Chapter Text
When he heard the slide of a key card in his apartment lock, he thought of only two things: a possible security breach, and going back to sleep.
He gripped the knife under his pillow and feigned deep slumber. A security breach in the heart of UA was unlikely, but less strange things had happened. If it came to it, he had his knife and his capture weapon handy.
His anxieties were relieved when the door slammed open and a familiar, obnoxious voice pierced the perfectly quiet room.
"Gooooood morning, listeners!"
Shouta groaned and tossed the knife aside so he could pull his pillow over his ears. It wouldn't drown Hizashi out, but maybe if he was lucky he would smother himself to death.
"Wake up, sleeping beauty," the cockatiel man crowed.
His boots made heavy stomps through the living quarters. He poked the Eraserhead-shaped lump on the futon with his toe.
"Shouta, I know you can hear me."
"Go away," the lump mumbled.
"Wake up, buddy. We need to talk."
The lump shifted, but only curled up tighter in the blanket.
"I brought coffee," he wheedled.
Shouta pulled the pillow off of his head and rolled over enough to peer at him through his hair. There was indeed a large cardboard cup of coffee dangling out of reach. He frowned at it.
"What's the catch?"
Hizashi's grin was just shy of deranged. "The catch? You get up and have a serious conversation with me."
"Involving…?"
"I'm declining to say."
Something terrible, then. It was Saturday. He wanted the sleep more than the coffee. He rolled over again.
"If you don't get up, I'll start singing," Hizashi added.
"You start singing, I'm jumping out the window," he mumbled ominously.
Well-used to this, Hizashi just laughed at him. "Then you get to die listening to my stirring remix of 'Party in the U.S.A.!"
Shouta growled and threw his blanket at his head, sitting up in the same movement. He snatched the coffee while he was at it. He took a scalding sip and glared at the cockatiel man who continued to laugh as he bundled the blanket up.
"Nice kitty cat boxers," he said. "You steal them from a little girl?"
"Fuck off," he grumbled.
He scratched his belly idly and got out of bed. According to the clock, it was nearly eleven, which was still too damn early on a weekend. He ignored Hizashi's inane chatter while he dragged yesterday's clothes on and pulled the worst of the snarls out of his hair with his fingers.
"What did you need to talk about?"
Hizashi trailed off mid-story and gave him a strange look.
"Well, actually, Nemuri wants to talk, too. She's waiting in the kitchen." He adjusted his glasses and gave him an exaggerated thumb's up. "Let's go!"
It didn't look like he was going to get a nap anytime soon. He gave his bed one longing look and shoved his socked feet into his boots. He looped his capture weapon around his neck haphazardly and let his friend drag him out of the teacher's dorm and down the hall.
"This better not be a prank," he warned. "I could be sleeping right now."
Hizashi grinned widely and gestured him into the elevator.
"Why would you doubt my intentions so? Shouta, I'm wounded."
"You're an idiot."
"My heart! Broken!"
"Tragic."
"Cold-hearted man," he teased. "You'll never find a nice spouse at this rate. You'll die all alone in your sleeping bag in your smelly socks."
"You're a bachelor, too, remember?" Still, the jab hit him unusually hard. He frowned to himself and rubbed his neck. He'd been feeling odd since New Year's. A virus would have gone away by now. Maybe he had an ulcer. Something was wrong, for sure.
"That's a choice," Hizashi snapped back with his usual loose, casual grin. Truly, the man wasn't bent towards monogamy. Any jibes about his marriage prospects rolled right off his polyamorous back.
"You, my friend," he continued as the elevator let them out on the first floor. "Are just sad."
"Keep your opinions to yourself."
He chugged some more too-hot coffee and hoped that was the end of it. He cared deeply for Hizashi, but sometimes his prying into personal matters was too much. Then again, he was walking knowingly into a Nemuri ambush, so his personal life was probably about to get dragged screaming into the light.
"Shouta," Nemuri sing-songed at their entrance into the shared teacher kitchen. "I made brunch!"
Her brunch seemed to be some passable eggs in the basket and mimosas. It wasn't something he would normally eat, but he took the offered plate for politeness' sake.
