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“Izuku!” that should have been the giveaway to Midoriya that he was dreaming. The blond’s lips hadn’t called him by his first name since he was diagnosed Quirkless, and, even though he was now a distinguished Pro Hero, neck and neck with his childhood friend in both power and Hero Rank, “Deku” was his default name. The only one who ever called him “Izuku” now was his mother, bless her heart, who tried her best to support his life-risking career even when she feared for her son on the daily.
Even so, Midoriya indulged the dream without a second thought, seeing a familiar scene in front of his shut-tight emerald eyes. Garnet gems looked back at where their band-aid covered arms were connected at their tiny, conjoined fingers, and the blond’s tiny hand pulled the forest haired boy up what, to them, was steep hill- one of their most difficult hikes.
“Wait up!” he would cry out, trying desperately to see the ground through his teary eyes. As a kid, he was always such a crybaby- not like that changed much, despite what his adult self claimed.
Even to this day, the male could never tell if his friend genuinely couldn’t hear his breathless cries or if he just ignored them. Either way, that tiny hand pulled him to the top- without fail, it always pushed Midoriya to be better, to go father, to keep going even when he wanted to stop.
It was thanks to that hand that Midoriya Izuku was now Pro Hero: Deku.
Just like that, the two smaller boys made it to the top, looking around at a sea of rainbow flowers framed by a few tall trees. Scarlet gems would look back at him with a grin. Childish as it seemed, that smile made Midoriya’s entire world brighter as the blond’s sunny glow dried the tears in jade gems.
“I told you we could do it!” the other would gloat, letting go of the freckled hand and running forward, “Isn’t it cool!” he would always frame it like he was looking for an answer, but his tone was anything but questioning.
“So cool!” admittedly, Midoriya was never talking about whatever his friend was showing him.
“One day in the future-” the blond crossed his arms behind his head, feigning nonchalance as he kicked at the ground, “Come back here with me…”
“Of course I will!” Midoriya practically yelled, unaware that his friend was still going on.
“Shut up!” the boy turned around to reveal the blush on his face, pulling something from his pocket and fiddling with it, “I mean…” he trailed off, completely mesmerizing Midoriya with his every move.
Suddenly two small hands were thrusted towards him, revealing a clearly plastic flower attached to a band that was far too large for a child like himself, “Come back here as my bride!” the blond demanded, not meeting Midoriya’s eyes in a rare moment of panic.
Of course, it wasn’t that easy, seeing as when freckled fingers reached for it with obvious glee, the blond pulled it back, pretending to forget that he was embarrassed. Rubbing his nose and crossing his arms, the smaller boy looked so much bigger to young Midoriya, “You have to be able to keep up with me, though, Izuku! I can’t have my bride lagging behind, you hear me?”
How could he say no to that?
“Mhm!” he cheered, “I’ll be your bride AND surpass you next time, Kacchan!”
Where the mouthed words, “It’s a promise,” should have been, there was a female’s voice calling out, “In the match between Pro Heroes Ground Zero and Deku, it seems that our resident flowerboy has surpassed his rival yet again!”
Blearily jolting awake, Midoriya realized that he must have left the tv running last night. The joking words, “I wonder how long he’ll be able to keep that title for, though, seeing as they really are neck and neck,” were muffled by the Hero’s own voice, “So I finally have surpassed you, huh, Kacchan?”
Rolling his emerald eyes, Midoriya got out of bed, looking around, “I doubt he even remembers that dumb promise… I mean, I almost forgot about it.” As kids, Midoriya made a lot of promises with his childhood friend, Bakugou Katsuki, dubbed Ground Zero to the world and, well, Kacchan to him. No matter how much he tried, that nickname was pretty much cemented in his mind by this point.
An ugly yawn scrunched up the male’s many freckles as he shuffled over to his nightstand, looking at the calm alarm clock and the calendar’s date circled in red. [Day Off!!!] it practically screamed at him, giving the Pro Hero the freedom that he needed to marvel in his sentimentality as he strode over to the closet where, sure enough, he still had that ever familiar box.
Opening it, there was the same plastic flower he had seen in his dream, or rather memory. It was more faded than usual, with the gaudy paint chipping in places, but the feeling of fondness that washed over him was the same as the first day he had been given the gift.
Suddenly, jades pricked with crystal tears glanced further into the closet, where they caught an expanse of white fabric- a wedding dress… that he and one of his closest friends, Pro Hero: Uravity, aka Uraraka Ochako, had bought while drunk thrift shopping. Both, in their inebriated states, were completely in awe of the fact that they found a wedding dress- of all things- that could fit Midoriya’s bulky build; he held up entire buildings quite a few times, so bulk was necessary, but it was astonishing to their drink-shrunken minds that anything fit him. Uraraka had broken down, sobbing about how he would be such a pretty bride and that he needed to buy it, so he did… regretfully.
To be fair, she framed it as if it was something very important, and he was drunk, so he believed her- which led to a killer hangover and quite a few questions as to why he had a wedding dress laying on the floor when he woke up.
It wasn’t until days later when he entered the thrift store- sober this time- and the cashier had, embarrassingly, recognized him. Thankfully, no one was aware of his Hero status, surprisingly, but it was still a mortifying experience, nonetheless.
