subject, grinning a little, "Why don't you tell me about your impromptu date?"
"There's nothing to tell, we just watched a movie, ate some pizza and relaxed." He answered.
"What movie and what pizza did she get?" Eri inquired.
"We watched the Dark Knight Rises, and she got pepperoni." He replied.
"Makes sense she'd like sausage..." Eri joked, merely earning a very dismissive eye-roll from Izuku.
"Is Ochako asleep?" He asked, now being the one to change the subject himself.
"I think so, yeah." Eri replied, wanting to say something about Ochako's mood to him... but it just wasn't right.
"That makes one of us. Are you gonna go upstairs now? Or are you chilling down here for a bit?" He asked, taking a step backwards.
"I'll stay here for a while. Don't worry about me, go and get some rest. Do you have lectures tomorrow?" Eri said with a fake smile.
"I don't, but I have a meeting with Kayama, she's my academic advisor. It's in the afternoon." He replied.
"Academic advisor?" Eri asked.
"It's a faculty member who just asks how things are going with the course, and to see if they can help you with more of the general university stuff, rather than the course material itself." He replied.
"Yet she's your lecturer." Eri pointed out.
"It's not uncommon, plus she is the most qualified, she's got a doctorate and two master's degrees." Izuku stated.
"Wow, she sounds impressive." Eri replied, quite surprised at the woman's achievements.
"She is, I mean I'm used to dealing with people smarter than me, I live with you after all." Izuku teased, though he really did mean it.
Eri just laughed a little at his comment, choosing not to say anything about it, "I'll see you tomorrow morning then. Good night"
"Good night. I'll wake you up, so don't stress about that." He said softly, leaving Eri be, and going upstairs, as she waited for the much more faint sounds of his footsteps to subside.
She gave it another 20 minutes, and finally relaxed, stepping back inside, her body cold from standing outside and barely moving.
Walking past the steps, she grabbed her keys and checked if the door was locked, pausing for a second, and making her choice, turning on her foot.
The night passed quicker than any of the Midoriya siblings had expected, as Eri's feet hit the ground first. Still sitting on her bed, the curtains closed and blocking out most of the sunlight, she heard her door open.
"Morning... sleep okay?" Izuku whispered, as she looked back, eyes barely open and her hair a mess, nodding a little.
"You've got an hour, shower and just chill for a bit. I'll take the train with you to school and keep you company." He offered, seeing her nod a little again, leaving her be, as he went downstairs to start breakfast.
About fifty minutes later, Eri walked in, wearing her school uniform, with her bag slung over her shoulder, watching as she set it down by the front door.
"I made you teriyaki tempeh and Mum's ginger and miso soup. There's rice too." He said, sitting down and serving her.
"Thank you... you could have made pancakes though." Eri said wearily, as she began to eat, unable to deny that his choice was probably better than something sugary in the morning.
"Well, I thought I'd be a bit more traditional. Plus, there's some turmeric in the soup, it'll help keep the cramps down." He replied.
"Thanks again... did Ochako already leave?" Eri asked, only now noticing her absence.
"She's still asleep, and I didn't feel like waking her up." He replied, eating alongside her, taking a little more rice.
Eri carried on eating, choosing to skip out on eating any extra rice, and instead went back for the soup, as Izuku had made it scarily close to what she remembered.
"Careful, that's my lunch you're eating" Izuku joked, watching Eri look up with her mouth full, and a worried look on her face, as he just shook his head and laughed, letting her know it was okay.
"By the way, I didn't hear you come up last night, how late were you down here?" He asked.
"I left the balcony like, twenty minutes after you left. I guess you just fell asleep quickly." Eri replied.
"Maybe, or you're just very stealthy" He replied playfully.
"Who knows? I could be a ninja." Eri joked, as Izuku rolled his eyes.
"In any case, I'll come and pick you up since I've got the afternoon free. I might even ask Momo to send a car over." He replied.
"Using her money already? I guess I know who wears the pants" Eri said with a smirk.
"I'm sorry would you rather take the train home instead of a nice comfortable car?" Izuku asked, raising a single eyebrow.
