A/N: I know, it's been way too long. I'm really, really sorry to keep you guys waiting, but I had some real life problems I had to deal with before getting back to writing. Luckily that's over now, at least for a little while (I don't know what the future entails, so I'll let you guys know if anything comes up), but anyway, here's a new chapter. Not my proudest work—it could use a lot of improvement, as could most of this story, but I tried my best. I've sacrificed sleep three nights in a row for you guys, so I hope you appreciate this! I'd love it if you'd leave a comment with some feedback and/or constructive criticism!
~+~+~
It'd only been a day since they'd been to the beach, but Izuku was already somehow sick.
The brink of twilight on a beautiful Sunday evening—there couldn't have been a better time for Class 1-A to prepare a delightful and delectable, almost fine-dining kind of dinner. Beef brisket and katsudon, curry and rice stew, all of it fitting for finishing off the last of their celebration. After all, making it through Final Exams was an accomplishment.
Mina, in line to grab some food with all of the rest of her classmates, was caught up in the conversation behind her.
"Dude, Midoriya, you okay?" Kaminari asked, eyes on Izuku as he stared down at an empty plate. "Your face is all red."
With a faraway look in his eyes, there wasn't any way she could deny that Izuku had fallen into a fog. Even from a distance, she was able to come to the conclusion that his chest was rising and falling a lot more heavily than usual, and judging solely by his slow response, he seemed a little feverish. He shook his head, almost as if to be a wake-up call. "I'm fine. Just a little hot, is all."
For a moment, Mina wondered if she was the one imagining things. Peering down at her Hero hoodie and tight black leggings, a draft of cold air wooshed right over her shoulder at a temperature surely below zero, and she shivered.
Nope. It was him. It had to be him.
Kaminari, now even more engaged in the confrontation than before, kneaded his eyebrows. "You sure? You seem... off."
Mina nodded unknowingly, a little part of her grimacing as out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Uraraka creeping up behind the boy in question and placing a gentle hand upon his forehead.
His reaction was half that of shock and a shrug. "You're warm," she said, peering over his shoulder. "Really warm. Do you feel sick?"
He nodded.
"You look sick to me, Midoriya," Kaminari said, and Mina finally realized something: If Izuku catching a cold was anyone's fault, it was probably hers. The beach, the rain, them sitting too long in their sopping wet clothes—it was all to blame.
Yet she froze, her feet still stuck in place. What it took to go up and apologize to him had magically vanished into thin air; she didn't have the courage.
His classmates, his peers, those who cared for him, made it known they wished he'd get well. Offering their condolences, they bombarded him, almost uncomfortably so, and Mina, wanting to make sure they didn't suspect anything was awry, quickly followed suit. He gave her a special smile, one he gave no other, and his adorably speckled freckles and warmly red cheeks made her insides melt into a remarkable puddle of love. She wished these feelings would last longer, she wished they'd never end, exactly what she'd wished ever since she started to fall for him, but Uraraka led him upstairs before they had the chance to linger, the chance to stay. Was it right or wrong to be jealous, Mina wasn't sure.
~+~
Izuku trudged through his dorm room door, Uraraka by his side barely being able to keep him steady. He'd felt like shit ever since he got out of bed, and now that the day was over, he was just so ready to roll around in his room and wrap himself up in a blanket that even resting his head on something as soft as a pillow would do. If he'd assumed correctly, it all kind of made sense, since his temperature had to have been above 38 degrees.
Uraraka knew she had to keep calm. She had an important job to fulfill. But even so, her nerves still managed to get the best of her. As they always did, she supposed. Izuku was her first love—how could they not? She'd brought up a tub of cold water to dunk Izuku's washcloth in, but she nearly spilled it before she even got the chance to lower it onto his desk.
She loved that he could do this to her, yet hated it at the same time.
"Right after Final Exams, huh? Bad timing if you ask me," Uraraka said, wetting the washcloth and resting it on top of his forehead. Despite the circumstances, she did her best to make casual conversation.
