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On November 3rd, Iida Tenya received a text message from his older brother Tensei.
‘Hey kiddo. What are you planning to do for your teacher’s birthday?’
The young hero in training texted back, ‘It’s Aizawa Sensei’s birthday? What day?’
‘November 8. He likes cats just FYI. Mic, Midnight and I are taking him out on Friday night. I would invite you but we will be drinking. So no kids.’
‘I would not want to intrude on your evening with him. But thank you for informing me, onii-Chan. I will plan something small and tasteful with my classmates.’
If Iida has seen the wicked grin on his brother’s face, he would have dropped the idea entirely. But he couldn’t, and he didn’t.
The next morning, before the teacher arrived to his classroom, Iida closed the door, stood before his class and announced,
“My brother has informed me that Aizawa Sensei’s birthday is on the 8th. I suggest we decorate the room the afternoon before and after Sensei leaves for the day. He will be 31 years old and he likes cats.”
"So what should do for it, then?" Kaminari asked as he bounced a pencil off his desk.
"Maybe we can make him a cat shaped cake," croaked Tsuyu, smiling at the thought of her teacher's face lighting up at such a cute gift.
"Or we can not acknowledge it and move on with our day," Bakugou sneered from his desk. "I doubt the old man wants us to even know he's getting older. He doesn't give a shit about this stuff."
Ochako and Tsuyu rolled their eyes. "Whatever, Katsuki," Ochako said. "He may be a hard shelled crab on the outside, but we all know he's a softie inside. I like Tsuyu's cat idea."
"You know what might be a nice gift too?" Yaomomo chimed in, her face red with nervousness but still determined to have her say. "Sensei always looks so tired and unkempt. Perhaps we could give him some basics, like a basket of soap, shaving cream and razors, you know, items to show him that we care about his physical health. Hygiene is important, maybe he could use a little basket that serves as a home-away-from-home? I'm sure he has a locker or something here to keep it in."
"Yeah!" shouted Mina. "I bet he would love that! Then he wouldn't need to worry about rushing out of his house every morning!"
"Exactly!" Yaomomo said, excited her idea was going well. "Plus he's up all night fighting crime, I bet he doesn't get a lot of sleep or time to take care of himself at home. Let's make it easier for him!"
The class celebrated their excellent idea and set about making a list of items they believed necessary for their teacher, while Tsuyu and Ochako, along with Sato, planned a lovely cat shaped cake.
The target of their misguided love entered his classroom looking haggard and ready to drop as he often did. The class went silent and waited for him to start the lesson for the day, but Mineta suddenly asked, "Hey sensei, do you like chocolate or vanilla?"
"Hmm?" The teacher turned to glare, annoyed by the unprompted question, but answered with his own question. "Why?"
"No reason."
Aizawa sensei scanned his class and made a note of the grins that tried to hide from him.
"I don't know how you know about my birthday," he grunted, "but do not do anything for it."
"Not even a cake?" Sero asked.
"I won't eat it."
"Why?"
"End of discussion," Aizawa snapped. "No birthday shenanigans."
Confident he had shut the entire thing down, he began the lesson, unaware that his army of students was in no way deterred from their plans.
November 7 came quickly. Class ended, Aizawa warned them a final time to do nothing for his birthday, assigned a difficult homework to keep them occupied, and left the room feeling confident that he had squashed their determination to drive him insane. But the moment he was gone, the students of 1-A started to decorate their classroom for their teacher's big day. Yaomomo made strings of cat decorations and Sero strung them up, and Ochako, Tsuyu and Sato ran off to the Home Ec kitchen to make the cake. Meanwhile, Mina, Denki, and Kirishima went out to prepare the basket of necessities, where they planned to purchase lovely scented items. Kirishima went to the board and wrote the manliest "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" he could, complete with little hearts, stars, and cat faces. Midoriya, who took photos to document it all, quickly drew a caricature of their teacher smiling and giving a double peace sign.
The next morning, the class set out the very adorable cake and the basket on Aizawa's desk, and made sure all the decorations were in place. Little black and yellow cats dotted the walls, strings of cat faces traveled the ceiling above, and everyone wore a grey scarf that resembled their teacher's weapon as well as a pair of yellow goggles, complimemts of Yaomomo’s quirk. Midoriya's camera documented the entire thing, eager to put together a scrapbook at the end of the school year.