The click of a handcuff around his wrist was a surprise.
He narrowed his eyes and followed the chain to Nemuri's own wrist. She gave him an exaggerated look of innocence.
"It's not my birthday," he said aloud.
"Sorry, sweetheart," Nemuri replied. "This is business, not pleasure."
Shame. Nemuri and handcuffs wasn't usually a bad combination. He set the plate down and tugged at the cuff experimentally. It was the good kind - reinforced and very difficult to pick. He rolled his eyes.
"Let's get this over with, then. I want to go back to sleep."
"Alright," Hizashi crowed. "Stage one of the Aizawa intervention is a success! Commence stage two!"
"I'm not an addict. I don't need an intervention."
"Sorry, sweetheart, but you kind of do," Nemuri purred. She seated herself in the chair beside him and put a hand on his thigh. "'Zashi and I are worried about you."
He could feel his eyebrows twitching in annoyance. He took the offered mimosa and gulped it down. Maybe the alcohol would ease his irritation.
"You've been off since the break," Hizashi added. "We've got a theory, but…"
"I think I've just been sick," he said shortly. "I'll go see Recovery Girl if it makes you feel better."
Nemuri's grin was cat-like. "Sick, huh? Well, before you do that, can you tell me something?"
"What?"
"How long have you known Emi Fukukado? You two seem close."
"Why ask about her all of a sudden?" The combined smiles of his two friends were making him sweat. "I've known her for ten years, more or less. She's a colleague."
"What do you think about her?" Nemuri squeezed his thigh. "I think she's quite charming."
"Charming?" Shouta snorted. "I don't know about that. She's annoying and optimistic, but she's a good hero. Her students are strong and respect her, so I gather that she's a good teacher, too. If you're worried that she's a security risk to UA, I'd disregard that. There's not a villainous bone in her body. I trusted her with Eri, didn't I?"
His mind involuntarily flashed back to the sight of her and Eri asleep on Hizashi's couch. They'd looked peaceful - dare he say cute - and he'd felt strange looking at them. Like he wanted that moment to last forever, and like he wanted nothing more than to join them, to wrap both of them in his arms and hold them close. It made his heart hurt strangely.
He shook the thought away.
Hizashi and Nemuri shared a loaded glance. He peered at them both suspiciously.
"It sounds like you really care for her," Hizashi said carefully.
"I trust her with my life," he snapped back. "We've fought our way out of plenty of villain attacks together. What are you insinuating?"
"He's not calling her a traitor," Nemuri soothed. She put both hands on his thigh and looked at him earnestly. "Shouta, we just think you're too pig-headed to realize you might have feelings for her."
His brain stuttered to a halt. They were asking him about… feelings? Were they back in high school? This was alarmingly like when they thought he had a crush on Tensei Iida and nearly humiliated them both right before the sports festival. Finding out that he'd just been studying how to counter his recipro burst with his new capture weapon had been a major letdown for his friends. And now they thought he…
"You handcuffed me at breakfast to ask me if I have feelings?"
"Maybe the wrong tactic, Nemuri," Hizashi said quickly. He held up his hands. "Look, you don't have to answer how you feel, but it's obvious that Fukukado's got feelings for you. Hey, don't scoff, man. She looks at you like you hung the moon."
"You're mistaken," he said dryly. "She's been telling those jokes about dating me since we first met."
"We're not talking about the jokes," Nemuri said. She pulled her hands back to clasp them dramatically, coincidentally dragging his cuffed hand with her. "We're talking about Emi. About the look in her eyes when she talks to you. The passion, the heartbreak, the delectable pain of unrequited affections - it's all there on her face! When she first saw you and Eri at the party, her face was a beautiful agony of longing. She's in love with you!"
He couldn't tell if the prickling in his face was the blood rushing to or from it. He gruffly pulled his hand back and gulped some more mimosa.
"You read too many romance novels."
"I'm not lying! Hizashi and Vlad saw it, too!" She gripped his thigh again. "Just picture it, okay? A young girl, still unsure of her place in the world. She meets a brooding, dark, older man who takes her under his wing. Star-crossed, they keep meeting for years until finally the feelings overflow in exquisite, painful ecstasy!"
