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Aizawa Shouta had a problem.
Actually, he had a lot of problems, but this was the biggest one. Recently, Shouta had adopted a daughter. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was that his daughter wanted to do something with him, something very specific that he knew he should’ve been expecting, and something he’d known was coming the day Eri woke up early and stumbled out into the living room, only to see Hizashi braiding Shouta’s hair. Though, that wasn’t necessarily the problem, either.
The problem was that Eri wanted to try.
“Why don’t you practice on your dolls?” Shouta had suggested, taking her into her room and pointing at her multitude of dolls, most of them hero themed or related. The most recent edition was one of Mt. Lady, who had synthetic hair that would be perfect for braiding. However, to Shouta’s horror, he saw that Mt. Lady’s hair had already been swept into a long, almost perfectly-done braid. He glared at the offending doll as Eri squirmed in his arms, shaking her head.
“No, I want to do yours,” She’d told Shouta, pouting at him, her lower lip stuck out dramatically. Shouta stiffened a little, glancing over at the doll again, and Eri piped up again, like she knew exactly what Shouta was about to ask, “’Zashi taught me. He lets me braid his hair!”
The braid did look impressive for a girl Eri’s age. It was near perfect, with only a few hairs sticking out. Mt. Lady’s fake blue eyes stared back at him, almost taunting him, and he didn’t get a word in edgewise before Eri was begging him again.
“Please?”
Shouta really liked to think of himself as a strict, mean teacher, someone who couldn’t easily be swayed, but even he knew who he really was. He knew he’d give in, and he knew that he couldn’t say no to her. He gave in right then and there and a day later, Shouta found himself sitting on the floor, waiting nervously for Eri to start.
Shouta wanted to say that he had no idea how this came to be. He wanted to say that he didn’t know why he’d given in. But he knew that this was his own fault and that he’d given in because in truth, he was soft. This was all his fault and anything that resulted from this would continue to be his fault.
“Shouta, are you sacred?” Hizashi was sitting across from him, giving him a bright smile.
Shouta frowned at him, narrowing his eyes in a glare. He was sitting on the floor, leaning against the couch. Eri was behind him preparing to do... whatever she was about to do to him, whether that was braid his hair or pull clumps of it out. He could hear his own heart beating hard, but he still shook his head, glancing away from Hizashi as he lied through his teeth.
“Why would I be scared?” Shouta asked, keeping his tone neutral. Both Hizashi and their other kid looked at him, both of them having gathered to watch. Hitoshi was looking at him with interest, raising an eyebrow at him, and Shouta couldn’t help but get the feeling that somehow, both of them knew. It was more understandable with Hizashi, who knew that Shouta hated having his hair brushed or put up by anyone, though Hizashi was the one person Shouta allowed to do it. He had no idea how Hitoshi had picked up on it other than by being able to see through Shouta’s lie that he was alright.
“Don’t be scared,” Eri chirped from behind him, and he didn’t have to look up to know that she was smiling at him. He just crossed his arms over his chest, waiting, waiting, fully expecting her to start pulling his hair. In truth, he was nervous. One of his least favorite things in the world was having his hair pulled, and it was sensitive. Shouta wouldn’t even let other people brush it because it was too easy to hurt him.
“Fine, fine,” Shouta huffed. Behind him, he heard Eri shifting around a little, and then leaning forward, feeling her small hands hovering by his neck and--
To his surprise, she didn’t immediately grab it. He heard a quiet laugh and then the gentle drag of a brush near the bottom of his hair, so light that he could barely feel it. For a moment, Shouta almost forgot who was brushing it, until his eyes went wide and his gaze fell on Hizashi.
“Did you teach her or something?!” He asked him, making sure not to move around too much. Hizashi just smiled at him and from beside him, Hitoshi laughed. Shouta just frowned at the both of them. He should’ve known that Hizashi, at least, would be in on this. There wasn’t much he could do about it, though, especially when there was no reason to tell Eri to stop since she wasn’t doing anything wrong.
“I told you that ‘Zashi taught me,” Eri said from behind him, sounding a little too proud of herself. She brushed out the back of Shouta’s hair in a long stroke, using the exact same gentle technique that Hizashi did whenever he brushed Shouta’s hair. Even with how sensitive his head was, it wasn’t painful at all, and all Shouta could think was that Hizashi must’ve warned her beforehand. “I’ll make it look nice.”
“Sure,” Shouta gave in once more, forcing himself to relax. Eri carefully drew all his hair back, brushing it a few more times, and Shouta let the tension flow out of his body, sighing quietly and closing his eyes. Across from him, Hizashi apparently got bored with the quiet, starting to talk to Hitoshi about school, but Shouta stayed quiet.
After a few minutes of brushing it, Shouta felt Eri begin to separate his hair into sections and carefully braid it, just like how Hizashi always did. He must have taught her well, because besides the tinyness of her fingers, it felt almost exactly how Hizashi did it. It was a little surprising, how conscious Eri seemed to be of pulling his hair, and he let her do whatever. She was evidently concentrating pretty hard, because she didn’t try talking at all, instead focusing on the braiding.
It didn’t take long at all before Shouta felt Eri sit back, heard her clap her hands together and shout happily, “It’s done!”
Shouta sat up a little, opening his eyes. The first thing he did was feel the braid, touching the way the plaits went up into his part and then down his back, the end of the loose braid on his shoulder. Except--when he glanced at it, he saw that it was tied off with a band that had a plastic calico cat on it, and stuck between a few of the plaits were small, fake purple flowers.
Even he had to admit that it was kind of cute. And Eri had done even better on him than on her dolls. It looked perfect.
He glanced up at her, finding her red eyes peering down at him in excitement and anticipation, and he offered her a rare smile, “Thank you. At least it’ll be out of my eyes now.”
She gave a happy noise and again, Shouta heard a small laugh from across from him, his gaze finding both Hizashi and Hitoshi looking at him.
“It looks good on you, Sensei,” Hitoshi teased him, and even Shouta didn’t have the heart to scold him or glare at him. Hitoshi patted his own wild hair. “Maybe I should get Eri-chan to do mine next.”
Shouta wasn’t entirely sure if he was kidding or not, but it didn’t matter, because Eri immediately jumped at the chance, launching herself off the couch in a flurry of excitement, “Please! I can give you pigtails!”
Shouta raised an eyebrow at Hizashi as Eri’s excited voice filled the room, “I think you started something. At least she’s enjoying herself.”