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The unintelligible syllables of the Be More Chill soundtrack came in through Denki's earbuds before they tangled and turned to static between his ears as he stared unfocused at his dorm room ceiling. Not to say he disliked the music; right as always, Ashido knew the style would be very up his alley. He'd meant to look up a plot synopsis and hunt around for translations, but... that hadn't ended up happening.
Wait... fuck, I forgot my meds again.
Back when he lived with his parents, they made sure he remembered to take them every day. It used to be part of his routine, and when he didn't catch it, two other people did. But now, he always went downstairs to shower and brush his teeth and stuff with the rest of the class, so he kept forgetting to open up the handy dandy plastic pill casing thingy in his... on his... great, he couldn't even remember where the damn things were now.
Really, if he hammered it in as a new routine earlier on, he wouldn't be having this problem, but noooo, because one day off his meds and he feels kinda stupid but it's fine, he can always take them tomorrow and then that keeps happening until he can only remember to take them once every week and a half except when he manages to have a good five days of taking it consistently and then two to three weeks without them and.... ugh.
The problem compounded on itself and Denki really just wished someone else would remind him to take his meds like a normal person. There's another thing; pretending to function like a normal person became infinitely shittier and more taxing without them. It just generally cramped his style and wait, when did the song change?
Denki pulled in a deep breath and let it out in a ginormous sighing groan. The music built before breaking off for a pocket of dialogue. The exchange sounded vaguely menacing, but Denki couldn't be sure what the characters were actually saying. At least not until:
"It's from Japan..."
Denki sat up like the bed at his back turned to lava. He started listening closer, and managed to catch bits and pieces. Techno sounds wound up his spine and took his breath for a moment. The music went quiet, and he leaned forward as the characters spoke. Then:
"iT'S FROM JAPAAAAAAN!!"
Denki absolutely lost his shit.
"Kaminari!" Iida's insistent knocking shot the moment and Denki's mood, sending both spiraling downward near instantly. "You must learn to keep your noise levels down!"
Denki knew consciously he probably shouldn't do what the acute surge in anger and disappointment suggested he do and yell Iida off his doorstep. He knew it consciously.
"It's not even lights out!" He snapped before he could wrangle his tongue in check and manage a more controlled, "Chill."
"Yes, but courtesy doesn't start at lights out."
Denki knew Iida was right. That didn't stop the sharp prickling of annoyance and upset bristling along his skin.
"Well I'm not even doing anything anymore, so you might as well leave me alone already!"
Iida sighed. "Kaminari, this is serious."
Tenya hopped backward as Kaminari threw the door open. His hair began fluffing out with static electricity, and he looked very unhappy.
"Everything is serious with you." Kaminari spat. "I get that you like to micromanage other people enjoying shit, but maybe you could cool your fucking engines."
"Kaminari, there's no need for that kind of language."
Denki looked away and took a deep breath. Engaging only got him more worked up, but he couldn't get Iida to leave.
"Yeah, well, there's no need for you to treat everything like a federal fucking-- like this huge, serious thing."
"But it is a serious thing. If you don't learn to keep yourself in check-"
"Shut up!" Denki's voice cracked, and his face felt hot. "Don't... Don't say that. Just leave me alone."
He retreated into his room and shut the door.
-+-
Shouto materialized an ice stool to reach the cereal bars he stashed in the space between the cabinets and the ceiling while Bakugo fixed breakfast. He melt/evaporated the stool as he unwrapped two of the bars at once and took a bite of both at once.
"Anyone ever tell you you eat like trailer trash?" Bakugo side eyed him from the stove where he flipped some fried rice. Shouto decided not to nitpick the semantics of trailer trash and what it means to eat like such.
"I have a right to eat like trailer trash and will do so for as long as I am able."
Bakugo rolled his eyes and Shouto exited the kitchen, plunking himself down on one of the armchairs in the common room.