"Yeah," he breathed, barely able to get the words out. "At least it wasn't during Final Exams. Imagine all that work I'd have to make up."
She rolled her eyes. "Oh, please. Miss one day at this school and you'll be making up work for a week."
Silence.
For whatever reason, there was this weird atmosphere hanging over their heads.
He cleared his throat, sinking down further into the bed sheets. Uraraka began to fret. "A-Ah, I should take your temperature!"
He pointed toward the thermometer.
"Okay, let's see..." she muttered as she motioned for him to open his mouth, picking it up off the table and sliding it under his tongue. The ten seconds it took to get a result went by painfully slower than they should have.
"Oh, geez," she stammered. "38.5 degrees."
He groaned, rolling over onto his side. The washcloth he'd been wearing fell off his forehead, and he begrudgingly put it back on. It was the only thing keeping him cold.
"Do you need anything? Something to eat? Something to drink?"
He looked up into her eyes. "Um, I don't want to be a bother, so you don't have to, but... Does chicken soup sound okay?" He needed notalgia right about now, and it just so happened his mom used to make it for him as a kid.
"Yeah, sure. I'll be right back. Here, I'll text you when I'm on my way up."
She was out the door and probably standing in the elevator on her way down to the first floor by the time he even made the move to bat an eyelash. Not that he particularly cared, anyway—he was too tired to care about much at all, if even that.
Uraraka was like a mom. If chicken soup was what he wanted, chicken soup was what he'd get, and since she wasn't much of a chef, she grabbed the canned kind and immediately into the microwave it went. In to time flat she was on her way back up to the second floor, carefully opening his bedroom door as to not startle him out of his slumber. She was glad she'd left it unlocked, and, to her surprise, he hadn't quite fallen asleep yet. He was on the verge of it, though.
"I brought your chicken soup," she started, sitting back down by his bed and running her hands through her hair. "It's the microwavable kind. Sorry if it sucks—I'm not a very good cook. Do you want it now, or would you rather wait? You look kind of tired."
He smiled, eyes half-shut. "Now's fine. Thanks, Uraraka. You're a lifesaver."
She blushed.
He sat up and began eating, and the two of them talked. They talked and talked and talked, all the way up until they were bored of talking, and then they sat. He sat in silence and stared off into space while she lazily scrolled through her phone, and then he was suddenly done with his soup and laying back down on his bed.
Every once in a while he got the feeling that there was no merit to his and Uraraka's conversations. He liked her. He really did. But it wasn't the same as when he was with Mina. It wasn't the same kind of like.
He liked her as a friend, at least; she was one of his closest. And he felt so, so bad for even accepting her request to go to the dance in the first place. He'd been leading her on this whole time, and there wasn't a single thing he could do to get rid of his guilt.
He just really wasn't expecting that in the middle of that mishap, he'd fall for someone else—and hard.
As he glanced at Uraraka out of the corner of his eye, the guilt he'd felt merely moments before had morphed into a conglomeration of a thousand pounds, all of which was weighing heavily down on top of his chest. He couldn't breathe, suffocating in self-hatred. He couldn't let Uraraka leave without letting her know.
"Uraraka..."
"Yes?"
He paused. He thought about holding her hand, but that would only make the bombshell he was about to drop on her ten times harder to hear.
Tell her.
He groaned, quiet for a moment.
Tell her, you idiot! You're only hurting her by waiting!
"Can you, um, pass me that water over there? The one by my desk?"
Dumbass.
"Sure! Hold on a sec," she said, eager to jump up and get it for him.
She was always ready to do anything and everything he wanted. She was there no matter what, and he was an asshole for not doing the same.
She handed him the water, and he gulped down the first few sips like he hadn't been so thirsty in his life. It wasn't long before he passed out—out of exhaustion or purely out of stress, he didn't know—and despite the fact that he would've never known, Uraraka stayed right there beside him, watching over him the whole time.
She held his right hand, the one hanging lifelessly over the side of the sheets.
