Work Text:
It started so innocently. Okinao Uraraka as a 4-year-old child in the lounge. He stares at the TV; Disney Channel, not Disney Junior. He loves Hannah Montana, it's his favourite show to binge after school. This channel is on every day from 4 until he falls asleep in front of it, the glow of the screen reverberating off his face. The protagonists are always his favourites, most tied in with token boy characters. He turns, seeing his father sitting on the couch behind him. Fake leather it is, a smell that invades his nostrils with an artillery assault. "I wanna be like her!" he points to the screen. Awaiting a response, none follows but a crackling sip of beer.
Okinao turns back to the TV, the frayed beginnings of fatigue settling through his body. His mind still buzzes with nervous energy but his body betrays that. He slumps onto his side, the carpet tickling his face. His eyes close, shapes and colours dance behind his eyelids. His working theory is that this is an alternate dimension, another world to explore and experience. Purples blues, his favourites.
~~~
The 8-year-old frowns deeply. Sex change? He knows what sex is, kind of. From his cousins and his father who hasn't yet learned how to work his TV controls. And who has a lewd poster of a well-known actress right there on the living room wall. "What's a sex change?" he asks the classmate who mentioned it, too much enthusiasm in his voice to feel casual.
The girl is more mature than he. This is a class for the intelligent, the creative and the capable. But Okinao is kept in a household sheltered from the world and most general knowledge. He has an abundance of knowledge in very specialised subjects. Just not in the broad world of socialisation and current developments.
The girl explains very briefly and with ignorant misinterpretation but a lightbulb goes off in his head. The fragments of his personality start to piece together. All his drawings, he always imagined himself as a cute woman with long hair in a pastel pink evening dress plated at the hips. Standing in a skirt surrounded by living friends as a teenager in total pastel punk aesthetic. A mother. An awesome pro hero in a costume fitted to a female body.
I guess I can have a sex change when my parents die, he thinks. A morbid place to go, a thought he knows is inappropriate. But he doesn't think either parent would be supportive of such a thing, but its all he can imagine his future as.
He tries to picture himself as a man, gives up such a task. It's impossible.
~~~
"I'm a girl,"
The car screeches to a stop. His mother grips the steering wheel so hard her knuckles turn white before twitching as she rolls the car to the side of the road. Once again, it stops. This time with a deafening silence. "Why do you think that?"
The 11-year-old feels like crying. Tears well in his eyes, always so emotional. "I-I just am! I'm a girl! I don't feel like a boy, I don't want to be a boy!"
"You know I'll always support you but-"
But.
Confused and left stumbling without understanding or affirmation. Okinao wonders what 'support' his mother was talking about. So far nothing. She simply allows him to dress like himself. Herself. A girl. And that becomes her moral high ground and defence of 'support' if anything is criticised.
It doesn't matter if she deadnames her daughter. Constantly uses the wrong pronouns. All without effort or attempt to change. Perhaps she simply doesn't see her as that way. As a girl, her daughter. Whenever she asks about it, her mother gives a half-assed answer she assumes is supportive. Is in fact crushing. Transphobic.
"I'll do that when you're actually a girl. You're not a girl yet,"
~~~
"I need to speak to you," a firm voice broken by tears. Ochako, her new name, raises her eyebrow at her mother.
"What about?"
"I was cleaning your room and...." she stiffens. "The smell led me right to it,"
The wrong time to admit being suicidal but perhaps also the perfect time. The woman cries. The girl stammers out her explanation of the lighter in her room. Saying she smokes weed is a lot easier on her parents than the truth. That she burns off her flesh with lighters each night. Once everything has calmed down and here's been too much hugging and crying for her taste, her mother asks.
"And what about the laxatives?"
This one she cannot admit to. The eating disorder? Too much, too harsh a burden to place upon her parents. And so Ochako lies once again. An innocent explanation is given and the tears and hugs becoming ones of relief over fearing the worst.
"I'm so depressed, I want to be a girl. I am a girl - why don't you believe me?!" her teeth grit in frustration. And finally, after too long and too arduous a journey of dysphoria and denial, Ochako's mother acquiesces to get her assessed by a psychologist. Not a gender therapist, but it's a start.
~~~
She starts at UA High as a girl.