As Katsuki spooned all the fried rice onto a large plate like he usually did, he heard footsteps scuttling towards the mess hall at a speed unusually high for 6:30 AM on a Saturday. He glanced up and saw one of the last people he expected to see this early.
"BakugoBakugoBakugo!!" Kaminari dashed over to the other side of the counter, grabbing on to slow his momentum.
"Yeah?"
"They mentioned Pinkberry in Be More Chill." Kamirari bounced with mildly crazed energy and excitement.
"Uh..." Katsuki blinked, silently resuming transferring the rice without looking down to the plate and wondering where the hell Kaminari learned such a strange English phrase.
"Y'know like... um..." Katsuki could see Kaminari slowly and gently deflating. "How at the airport and..."
God, why was Kaminari so... Like that! Always jumping from excited to despondent to angry to this that or the other thing for exactly 0 reasons all the damn time; what was his deal? Still, Katsuki knew at this point there was no fixing it and it probably didn't mean much, so he just moved on.
"What does Pinkberry have to do with being colder?"
"No, it's Be More Chill!" Some of the wind returned to Kaminari's sails. "Remember? When we were all in Texas, some of the theater kids gave Ashido that musical list?"
"Mhm." Katsuki put the now empty pan back onto the stove and picked up the plate of rice.
"Yeah, Be More Chill was on it and I listened to it and they just mentioned Pinkberry!"
"Alright." Katsuki started towards one of the tables in the dining hall and Kaminari continued to trail behind him.
"Yeah, and... and..." Kaminari went quiet. Katsuki set down the plate in the center of the table and turned around to return to the kitchen and grab some bowls. A sort of dejected, guarded look stuck to Kaminari's face and Katsuki resisted the urge to let out the aggravated sigh building in his chest. Why did this always happen?
"Help me get the bowls." He said, walking around Kaminari.
"Oh, sure." Distractions, Katsuki noticed early, worked well with Kaminari.
Once they got all the bowls set up, Katsuki got a serving spoon and filled up a bowl for himself and fried up an egg to put on top of it. When he turned around from the stove, Kaminari was gone along with a bowl and a portion of the rice.
Idiot. He's never gonna remember to bring that back downstairs.
-+-
"I'm kinda worried about him, he keeps acting... erratically?" Eijiro looked to Sero from the sidelines as Kaminari sparred with Tsu. Aizawa was out sick today, so the class ended up doing the hero course equivalent of busywork. Until the sub got to the school, Nezu put All Might in charge.
"I mean, I only noticed it kinda recently, but yeah. You think stuff from the school year is kinda weighing on him?"
"Maybe, but... I dunno, I feel like they're two separate things."
"Yeah..."
Tsu hopped backward and winced as Kaminari reached for her and managed to arc across enough electricity to make her hair stand on end. She leapt into the air and Kaminari held up his arms in a block where she came at him. Just a few millimeters away from landing a hit, Tsu... lost traction in the air??? The entire class gaped as she kind of sort of slipped around Kaminari and landed in a disoriented heap on the ground in front of him. Kaminari blinked down at her a moment before smiling a big, toothy smile as she regained her rhythm and swung her leg at his ankles. Kaminari didn't react quite fast enough to avoid losing his balance, and as he fought to keep himself from tumbling -the smile replaced with a frantic 'oh shit' face- Tsu shoved him in the chest, negating his efforts.
In a surprisingly underhanded move, Kaminari ended up grabbing a fistful of Tsu's hair and taking her down with him. None of the class could quite tell if he'd intended to do it, but that didn't matter because when the two of them hit the mat, Kaminari wrapped his legs around Tsu's, flipped them, and pinned Tsu with an arm across her shoulders and a palm sparking with electricity ready to strike. A palpable silence fell over the gym until All Might remembered he was the ref.
"Uhh, Kaminari wins the match!" He announced.
Denki and Tsu shared exchanged looks.
'That happened right?' Denki asked silently.
'That definitely happened.' Tsu confirmed.
A huge grin broke out across Denki's face and he vibrated with excitement and the high of winning.