"Deku-kun," she mouthed. She let out less than a whisper. Then, out of the blue, she held his hand with a little more confidence, a little more force, but not enough to wake him. "Sometimes... I wonder if I might be burdening you. Am I in the way of anything? Your studies? Training? Dreams of becoming a hero? I really wish you'd rely on me more."
Uraraka knew she was taking on too many responsibilities for someone she was only just dating. She still hoped she was important to him, though, important enough to be the first person he'd go to, because that was who he was for her. But she knew that assuming that would be jumping the gun.
But she did love him. She could admit that now, unlike a long time ago, and she'd surely felt this way for at least the last six months. It'd probably been longer, but she couldn't pinpoint exactly when it started.
Just as she was about to open her mouth to continue, he started to say something.
"M—Mi..."
Uraraka leaned in, brushing her hair back behind her ear. "Mi? Deku, what're you—"
"M-Mi..." he mumbled again.
The realization hit her.
"O-Oh! 'Mi' as in mother, right? I didn't even think about that. Do ya miss her? Ya must be dreaming of her right now. I bet she'd be a lot better at helpin' ya than I am. I honestly can't blame ya, though, 'cause I miss my parents too."
Her accent was starting to show.
She scratched her scalp in that Uraraka-kind-of way, the way she liked to rely on whenever she wanted to wrap her head around things she had a difficult time comprehending. "I don't know why I'd be thinkin' anything else, anyway..."
He rolled over, burying his face deep down in his pillow. He let out a loud snore.
She sighed. She was only being silly. Resting her head in her hands, she leaned a little closer to him. A smile crossed the corners of her lips. "Well, Deku, I haven't had dinner yet, so I think it's time I head out. Have a good night's sleep, okay? Try to make it to school tomorrow if you can."
She decided she could stay for at least a little while longer. Calling it at five minutes, she stood up, skipping out the dorm room door.
~+~
"Ashido."
Startled, she slipped up, spilling the last of her melon soda on her brand new Hero hoodie.
"Kirishima! Look what you did!"
Kirishima decided he'd better be on the defensive. "What I did? You're the one who spilled it! What's with this new attitude problem you've got going on lately? It's been bugging me, Ashido," he said, a hint of anguish in his eyes he was seemingly trying to hide.
She stayed quiet.
He smirked. "Oh, I get it. It looks like Uraraka just got back, so you don't need to worry. He's all yours."
She was seconds away from elbowing him in the side out of spite. "Y'know, I'm all for joking around and stuff, but, Kiri, you gotta learn when to keep your mouth shut."
He huffed.
It wasn't like she'd hurt him if she decided to do it. He had the reflexes to activate his Quirk fast enough.
"I'm going upstairs. I need to change," she said, turning a blind eye to whom she would usually call her one of her best friends and making a beeline for the elevator at the back of the building. She looked over her shoulder right before pressing the button for the fourth floor, rolling her eyes all the while, and she realized: Uraraka had snuck right back downstairs like it was nothing, like being up there with Izuku was totally run-of-the-mill—as if they were more than merely dating, already acting like husband and wife. Class 1-A seemed to accept it, so why couldn't she?
That was a stupid question. Obviously because she liked him, and he liked her back.
She shook off the thought, hiding it in the back of her mind, heading through the hallways to her room, changing into clean clothes, and hopping back onto the elevator to travel down two floors. She snuck over to the boys' wing and knocked on Izuku's door.
Footsteps pattered heavily against the ground on his way over to her, and a faint "coming" could be heard through the paper thin walls and hardwood floorboards. She felt guilty; she'd gotten him out of bed for no reason.
He was a mess. His hair was disheveled, his sweatpants slipping down his waist, and his eyes seemed to stay glued shut. The moment he saw her, though, realization hit him hard, and his face lit up like a Christmas tree all the way up to the tips of his ears.
"A-Ashido! Um, I'm sorry, I wasn't expecting you," he fretted. "Hold on a minute," he said, leaving the door cracked open a bit as he went and tidied up his room. He headed back over to her. "Okay, you can come in now."