"That is not how any of that happened."
"So something did happen! Shouta, did you sleep with her?"
His face was definitely red now. "No, I haven't slept with her. You think I'd have a one-night stand with a colleague?"
Nemuri and Hizashi both gave him a flat look. That was the wrong tactic to take. They were both intimately acquainted with his various purely physical conquests.
"That's never stopped you before," Hizashi said pointedly. "She's a beautiful woman, too. Look, if you have no intentions towards her, maybe I'll make a move on her."
"You won't," he snapped.
Hizashi's grin was downright terrifying now. "Why not? Neither of you have feelings for each other, right?"
He hated both of them so much. They took his silence as a victory and grinned at each other.
"It doesn't matter," he said. "You're both wrong. It's just a stupid joke. Someone like her wouldn't seriously want someone like me."
He reached for Nemuri's drink. She pushed his hand away.
"Why are you being such a coward about this?"
"I'm just being reasonable."
"You're being anything but," Hizashi said. "Gimme your phone. We'll just call her and settle this for good."
"That's not something you ask over the phone," he protested.
"Then go ask in person," Nemuri said. "It's Saturday. You're both free. Just hop the train and go."
"We just want you to be happy," Hizashi said. "You've been moping like a lovestruck schoolboy all month. You're driving us crazy."
"I think it's a waste of time."
"Is it?" Nemuri cupped his cheek and pulled his face around to meet her eyes. "We'll drop it right now if you can look me in the eyes and tell me that you don't feel something for her."
He opened his mouth. The words died in his throat. He looked away.
"Thought so," she said softly. "Look, maybe we're overreaching here, but it's obvious something is there. It's a shame for you two to avoid possibly being happy together. We just want you to have a future, maybe, after your pro career is over."
That was a sobering thought. He tried to avoid thinking about it - the future he had as a poorly-paid pro going into his thirties, then forties, then who knows. He'd never made the time to think about it seriously.
He thought about Eri, who he already cared so much about. The feeling of Joke's strong arm hugging them both right. A tenuous little future, that maybe a shabby man like him really could have it all.
If wishes were horses…
"Fine," he said aloud. "I'll go. Just to shut you up."
The dawning delight on their faces made him regret it instantly.
"Uncuff him," Hizashi said. "We've got to get him into the shower right now."
"I'm on wardrobe!"
So much regret, he reflected as they whisked him away to the showers. He fought off the perfumed shampoos and body scrubs to shower his own self, thank you. He shaved carefully as they bickered about which of Hizashi's sweaters to stuff him into.
"I'm not your firstborn daughter about to be given away," he grumbled.
"We just want to maximize your success!"
Nemuri took a comb to his hair, carefully smoothing out the tangles. She remembered without prompting his little PTSD problem with his hair and gave him the comb to untangle the back himself. He probably didn't deserve these friends. Then again, he thought as he talked Hizashi out of loaning him sexy underwear, these two were probably exactly what he deserved.
"I feel like a proud mom," Nemuri said, surveying their handiwork.
Hizashi wrapped his arm around her and wiped away an imaginary tear. "I'm so proud of him, dear."
Shouta rolled his eyes, but he had to agree that they'd cleaned him up alright. He still looked tired and scarred, but his hair was neat and his clothes weren't several days worn. He wasn't pretty, but he'd pass as a human being, he supposed.
"Thanks for your help," he said gruffly.
He picked up the briefcase containing his capture weapon and goggles. He turned to Nemuri.
"You'll take care of Eri if I don't get back until late?"
She gave him a saucy wink in return. "Honey, you better stay the night." Still, she patted his shoulder. "But really, don't worry about it. We'll take care of her."
He nodded goodbye to both of them and made his way out of the teacher's dorm and across the campus. It was so quiet without all the students making their ruckus. He tugged his scarf closer and hustled off to the train station.
He tried not to reflect too much until he was in the train car, 30 minutes away from his home station. No turning back now. He gripped his phone in one sweaty hand.
He was really doing this, huh?