"...Okay fine." Eri said meekly, taking a few, uninterrupted minutes to finish her breakfast, as she and Izuku headed out the door.
After he dropped her off, Eri turned around to walk to school, running into Kota at the front door.
"Jesus you look like shit." He commented, noticing how tired she seemed.
"Hi Kota, yes my weekend went great, thank you for asking" She said snarkily, walking past him without a second's thought.
"I'm just saying, you look like you haven't slept, is everything okay?" He asked, after catching up with her and avoiding bumping into the other students in the hallway.
"I'm fine, I just slept less. And if I wore makeup you wouldn't even be able to tell." She replied.
"Well I mean no amount of makeup can fix that" He said, pointing to her face as he spoke.
"And no amount of money can fix your face either." She replied.
"Oh I'm sorry is that all girls care about? Money? I knew you were shallow, but I expected better from the rest of you" Kota joked.
"We care about more than money, but whatever we care about, you just don't have." Eri replied playfully.
"So height then." Kota snapped back.
"And what is it guys care about?" Eri asked.
"Depends on the guy."
"What do you care about in a woman?" Eri asked teasingly.
"N-nothing, I just... want her to be cool I guess" He said meekly.
"We also like confidence, so good job there." Eri said, patting him on the shoulder as they walked into their homeroom class.
"Anyways, we're getting our diagnostic exams back today, apparently we'll be put into different classes based on our results." Kota informed.
"I still find it weird they do that." She replied.
"Oh right, I forgot your brother went here. I'm assuming he told you what it'd be like?" Kota asked.
"Yeah, they usually separate us into three class groups for each subject based on the test scores, so the nerds all get put together, and the dumbasses like you get put together." She joked, watching the teacher walk in, silencing Kota, as he opened his mouth to reply.
"Good morning everyone. As you know, we'll be handing out test results. Each of you will get a sheet of paper with your scores for each subject, and another sheet of paper with your class numbers for each subject. Your timetables will remain the same, but you may be in a different room, so please don't lose that second sheet of paper." He announced, handing out the results to each student individually.
Eri watched everyone's reactions carefully, seeing which students were shocked and in despair, which were happy, and which were indifferent.
Eventually, the teacher got to her desk, where he smiled softly, "Well done, I have to say, it's nice to know you live up to your brother's legacy. You almost outdid his scores when he was your age." He pointed out, handing Eri's results to her, as she just laughed nervously, with Kota leaning over to see.
"What the hell?" He whisper shouted, looking around to see if anyone heard him, before continuing, "You got scores that high, and your brother did even better than you?"
Eri didn't say much, as she scanned through her results, at least happy that she'd gotten 90's and 80's in every subject.
"We're gonna be in different classes too, look." Kota said, disheartened by the outcome.
"What do you mean?" Eri said, more so concerned, as she looked at his results, and he didn't get higher than a 65 in anything, with his lowest score being a 42.
"My aunt's gonna kill me..." He said, leaning back in his chair.
"It doesn't count for our final grade, it's just like placement matches in any ranked videogame, she'll be fine" She replied dismissively, trying to figure out the cutoff for the different class groups, as she realised that any student who scored a 67 or higher would be in the first class, and students in the 33 to 66 range would be in the second class.
"You're not going to be in any of my classes?" Eri asked, her voice a little muted.
"Seems that way. Maybe if we do really well they'll move us up? Though it'd be better if you acted out and got moved down, that'd be much easier for me" He replied, laughing a little, as Eri still had the same disheartened look on her face, mixed in with the tiredness.
"Oh come on, don't tell me you're gonna miss me that much?" Kota said playfully, giving Eri a pat on the shoulder, "We'll still see each other."
Giving him a, well, less than self-assured smile, she turned to face him, "I know, I just... it's a lot to take in. Now I have to actually pay attention to the teacher instead of you. I'm gonna be so bored."
"How do you think I feel? At least you're smart enough that you don't have to pay attention, regular people like me have to try and understand what they're saying." Kota replied.
"Well that sounds like a you problem, I can't help you with a skill issue." Eri teased.
"Oh shut up, I don't wanna hear it from the dumbest member of the Midoriya siblings" Kota fired back, as the teacher dismissed them all to their first period, the bell sounding a second or two afterwards.