It was funny. He had went from completely dead inside to wide awake, all in the span of seconds. She giggled at the thought of it. "Midori, you can relax. I don't care what you look like or what your room looks like. It doesn't matter to me. Just rest, okay?"
"Yeah. I'm sorry, I guess I'm just kinda disorganized, being sick and all. Is it cool if I lay down?"
She smirked. "No, stupid. I didn't come here for you to bore me by going back to sleep. Get up. Right now."
In the midst of shimmying into his bed sheets, he froze.
She let a little laughter slip. "Oh, Midori, I'm kidding. You should've seen the look on your face!"
He sighed, smiling, not sure what was the right thing to say. Inevitably, he ended up giving into instinct and curling back up in his blankets. Even Mina was jealous.
She sat in the same spot as Uraraka, giving him the same exact look Uraraka had given him not long before. Longing. Hesitancy. Wonder in her eyes, speaking by saying nothing at all. What should she say? Was it really a good idea to come up here in the first place? How should she even approach this kind of situation?
She usually wouldn't think these things with anyone else, but Izuku made her overanalyze everything.
He decided he'd help her out a bit. "So, what's up? What are you doing here?"
She smiled. "Honestly? I don't know. I guess I just got... envious. Of Uraraka."
He blushed. "Oh."
"Yeah. And I wanted to ask you a question."
"What?"
"Did you tell her? About us?"
"Uh..." he started, staring off into space, knowing that was enough for her to figure it out. "I— Ashido."
"Heh, funny. That was the perfect opportunity, and you blew it. Are you ever gonna tell her, or are we just gonna pretend that this is nothing?"
"No, Ashido, I just don't know what to say—"
"Midoriya, you're gonna have to tell her eventually. Either that or get your secret spilled for you, and I'm sure neither of us want that."
Izuku didn't want to reason with her, but he also didn't he want to argue with her either. He'd tried. He'd tried telling Uraraka, and he was seconds away from doing so, but in the end he was just too chicken. Did that not count for anything? "If you think I'm not trying, you're wrong, Ashido. I am, okay? Believe me. I'd just rather let her down easy, and right now, I don't exactly know how to do that."
Izuku laid flat on his back, staring straight up at the ceiling. Glow-in-the-dark stars and some extra All Might memorabilia he had laying around were all that his eyes could see, but before he knew it, Mina had her head resting on his stomach, and he couldn't look at anything else but her.
"I thought you were mad at me," he said.
"I am."
The humming from the overhead fan stopped what would've been an inevitable silence.
He lifted his knee a little, hoarding her attention all to himself, but at the same time she didn't seem to mind it. "You should probably get off. We're not dating, you know."
"Maybe we would be if you'd told her."
"No, if I'd told her you wouldn't be up here right now."
She decided she'd change the subject. "Your stomach's rumbling. Really loudly."
His face set fire. She giggled at his not-so-newfound shyness, and, as his eyes met hers, he noticed there was a certain sparkle about them, brighter than anything he had ever seen before. "Midori, you're kinda cute, y'know. Really cute."
He hid his face under the covers.
She laughed a little, weaving her hand into his, holding it up happily. They were a perfect fit, a force to be reckoned with. For a split second, she wished they weren't the only two in the room.
Slipping his fingers through the spaces between hers, Izuku squeezed once, twice, lightly enough to barely even be noticeable. But she still figured it out, sending her heart soaring, bringing her to tried-and-true bliss.
He let go, and she thought, Perhaps he hadn't done it on purpose. She could've just been getting ahead of herself—as she always did, she supposed. It was habitual for her. Especially lately.
"Midoriya."
"Yes?"
"We can't keep doing this."
"What do you mean?"
"You and me. It isn't gonna work this way. Something needs to change. You either tell Uraraka, or it's over."