The psychologist was surprisingly refreshing, focusing on the element of gender rather than anything else. While she hasn't started HRT yet or even blockers, Ochako feels like she passes well. At least, she does in a scarf and coat. Cheeks pink against the crisp breeze of spring.
"Hey, Ako!" her parents grin over-enthusiastically when she returns after the entrance exam.
It's not 'Ochako', but it's something. They don't call her 'Ochako' - ever. They call her by the correct pronouns and never use her deadname. They call her a shortened nickname that's easy to swallow. But they never call her Ochako.
"How was your day sweetie?"
"Good, mum," she smiles, blushing slightly when she remembers the cute boy with the green hair who saved her. And she giggles when she remembers him falling, his nervous laugh, his adorable smile. She just hopes he's in the same class as her! And no matter what, she'll fight for his position at the school no mater how many points he got. He saved her and is deserving of a place in a hero academy.
As soon as she secures her place in 1A, she sets up a meeting with the school principal and her homeroom teacher - a Mr Aizawa if the timetable reads correctly. She would have invited her parents for support - if she felt they could provide it. But instead, she faces them herself, at one end of the long table facing them, as if on opposite sides of a battlefield.
It goes surprisingly well.
She's decided to be entirely stealth, to everyone. She may use the girls' changing rooms though is self-conscious about her body anyway, deciding instead to use the disabled facilities. The school isn't intending to include dormitories so that isn't an issue for now. Officially, she is female and her name is Ochako - that's all the faculty needs to know.
"If you have any problems, please address them with your homeroom teacher," the principal gestures to Aizawa, who looks like he'd rather be anywhere else. He squirms with discomfort at the subject - he has been for this entire meeting.
"Additionally, we'll be applying to the school's gender psychologist on your behalf," Mr Aizawa states quickly, seeming more interested in finishing this meeting that enthusiastic in the discussion. That should concern her, but for some reason it doesn't. Almost as if this would all have been put in place regardless of the meeting, and this entire thing was redundant.
"Wait, gender psychologist?" she asks nervously. "Why does the school have a gender psychologist?"
"They're more of a school psychologist who specialises in elements of diversity," her homeroom teacher answers hastily, voice raising in volume.
"Oh, okay," Ochako accepts it without question, much to the relief of said bored teacher.
Before she leaves, she spins around, eyes full of worry. "Um, about the entrance exam?"
"Yeah?" asks Midnight, another teacher who regards the interaction with casual dismissal.
"About the boy who saved me, Izuku... I know he didn't get any point but- he deserves to be here! He made sure I was okay, even if I have to give up my spot for him..."
Quickly, Aizawa raises a hand to cut her off. "Don't worry, we've already decided on Izuku Midoriya. And the outcome is favourable," Perhaps the faintest hint of a smile follows, but she doesn't dare to hope.
"Th-Thank you!"
The heavy steel door closes behind her, and with the belief that she's out of earshot she squeals with excitement ready to cry in her overwhelmed happiness. Yet it isn't the feeling she expected. Because there was no confrontation, there is no relief. Only a simmering feeling of unfulfilling. Still, her heart warms when she thinks of Izuku.
~~~
Izuku and her are in the same class! And both passed the first trial of expulsion set up by Aizawa, securing a stable place in their class. She actually agrees with her homeroom teacher that the entrance exam isn't a good way to judge the potential of prospective heroes. Izuku is proof of that.
They sit in the cafeteria along with Iida the class rep and Tokoyami. Discussing arbitrary things over plates of rice cooked perfectly. Ochako wishes she could cook.
"Hey, can you call me Deku instead?" Izuku asks everyone with a trusting smile. "It's a nickname I've been using since I was a kid - I don't know why, but I just feel more comfortable with it - like calling me it means we're closer," he shrugs it off, like no big deal. But she's sure it is.
"Yeah, course I can!" With a giggle, Ochako reaches over for a friendly side hug. That's all it is, but not all it'll ever be.
"So Uraraka, you think you'll be a rescue hero?" Iida asks, always circling back to his comfort zone of hero talk.
"I think so," she agrees. "It's where I can make the most difference!"
"Yeah! Uraraka's zero-gravity quirk is great for rescue work - lifting debris, removing people away from danger," explains Izuku, clutching his journal of observations about everyone's quirks. Uraraka fills him with butterflies. Not just because her quirk is amazing, or because she's kind, and pretty, and has such strong convictions. Something about her feels familiar. Something he can empathise with, though he doesn't know what.