"Um... would you mind getting off of me?" Tsu croaked.
"Oh! Sorry." He scrambled to his feet and held out his hand to help her up.
"Can I ask what you did when I came at you from above?" She asked, grabbing his hand and hefting herself to her feet.
"I believe all of us would like to know that." All Might walked into the arena.
"Uhh... well it's um... that is..." Denki tripped over himself a little before finally finding traction. "One of the second years said something about how if two things have the same electric charge- well um... actually I don't remember if it was the same charge or different charges, but they repel each-other. But since I don't know how to change what kind of charge things have, I just kinda charged you then charged myself and hoped something would happen. And it worked!"
"So if it hadn't, you would've taken the hit." Tsu said.
"... Yeah. But it worked!"
All Might nodded, but his brow still furrowed.
"I wouldn't encourage you to make such risky gambles in the future, but that was still very good thinking Kaminari."
"Thank you." Denki smiled brighter.
He and Tsu switched out with Todoroki and Aoyama, but before he got to the stands, All Might pulled him aside.
"Kaminari my boy, I've noticed you tend not to diversify the ways in which you apply your quirk."
"Uh... I mean, I technically just did??" Denki wasn't sure where All Might would head with this, but a sinking feeling set into his stomach despite his hope that this wouldn't turn into one of those 'Be more x' talks the adults in his life seemed to think were much easier for him to apply than they actually were.
"Yes, and I applaud your efforts!" All Might reassured him. "But it's come to my attention that you might benefit from some research and finesse training."
There it was.
"Uhh... I'm kind of... not a 'research' person."
"If you'd like help, young Midoriya is quite skilled at it. He could give you pointers."
"Yeah, um..." Denki wanted nothing more than to get out of this talk and promptly forget it ever happened. But he knew no matter what he did right now, the idea and the expectation would still be there until results happened. "I'll have to check with him about that then."
He instantly skittered to the stands without looking back and sat himself down next to Sero.
"Hey you probably already know it," Sero leaned over to him. "But that was super cool. I had no idea you could do that!"
"Neither did I." Denki laughed softly.
Denki couldn't really pull himself out of his own head throughout Todoroki and Aoyama's duel. Or anyone else's for that matter. Sero and Kirishima would commentate and he'd make a noncommittal response if they were addressing him, but other than that he couldn't think about much other than how now All Might and probably the rest of the class and teachers expected him to do something that already felt impossible.
At least he remembered his meds this morning.
-+-
"Hey Kaminari?"
Dappled greys stretched softly over the sky, diffusing the sunlight and punctuating the afternoon's humidity. It would probably rain tomorrow. Denki and Shinsou snuck onto the roof to play cards and were in the middle of a sort of dull game of Bullshit.
"What?" Denki peeked up from his hand.
"I -and some of the rest of the class- have kinda noticed you're acting a little... off?"
"Two queens." Denki set down a seven of spades and a three of hearts.
"Bullshit."
Denki hissed through his teeth and picked up the entire stack between them.
"Three kings." Shinsou said, setting down the cards. "Is something bugging you?"
"Not exactly. Two aces."
"Two of diamonds. What exactly is it then?"
"... Four threes."
A pause settled in just long enough to form tangibility for itself before Shinsou finally took his turn.
"Two fours."
"Bullshit."
Shinsou clicked his tongue, adding the cards on the roof to his hand. Denki hunted through his hand, sure he had a five somewhere.
"Five of hearts."
"Six of hearts."
"Seven of diamonds."
"Four eights."
"Bullshit?"
Shinsou flipped all four cards over to reveal all four of the eights from the deck.
"Damn it." He swiped up the cards.
"I know something's going on with you, Kaminari. You're not that hard to read."
Denki huffed through his nose. He knew that already.
"Two nines."
"Three tens."
"Four jacks."
"That's total bullshit and you know it."
Denki frustratedly flipped the cards over to reveal a six of spades mixed in with the three jacks before gathering all the cards into his hand.