The first thing that happened when Aizawa walked in was stop in his tracks to observe the sea of grey scarves and yellow goggles. He sighed and rolled his eyes. He wasn't that surprised. The second thing that happened was his observation of the plastic cat faces all over his barren walls. He pretended to ignore them but inside, he actually liked them. They could stay up. When he saw the drawings on the board, he cringed. Finally, he set his sights upon the cake and sighed again.
"I told you," he said as he walked to his desk, " I am not going to eat anything you-"
His dry eyes finally landed on the basket. He leaned in closer and squinted, hoping he wasn't seeing what he thought he saw. There, in the large yellow basket, was a collection of cute cat shaped soaps, a bottle of shampoo for thick hair, conditioner, men's deodorant, a heavy-duty razor and shaving cream, a bottle of charcoal face wash, a very popular moisturizer, a pack of three toothbrushes and a mint toothpaste, mouthwash, nose pore strips, and cologne. There was even a licorice scented sugar scrub, a concealer, and a few packets of all skin types sheet masks with cat faces in the basket. The only good thing he saw was two bottles of his preferred eye drops. He stared at it all but said nothing.
"Happy birthday!" The class chorused, hoping he loved it.
Aizawa nearly dropped into his chair in disbelief. "Who...who did this?" He asked. He sounded...not happy.
"We all did!" Mina exclaimed, clapping her hands. "We wanted to get you a really nice and helpful-"
"Inconsiderate, hurtful gift," he finished for her. The entire room fell silent.
Aizawa stared at the gift, then asked in a heartbreakingly soft voice, "Why would you give this to me? Do you have any idea how much it hurts to have to see my own class give me a basket of hygiene products? Like I'm some sort of disgusting animal?"
Ochako tried to diffuse the situation and stood up to offer the logic behind it.
"Sensei, no, that's not-"
"I can't believe this. I have never been so disrespected in...in my life. What if I just walked in and handed each of you a stick of deodorant? How would you feel?"
When he received no answer, he said loudly, "How would you FEEL."
"Not good," came the response.
"Yeah," he snapped. "How do you think this is making me feel right now?"
"Not...good?"
"I'll tell you how I feel when I see this. I feel like you think I'm messy. Sloppy. Lazy. Filthy. Disgusting. Unkempt. Incompetent. Smelly. Ugly."
Every word said became sharper and sharper until his voice cracked. He couldn't cry, but it certainly sounded like he would.
Yaomomo quietly stood up and said, her own voice cracking, "Sensei, the basket was my idea. I didn't realize it would hurt your feelings. I apologize on behalf of class 1A."
"We all apologize," Tenya said, jumping to his feet and bowing low. "We are all to blame. You asked us to do nothing, and we refused to listen. My brother told me your birthday was coming up, and I put this whole thing in motion. I’m sorry.”
"Why was this the first thing that popped in your heads?" Aizawa asked.
Tsuyu stood up and answered, "I'm sorry, Sensei. We thought that because you always look tired, that you had no time to do your hygiene routine at home. We wanted you to have a a home-away-from-home basket to keep in your locker for days you don't have time."
"No one does that," he replied dryly.
"We do," half the girls answered.
"Yeah," said Mina, "I mean, I have moisturizer, makeup and tampons in my locker."
"I have deodorant in mine," said Kirishima. "I stink, Sensei."
"Yeah," added Ojiro, "I keep a comb and detangle spray in my locker."
"Even Bakugou has deodorant spray in his locker," Kirishima added, ignoring the rage of his friend.
Aizawa blinked and rubbed his dry, angry eyes. "So...then this isn't meant to be a way of telling me to stop looking like trash?"
"No! It was meant to help you on your off days," Mina said. "We're all people. We stink and need to fix our hair once in a while. This is not commentary, I promise."
Aizawa sighed. The gift still made him hurt, but he said, "Thank you for the explanation. I should have asked first. But for the future, please refrain from giving me gifts."
"Sensei, nothing is going to stop us from making you a cake," Sato said. "And yes, you are going to eat it."
He tried to find an excuse to avoid the cake. "...I have diabetes."
"You don't, I saw you eat a pudding cup last week."
"It was sugar free."