"You should ask Thirteen for extra lessons!" Iida suggests.
"Huh..." she thinks. "That is a good idea!"
"Hey, Ochako?"
She's still getting used to the name her parents never call her, a second of hesitation before she responds.
"Oh, hey Tsu. Yeah?"
"A bunch of us were going down to pier later on. You can bring the guys if you want!" She points behind her, in the general direction of her table. So Todoroki, Yaoyorozu and Mina are going too. Uraraka squirms is her seat, uncomfortable with the idea of going out with her classmates in her own town.
Tsu looks at her for an answer, the gaze unnerving when blinking isn't so necessary for the amphibian.
"Wh-What do you think guys?" She asks her table. Please, let Iida have studying to do. Let Izuku have training. And let Tokoyami have assignments.
"Sounds great!" Izuku agrees over a small bowl of rice. "We'd love to come,"
"Indeed, a break will do us good," conforms Iida.
Dammit, the one time everyone's ready to have fun!
Anxiety overwhelms her at the thought of wandering about town with her friends, a forced melting pot of aspects of her old and new life. Her chest tightens, a mirage of fixated stares from glassy eyes uncomprehending of her identity. Like a bullet, she shoots up from her seat. "I- I gotta go!"
Her legs move on autopilot, a programmed route she whisks to in the mode spurred by instinctive danger. Only once she slams closed the stall door does she regain autonomy. She bends over the toilet. No, she isn't nauseous.
She rolls up her sleeve, bunching it at the end to keep it in place. Just before leaning over the toilet, she tries again to stop the thoughts that invade her mind. Failing, she slides her fingers down her throat. Over the years, it's gotten easier. Silent now.
Burning flames of acid licking against her throat, eroding the barrier between physical and mental pain. She doesn't shake, doesn't react when coiled knots jolt up from her stomach.
The bathroom door opens without warning, too sudden for her to fix herself.
"Ochako? Are you okay?"
Izuku. Trust her to choose the one gender-neutral bathroom on the school campus to rush into.
Izuku smells something strange when he enters the bathroom. Something distinct but untraceable. "Um, Ochako?"
"I- I'll be right out!" she calls, shuddering when she wipes her mouth with toilet paper as her stomach churns once again. She isn't finished. After wiping her hand as much as possible, she opens the door to see Izuku waiting by the sinks, a worried frown on his face.
"Are you okay?"
"Huh? I'm fine,"
"You... you're crying..."
Is she? Ochako reaches up, feeling tears on her cheek. The intensity of the fire in her throat smothered her other feelings with its smoke. "O- Oh..."
"Ochako, if something is going on... please tell me,"
"There isn't anything to tell you Izuku," she washes her hands by the sinks, forgetting she didn't even pretend to flush. So many mistakes.
"Uraraka...." he lingers in the bathroom as she tries to leave, clutching tightly to his worries. Such empathy, she sighs. He'll make the perfect hero.
~~~
Sky painted in pastels, light fading behind the blackness of the pier. Previously a shipbuilding port, busy with industry and vibrant in culture. Now abandoned, a town plunged into poverty. Including Uraraka's parents. They buy hot buns and hot cocoa and wander around aimlessly.
Sitting on the edge of the pier, they stare below them into the torrential depth. A black sea, trappings of tar. If one falls in, they'll be done for. At least they would be if Uraraka wasn't here.
"Hey Deku?" she lies her head on his shoulder comfortably, feeling his fluffy hair tickle her cheeks. "I know why you wanna be a hero, but why do you care so much about everyone, about me?"
"Why I care about everyone? That's easy! I'm inspired by All Might. A hero who helped everyone no matter what!" He answers with excitement, missing the disappointment that slips on Uraraka's face. "As for why I care about you..."
Her eyes sparkle, alight with hope. "Yeah?"
"Because when I met you, I thought we could become really close!" he smiles his toothy smile, always so happy. His feelings so strongly tied to his ideology, she can't get over how dedicated he is. Yet it doesn't make her feel inadequate. Izuku inspires her.
She takes his hand, squeezing it in hers.
"Are we allowed to be here?" Iida cranes his neck, looking for a sign posted.
"It's fine, nobody's here," Tsu assures.