Mina said that with a straight face, but inside her heart was breaking. She knew whatever was going on between them was wrong to begin with—they were screwing over one of their best friends, completely neglecting anything and everything she felt—but she couldn't help herself. She was in love with him. He was her first, and she wanted him to be her last.
But she had to give it to him up-front. She wasn't cutting any corners, hiding any parts of the whole truth. Uraraka needed to know, and if it wasn't anytime soon, Mina wasn't going to be able to look Izuku in the eyes anymore.
But she really wasn't sure if she could keep that promise. She'd inevitably end up flirting with him in the meantime, similarly to what she was doing right now, but how would she be able to resist temptations in the future? Could she really move on so easily? Especially from a love like that?
Of course, this was assuming he'd chicken out of telling the truth.
"I will, Ashido. Soon. I promise. I just gotta work up the nerve."
"Okay," she said, sighing and sitting up, letting go of the intimacy they'd had merely moments before. Part of her believed him, part of her didn't. She knew he was trying, but she could never see someone as shy as him putting on that brave of a face.
She dipped the washcloth, the one that had fallen on the floor forever ago, into the bucket of water that Uraraka had brought up before. She wrung it out and laid it on his forehead. "I feel bad. I haven't helped you at all since I've been up here."
"It's okay," he mumbled.
She brushed the loose curls out of his face. "No, it's not. I'm sucky at this kinda stuff. I've been worrying about myself too much. You sure I'm worth your time?"
"Yes."
She smiled. "Thanks, Midori. I'm glad. Well, I should probably go. It's getting late, and people will wonder where I am," she said, flicking him on the forehead, staying silent at his surprise but wanting to let out a laugh.
She stood up, waving goodbye on her way out the door. She checked each end of the hallway only to see she was alone, and, once she was sure she wouldn't be spotted, she floored it for the elevator, which was conveniently close by. Little did she know, she wasn't as sly as she thought.
~+~
Mineta's room was the perfect hangout. Kaminari couldn't get over the crazy fantasies his friend would think up and the stupid things they'd discuss, like the top ten prettiest Pro Heroes and which ones they thought they stood a chance with (none, they'd soon out), but, ultimately, as life would have it, all good things would eventually have to come to an end.
"I think I'ma head out. See you later, dude."
Mineta furrowed his eyebrows. "Already? It's not like we'll be doing anything in school tomorrow."
"Sorry, bro. Everyone's still downstairs, and I wanna hang out with them. See ya," he said, his hand on the doorknob. He paused. "Unless you wanna come too."
"Nah, I'm good."
"Okay."
Kaminari pushed the door open, but before he even had the chance to make a move, he noticed his fellow pink-haired friend peeking her head out of Izuku's room, looking for an opportunity to leave.
She was seconds away from seeing him when he quickly closed the door.
"What are you doing?" Mineta asked.
"Nothing," Kaminari said, sweating.
"What? Did you see a ghost?"
"No, no. It's nothing, really. Can you just— give me a sec? Please?"
A little while later, Kaminari carefully walked out into the corridor. He was lucky to be alive. If Mina had bumped into him at just the wrong time, things could've gone far, far south, and fast—not just for him but for her as well. Though, the potentially detrimental encounter did leave him with one burning question: What was Mina even doing in Izuku's room in the first place? And especially right after Uraraka had left?
He decided he'd investigate it more in the morning. Her ever-growing closeness with his next door neighbor and soft-spoken classmate had been puzzling him for far too long lately, and his own inquisitiveness was starting to get on his nerves. Even though it wasn't any of his business and he knew how easily curiosity could kill the cat, he still wanted to know.
If anything, he wouldn't be the one to be killed by curiosity. It would probably be Mina.
~+~+~
A/N: I'm trying to get back on a regular updating schedule. It's just that as a high schooler, my life is super busy right now. (High school's really fun, by the way! I've made so many new friends this year.) The next chapter is either going to be long, or kind of short (I don't know whether or not to split it up into two, since it is a big step in the story). It should be out in the next couple of weeks. Thank you guys for reading! <3