"You bought it in the cafeteria. There aren't any sugar free pudding cups there, Sensei. Why don't you want to eat my cake?"
"Because I prefer to avoid being caught up in the affairs of my students. I don't want you thinking I'm going to give you better treatment because you fed me."
"Sensei, I like to bake. I'm literally a sugar wizard. You're eating it."
The teacher sighed. "Okay, fine. You caught me. What kind of cake is it?"
"Well," said Ochako, "you didn't tell us if you liked chocolate or vanilla, so we brainstormed and realized, hey! He's always tired. Let's make a coffee flavored cake!"
He hoped they didn't hear him mumble, "Shit. I love coffee cake." And of course they heard him. He knew they heard him because almost immediately, Kaminari and Mineta sprang to their feet to hand out well hidden forks, cups, and cat-faced paper plates to everyone, including their teacher. He was given a piece of the cake with a candle, and he waited.
He let them do what they felt they needed to do, and waited somewhat patiently as they gathered around him, turned off the lights and sang both the English happy birthday song they had learned, and the traditional tanjoobi song they all knew and loved as children.
He blew out the candle and made a wish, though of course he didn't believe in anything as absurd as simple thoughts becoming true. While they ate their coffee cake, which he had to admit was absolutely amazing, he found himself glancing at the basket. He pulled out the unfamiliar items and asked, "what the hell is concealer for?"
"That's for the dark circles under your eyes, Sensei," Mina answered. She jumped out of her seat and showed him how to use it using his hand as a palette. She explained the other items he had taken out to examine, and said she expected him to begin using what he needed immediately. "Oh jeez. You're even more pale than I thought. I'll return this and get a better shade."
"That sounded like a not nice compliment."
"Sensei," Mina said with a smile, "listen. Skin color changes person to person. You and I are literally so opposite of the spectrum that I couldn't even begin to guess where you fit. Do you ever tan?"
"No." His answer was flat and any normal person would have known to stop talking to him. But Mina was not any normal person. She took his hand and looked it over, then said,
"Hey, Momo! Come here." Class 1-A's top female student walked over still wearing her scarf and goggles over her head. Her hands were occupied with a plate of half consumed coffee cake. "Momo, can you just make the right shade for him? I doubt he'll let us take him to the makeup store."
"Mmm, sure," Momo answered. She set down her cake and looked at his hand. "Wait. For his eyes, right? Sensei, look at me for a minute. Move your hair out of your face, too."
Aizawa leaned back cautiously. "Wait, stop. What are you doing? I'm not-"
"Sensei," Tsuyu suddenly joined in, "may I say something?"
"Um. Yes, go ahead." He definitely did not look like he wanted her to say anything but he knew damn well that Tsuyu would say what she wanted to say, and there was no fighting it.
"You look very unhealthy. Not to just us, but to everyone. When my parents met you and All Might, they waited until you had both left to ask me if you were ill or sick. They thought you might have had an incurable disease. My siblings were afraid of you because they didn't want to get sick."
The teacher furrowed his eyebrows. But before he could comment, another student joined in.
"Honestly," said Toru as she appeared suddenly, or maybe she had been there the whole time, "my parents asked the same thing. You're very pale and ill looking. And we understand you may not care, but we do worry."
"What if you are sick, and you never told us?" Mina offered. "And then one day you don't come to class and we find out we have to attend our teacher's funeral because he-"
"Stop!" Aizawa put his hands up. "Stop, stop. I'm not sick. I'm just...I'm busy, okay? I work full time and fight crime at night. That’s all.”
“Then take a fucking break,” Bakugou said. “I don’t care how you look but clearly everyone else here does. Just accept that some of these idiots care about you. Take a day off and get a haircut.”
Caught off guard by the comment, Aizawa sighed. “Fine. I will. I will...take a day off and try to work on my image. By only a little.”
“Not for us, Sensei,” Tsuyu said. “For you.”
“Fair enough. Now, let’s finish this cake, and start our lesson today. And Iida, next time your brother tells you something like this, you ignore him. Got it?”
“Yes, Sensei.”
“Good.”
He was already brewing plans on how to punish Tensei himself. But despite his annoyance at the situation, Aizawa couldn’t help but grin a tiny bit and feel grateful that his students cared enough to go through this trouble.
It was the best birthday he’d had in years.
End.