Except someone is, at the end of the beach. A gaggle of teenagers who stumble and slur in drunkenness. Uraraka recognises their voices from a distance, hiding behind Izuku. They won't recognise her, surely. She's grown her hair, is wearing makeup. Hasn't seen them in at least a few months, since her last day of middle school.
"Aww, my coca is finished," Izuku frowns.
"Mine too," Iida shakes his in disappointment. "Let's go back, I saw a recycling bin by the stalls,"
"Can we um, wait a minute?"
"Why?" Asks Izuku.
"Those kids um... used to bully me in middle school," she admits, cowering in on herself. Hiding under her scarf and jacket collar.
Though he'd never call himself a victim of bullying, Izuku knows how she feels. To be afraid to approach people, avoiding them at all costs. The underlying fear of others that never really goes away. "Yeah, guys? Let's wait a while,"
Eventually, the people and voices disappear. The UA group walk back along the pier and to the beach, Izuku jogging around in the sand as they go.
Some of the stalls are still operating, and once they turn for the recycling bins, they're greeted by the drunken teenagers from the beach sitting on them. Immediately, Uraraka hides behind Izuku. Fortunately for her, she's one of the few people much smaller than Deku.
Unfortunately for her, Izuku is oblivious and moves out of the way. Revealing her.
"Can you please move?" Asks Iida tersely. "Those aren't for sitting on!"
"Huh?" They exchange confused, mildly annoyed glances. "What are you, the beach police?"
Uraraka observes them so intensely, they sense her discomfort. One looks over, locking eyes with her in a moment of stunned shock.
"Hey, you're Ochako!" He points to her, exclaiming loudly. "You used to be a boy! Didn't you?"
No! Is her immediate reaction. She was never a boy. AMAB yes, but was never male. Her earliest memories are female, her conviction of mental transition at age 10, social transition at age 12. Not having ever felt male, experienced life as a male, she cannot honestly answer 'Yes, I used to be a boy'.
But answering to the contrary feels like a lie, something she'll be accused of. "W-What?" is all she can stammer, frozen between conflicting opposites.
"Yeah, we went to school together! You used to be a boy named Okinao!"
"That isn't true," Iida dismisses. "I don't believe that - it isn't true right?" he asks Ochako, no judgement intended.
"I... No!"
Her feet carry her away, the only way she can defend herself. Her name called from behind, she ignores their cries. Voices fading behind her. She isn't a boy, she isn't! Never has been. But how could she defend herself in that position? From people who have no idea?
She rushes to the sanctuary of the bathroom and slams the door closed. An outhouse with one stall. But before she can do anything, there's another knock on the door.
"S- Someone's in here!" she whimpers nervously.
"Yeah, it's me!" Izuku answers from the other side, voice optimistic. "Are you okay?"
Instead of answering, she asks. "Would you be okay?"
"Honestly, I don't know," he admits. "Whether it's true or not, that was an awkward situation to be thrown into. I just want to make sure it didn't freak you out too much,"
"Yeah, I'm okay..."
"You aren't new to this are you?" he sighs. "Bulimia,"
"I-"
"I know. I'm not new to it either,"
She decides to open the door, no assault on her eyes as dusk falls to darkness. "Really?"
"You think I'd lie about this?"
She hugs herself tightly, fingernails digging into her sleeves. "No. I didn't mean that,"
Izuku reaches out a hand, head tilting away; from the light. "Coming?"
"Aren't you confused? Curious? Weirded out?!" Ochako asks incredulously.
"Why would I be? I don't think any differently of you. And I don't think any of the others believed them. Whether you just got outed or not, and you're really cis, it doesn't change the fact that you're my best friend,"
She makes the decision not to tell him. Not yet, not unless necessary. She's stealth, as much as possible. But she wants to get closer to Izuku. "Do you think we could do something at the weekend too? How 'bout a one-on-one training session?" he's never had the courage to ask anyone out before. And while it won't be a date exactly...
"Yeah, sounds great! And we can get tea afterwards? I know a beautiful little tea house..."
"It's not Whittard's is it?" she chuckles.
"Oh no, a little independent Japanese place," Izuku explains with a smile, just as relieved as her it won't be the extortionate chain of tea houses. They link hands, walking side by side, feet moving together in rhythm as they talk. Perhaps, just perhaps, they can become so close they transcend being friends.
Ochako can only hope.