"Why does everyone wanna know what my deal is so badly anyway? Isn't mystery alluring or something?"
"Queen of spades. Yeah, it might be, but you're not a mystery. You're Kaminari."
"Two kings."
Shinsou waited a moment to see if Denki would divulge more information before setting down his card.
"Ace of diamonds."
"Two two's."
"Four threes."
"Four of diamonds."
"You're sure you can deal with this on your own?"
"I don't want any help."
"I didn't ask that."
Denki let out a long sigh and tossed his cards onto the pile. "I fold."
"I think that constitutes as cheating." Shinsou smirked.
"What? You're jealous you didn't think of it first?"
"Maybe a little." Shinsou reassembled the deck and handed it to Denki to shuffle, which he did gladly. "So what's got you all helter skelter lately?"
The cards made those sounds that cards being shuffled make. Y'know the ones.
"... I've always been like this. You just never noticed."
"Was us never noticing on purpose?"
"Yeah." Denki tapped the edge of the deck against the roof to align all the cards. "Go fish?"
"Sure."
Denki shuffled the cards once more for good measure, then dealt them out and put the remaining cards on the roof between them.
"Should we notice now?" Shinsou asked, arranging a pair of twos in front of him. Denki saw no matches in his hand.
"I didn't really want you to."
"Well we have. Who goes first?"
"Huh? Oh, uh... I dunno, rock paper scissors for it?"
"Sure."
Their first round ended in a tie, but the second time Denki chose scissors and Shinsou chose paper.
"Got any ones?"
Shinsou handed him an ace of hearts.
"Got any three's, and can I ask why the secrecy?"
"Go fish, and..." Denki sighed. "If everyone knows, they'll think I'm lame."
"I'm pretty sure some of our classmates already think you're just a little lame. But like, in an endearing way."
"But I don't wanna be lame at all!"
"All of us are lame somehow Kami."
"... Got any kings?"
"Go fish."
"Okay, well how are you lame then?"
"I'm a hopeless Romantic who gets tangled up in his own support gear." Shinsou said with zero hesitation. "Got any fives?"
"Go fish... Also what?"
"You heard me." Shinsou glanced up at him pointedly.
"You do not strike me as a romantic."
Shinsou chuckled. "Yeah, it's gotten me into plenty of situations that showed off my complete lameness. Also, you can't tell anyone. I have told exactly one other person who isn't you about this."
"Woah, really? Who?"
"Can't tell you."
"What? Why not?"
"It's your turn." Shinsou reminded him.
"Oh, um... Got any..... nines?"
"Tch," Shinsou handed his nine over, and Denki happily paired it with his own. "So tell me, what could your personal secret to lameness be? Also fork over that king."
"Wha-" Denki puffed out one of his cheeks and relinquished the king of spades. "Totally unfair, these are completely different levels of lame."
"Well how would I know that unless you tell me?"
"Well like- and-"
"Got any jacks?"
"Go fish."
"You don't have to tell me. But everyone's been noticing you acting kind of... erratic."
"And impulsive? And forgetful? And hyper?"
"Well yeah, but you're all of those things already."
"Got any tens?"
"Go fish."
Denki pulled the ten of diamonds out of the well and set it down with its partner next to his other match.
"We know you're kind of... Like That, but you've been... kind of a wild sliding indicator the past while? And we're all just trying to piece together why you're acting the way you're acting."
"Maybe I don't want you guys to piece it together."
"I inferred as much. Got any twelves?"
"That's not even a card." Denki chuffed.
"I like keeping people on their toes."
"Well I don't have any, so you'll have to go fish."
"Of course." Shinsou pulled a card. "But for the record, lameness is a meaningless metric and normal is a myth."
Denki rolled his eyes. "Yeah, and the reason Midoriya is the most popular kid in class is because everyone convened and decided to pull names out of a hat."
"I wouldn't say he's the most popular."
"Wow, said by his own boyfriend. Got any aces?"