"I'll see you at lunch!" He exclaimed, catching up with a few of his other friends, as Eri just rubbed her eyes, wanting to fall asleep at her desk, making her way to her new classes, putting her chair back in its place as she left.
Pulling her chair out for her last period, the white-haired girl was running on empty. Her bag was twice as heavy now that they'd gotten new pieces of homework and textbooks to take home, and her cramps hadn't subsided as much as she'd thought, so eating a proper meal was thrown out of the window.
As they all sat down, the teacher announced that they'd be going through their diagnostic exams for their literature topic and that they'd be using a previous student's paper to look at their exam technique and style of writing.
The board wasn't too clear, as Eri had to focus a little to take a proper look. Getting her original paper back from the teacher, she watched them return back to the front of the class.
"I have to say, all of you in this class did very well. The lowest score any of you received was a 74, and the highest was a score of 88." The teacher announced, as Eri saw her score.
"88? Looks like someone beat me" She thought to herself.
"The example paper we'll be looking at today is the same as you have since we rotate the diagnostic exams every four years to stop you from getting the papers from an upperclassman, but this student has already graduated." She explained, much to the dismay of a few students, which was expected, as she had been a teacher for quite a while now.
"This student got a score of 97, and has even gone on to study at UA, so I'd suggest you all take notes, and stop complaining about school rules." She added.
That shut everyone up, as studying at UA was something that seemingly only happened to a lucky few. Eri could hear all of the hushed whispers, the comments about this seemingly enigmatic student, with the students believing them to be a genius or on a completely different level from all of them.
The instant she saw the teacher project the paper onto the board, she confirmed what she already knew.
It was Izuku's handwriting.
The rest of the class went by in a haze, as Eri already knew most of the "advice" that the teacher was giving out. The drowsiness really set in, and with nothing or no one to distract her, she felt her eyes get heavier and heavier.
Slowly, she felt her head tip forwards, ready to rest on the table and catch up on the sleep she'd missed, but right then, the bell rang, notifying the students that their day had ended, as everyone packed their bags in a matter of seconds.
Eri was much slower than the rest, as she carefully put away her exam paper, struggling to lift her bag, she adjusted the shoulder straps a little and began to walk out of the class, hearing a voice call out to her before she could escape.
"Eri? Can I speak to you for a second?" Her teacher asked, prompting Eri to spin on her heel and face her with a smile.
"Sure thing, what is it?" Eri asked.
"Well, I just wanted to let you know not to feel disheartened." She said sincerely.
"What do you mean?" Eri asked, feigning confusion.
"I noticed the look on your face earlier, you knew that was your brother's paper, didn't you?" She replied, watching her student's expression change.
"Was it that obvious?" Eri joked.
"I'm sure you two have a rivalry about these kinds of things, and he was the top of his class in his year, and in fact, no one's gotten a higher score than him on the diagnostic exams ever since, and I know you only got a score of 84 on this exam, so I imagine how it must feel." She explained.
"It's fine, really." Eri said dismissively, taking a single step backwards so she could leave, but not breaking eye contact just yet.
"Don't worry though, I'm sure you'll be as good as your brother soon enough, after all, a score of 84 is nothing to scoff at, and I can tell you're a very bright student." She said cheerfully, watching Eri's faint smile grow a little wider.
"Thank you, I'll keep that in mind." Eri said, equally as cheerful, waving goodbye, as she walked out of the classroom, wiping away her fake smile, and opening her phone, only to see two messages.
Izuku
Hey, sorry, I got stuck at the library with Tamaki and Mirio. But Momo's free, and she's gonna pick you up. She'll be at the gates in a red car, and you remember what she'll look like, so she'll stand out. Sorry again for the change of plan, I'll see you later.
Izuku
Sorry, forgot to mention, I gave her my key, so she'll stick around the house until I get back, keep her company okay? Hope school went okay!
Sighing once more, Eri stepped out of the school's main door, the sun beaming down on her, causing her to almost cower away from it, as she covered her eyes and looked for the red car.
"Eri?! I'm over here!" Momo called out, as Eri finally spotted her, slowly walking towards her brother's girlfriend.