Since she had been so insistent about how cute he looked in the dress, he couldn’t return it, so it sat in the back of his closet- not as a reminder of than night, since he couldn’t remember a damn thing, but as a reminder of the time he went to buy a new tee shirt and instead listened to a thirty minute story about how he had a mini-wedding in the middle of a thrift store. Uraraka was the flower girl, dawned beautifully in his way oversized hoodie, since she was complaining about the store’s a/c; the manager of the store was the one to “give him away,” even though he didn’t have another partner- or maybe he had been given away to a mannequin? He couldn’t quite recall, and the employee only said that the manager was the one to “give him away.” At one point, apparently, he had broken down crying about how he “felt like such a pretty bride,” and everyone in the store had agreed.
From that point on, the dress was a reminder that just because he could drink, does not mean he should…
Even so, he also still had the ring… as well as a tripod camera his PR manager had given him as a way of fueling his personal media coverage. They had said he needed a way to ‘connect’ to his fans on a more personal level instead of only doing company-run publicity stunts. He rarely used it for his public or private accounts, save the occasional nature pic or whenever he found inspiring street art.
Making up his mind, Midoriya got to packing. Since he had the day off the next day as well, what was the harm in a camping trip? A sense of giddiness electrified him as he laced up his hiking boots, carefully putting everything into a bag he had tailored to his broad ass back, thanking the company for making it easy to hide his logo so that he didn’t have to answer a thousand questions on the train ride there.
Stopping only a few times to take publicity pictures, the Pro found out just how much he had grown since he was a kid. To young Midoriya, this trail was a test of courage; his tiny legs would ache halfway through, but Bakugou was always tugging him along. At that age, he thought his friend was invincible… and maybe sometimes he still does- if he could even still call Bakugou his friend at this point. They had been through quite a few lowes in their lives, and Midoriya had been nursing his crush on the blond for, well, most of their lives. However, he only ever referred to Midoriya as his rival, Hero partner, or the very occasional term “childhood friend.” With everything they had been through, well, Midoriya would be lying if he didn’t want some confirmation that his feelings weren’t still one sided.
The tiny band burned in his pocket, as well as the small, miniscule hope that maybe, just maybe he wasn’t alone.
After going over the pictures he took of himself at the base, a cool looking rock, and the halfway point, Midoriya sat at the top of the trail. There was nothing that gave away his definite location, but, as his PR team would put it, he was doing things that made him seem “more human.”
Now, it was time for the fun part of his trip. First, setting up his tent, the Hero stripped himself of his shirt, letting the breeze caress what little sweat there was coating his skin before carefully pulling out the white fabric and slipping it on.
It was a Wednesday evening, so there wasn’t anyone else on the trail, which gave Midoriya free reign to take as many really dumb pictures as he wanted. First, he set up the tripod to take pictures of him and the rainbow array of flowers. Sitting, standing, puffing up his dress, smiling, blushing, sniffing the flowers; he took any picture that came to mind, but a shadow of the trees reminded him of something that happened after the memory cut off that morning.
Hiking up his skirt and hurrying over to the edge of the clearing where one old tree twisted in ways that endlessly fascinated him as a kid, there was a carving- barely legible after years of various weathering and the fact that it was drawn by a child with a pointy rock, but it was clear as day to Midoriya.
[(Katsu)+(Izu)]
It was the first character of his and Bakugou’s first names. As a kid, Midoriya wondered why it wasn’t “Katsuki + Izuku,” but Bakugou had reassured him it meant more this way. Scoffing at the memory, the forest haired male pulled the fabric around his waist up until he could reach the knife in his pants pocket and set aside in a patch of dirt a ways away.
Doing things in order of importance, he realized that he should take a few before renewing the carving, so he did. Then, he took a few of him recarving the indention, careful not to move too much and risk off-setting the camera. It was a grueling process, but it made his smile a bit more realistic, as if he were actually renewing his feelings for his childhood friend… as if there was hope for his feelings ever being returned. After deleting thirty some pictures- an exaggeration, but that was what it felt like- Midoriya was finally able to move to the aftershots.
There were several- of him recreating the preshots and a few new poses as well.
Finally feeling excited about his little project, Midoriya stood, in a wedding dress, looking over at the cobalt sky fading to rose and violet… A few more pictures couldn’t hurt, right? He still had enough light to take just a couple more.
It was a relief that the bubblegum ring Bakugou had given him was plastic and had a gap where he could adjust the size, even if it made his ring finger blue after a few minutes of wearing it.
Letting out a sigh or relief as he finally unzipped the dress, carefully dusting it off and resealing it before putting it away, Midoriya scrolled through the photos he took. He sorted them into three potential posts before retreating to his tent and pulling out his laptop.
He sorted out all of the public posts first, moving them from his camera to a place where he could post them to his media. If his PR team didn’t at least say something, he was going to give up, honestly, but, with that out of the way, he could focus on the fun part.
Finally uploading the files to his personal, Midoriya picked several photos of him in the dress, loading the final post with: “@Urock_my_gravity @FROPPY-ing_in_the_rain Will you let me take your wedding photos, yet?”
Of course, the first two contained more defining scenery and were captioned with: “What if I got married" and followed by the second post of his back to the camera, but the scene quickly switched to his close ups with the ring on and the caption: “Jk, jk, unless-”