"Go fish. And Midoriya wouldn't believe you if you told him that. If we're quantifying popularity, I think Asui has the most of it."
"... Damn, you're right."
"Got any queens?"
"How dare you?" Denki faked scandalization as he handed over the monarch.
"I simply dare."
The game went on like that, and Shinsou didn't prod Denki any further. Not until they finished the game at least.
"You think we should go in before everyone starts wondering where we are?" Shinsou asked, gathering up the cards.
"Yeah, probably." Denki's fingers tapped against the roof unbidden, itching for something to do; like say, shuffle cards that were right there.
"... Before we go down, I feel like I should ask you one more time: What's all of the... inconsistency around you about?"
Denki took a deep breath and repositioned himself to stretch his legs out in front of him, leaning back on his hands and staring up at the sky. "You really wanna know that bad, huh?"
"If it helps, I promise I won't tell anyone. I won't even hint that I know."
"... You promise?"
"On the river styx."
"The what?" Denki swiveled his head back around to fix Shinsou with a bewildered expression.
"It's this thing in greek mythology. Trust me when I say you don't break an oath sworn on the river styx."
Denki raised an eyebrow, shrugged, and returned his gaze to the mottled fluffy canvas of whitish grey above them.
"I trust you." A snippet of silence slipped by. Denki pulled a silent breath through his nose. "The kids at my middle school knew. But... nobody here does. Except... you soon I guess. I'm still avoiding it I guess 'cause I'm just like that, but you probably knew that already and oh look, I'm getting off track."
Denki let out an irked breath and flopped down onto the roof.
"I... At the end of elementary..." Denki's stomach seized and squinched up like he was about to fall from an unfortunately treacherous ledge. "I got diagnosed with ADHD. And lately, I've been forgetting to take my meds because my parents used to remind me, but they aren't here. So I've been having a harder time managing it."
Denki's words hung in the sticky air like something dubious spinning at its apex, ready to succumb to gravity and create a loud ugly mess. Shinsou caught it softly.
"I'd say you do an excellent job despite the difficulty curve."
Denki looked up at Shinsou. Seeing his soft, candid smile, Denki couldn't help the way a smile tugged at the side of his own mouth.
"Thanks. I... I really appreciate it."
"No problem. And... If it helps, I can remind you to take your meds. Although I gotta say, I never even knew people with ADHD needed them?"
"I mean, I don't need them?" Denki sat up. "Like, I'll live. They just make my life soooo much easier."
"Oh. Yeah, I see that."
"So, are we getting off this roof and out of this humidity or what?"
"Oh, absolutely." Shinsou straightened out the stack of cards and slipped them back into their beat up cardboard box. The two of them dropped down onto Shinsou's balcony and unhitched the rope they affixed to the overhang over the balcony in order to get to the roof in the first place.
"Ahh~ Air conditioning!"
"Next time, we should consider the weather more."
"See, I know in my brain that that is a good idea. However my heart insists on spontaneity."
"Don't you go talking about matters of the heart to me, we will be here all day."
Denki shrugged. "Time is relative."
Shinsou smiled and rolled his eyes, making his way to the door.
"C'mon, let's head downstairs."
"What's happening downstairs?"
"No clue, but it's the first Thursday of the month, so Bakugo will be down there making dinner."
"I sense mischief."
"You sense right."
"I love you."
"I love you too, now c'mon, every second counts where pranks and fuckery is involved."
Denki grinned and followed after Shinsou, knowing full well Bakugo would probably withhold their dinner from them once he figured out what they were doing and tell them to make their own. Still, that wasn't happening now. Now they schemed and consequences didn't exist.
"Oh, by the way, did you take your meds today?" Shinsou asked halfway down the stairs.
"I... did not."
"Are you allowed to take them now."
"I mean... technically I am, but... I'm not sure where that sentence was going."
"Well go take them ten."
"Right yes. I'll do that." Denki started towards his room, but stopped not two steps into it. "And then mischief?"
"Absolutely."
Denki smiled and scumbled off to his room.