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Ochako hates middle school. Pushing her bangs away from her face, the twelve year old grabs her backpack from her locker, ignoring the poorly muffled snickering coming from just behind her. As she marches out the front doors of the school, pointedly steering around the other departing students, her shoulders slump in defeat.
What does it matter, that her parents couldn't afford the school uniform? Suzuki Middle School required all students to buy uniforms from a particularly expensive retailer, the name of which Ochako couldn't pronounce. When she'd told her parents this the month before school started, they'd exchanged the look. Ochako knew what the look meant; their eyes were saying, "we can't afford this!"
Ochako hated the look.
So even after her parents best efforts of putting money aside for the uniform, Ochako still could not have it by the first day of middle school. Instead, she had walked to school that day in her elementary regalia, and had promptly been laughed at by a circle of her new classmates when she'd entered the classroom.
Her fists clenched. Her steps thumped against the empty sidewalk.
She directed her furious gaze away from the street and onto her shoes, which were similarly discolored and downtrodden from the year before.
It made Ochako angry, thinking about the way those kids laughed at her. Not because she was embarrassed, but because her parents had tried their best. Didn't her classmates know that her parents had really wanted to get her the uniform in time? Didn't they know that Ochako didn't like what she was wearing either? Ochako wanted to scream at them.
Instead, she had sat through class, and lunch, and the classes after lunch, all by herself, trying not to pull at the too short sleeves of her bright yellow blazer.
It was a familiar sensation, feeling too big for the space she occupied. It made the back of the brunette's head tingle in a way that felt like TV static.
Even without looking up, Ochako could visualize the pristine neighborhood that surrounded Suzuki Middle slowly gradiating into the slightly rougher, more downtrodden apartments and businesses that characterized her home address. The more she walked, the more the sidewalk transitioned from smooth gray concrete to crumbling blocks, pushed through with grass and dandelions.
As Ochako made the turn onto her block, she stopped.
There, sat beneath the ragged orange banner of the corner store, was a homeless old man. This wasn't all too surprising; there were plenty of homeless people in her neighborhood. In the crumbling warehouses and dark back alleys of her district, the homeless would flock. Ochako knew of several soup kitchens and shelters only blocks away from her tiny bedroom.
The homeless man was talking to himself. That wasn't surprising either.
Even as a little girl, Ochako hadn't found it strange that certain people talked to themselves. It was just the way things were. Ochako understood it, to some extent; sometimes her head felt too full. She'd had a whole slew of imaginary friends when she was younger, from a 'talking monkey butler' to a 'knife man.'
What was surprising about the old man, and what stopped Ochako in her tracks, was the huge, smeared lettering of a tattoo across his opened palm. His arm, long and clad in a multicolored sleeve, was sprawled away from him, just visible to Ochako from the shade of the banner.
Craning her neck, Ochako just managed to make out a word in upside down English. She pursed her lips together.
To any other person, this might've just been a quirky oddity on their way back home. But Ochako, having had a bad day at school, sweating in her too small blazer, and already too tired to deal with anymore nonsense, wanted to know what that word was.
Stepping towards the man, she squats down. He doesn't even react, still mumbling beneath his breath.
Ochako pokes him right in the middle of the forehead.
Instantly, his head shoots upwards, and the girl gets a full view of his wrinkled, very, very old face. He's ancient looking; like some type of wizard. He's got a shriveled, bald head, a wispy white goatee, and so many deep lines carved into his mottled skin that they look immovable. What's most striking about the old man, though, are his bright green eyes, which practically glow from his sunken eye sockets.
"Hi." she says, and watches his mouth move soundlessly.
When he finally speaks, his Japanese is oddly accented. "What..." he licks his dry lips, "what do you want?"
Ochako points to his still open palm. "What does that mean?"
The man's eyes flicker downward, "Why do you want to know?"
Ochako's eyebrows furrow. "Because it's interesting. Tell me." Only a second after letting the sentence leave her mouth, she knows that her demand was rude.
The old man seems stunned for a moment. Instead of being upset though, he lets out a creaky laugh, like a wildly swinging screen door. His eyes, if somehow possible, shine even brighter."'Tell me' she says!" The old man repeats, now running his interestingly tattooed hand through his sparse chin hair.
"Mmmm.." he hums, slamming his fist into his other palm, which the brunette can see is similarly marked in upside down English. "Okay! If you really want to know, you'll get me something from the convenience store here, ja?" He jabs a bony finger to the storefront behind him. His eyebrows waggle. He doesn't seem like he actually believes Ochako will do it.
That back area of her brain tingles like TV static, again.
Ochako reaches into her pocket, carefully counting out her pocket change. Then, as the old man watches with raised brows, she stomps her way into the store, grabbing two squeeze pouches of applesauce and slamming her money onto the counter, blushing at the cashier's unimpressed look.
She stomps out just as brusquely, plopping herself right down beside the now smiling old man, and shoves the apple sauce into his hands. "Thank you" he says, and pops open the cap, slurping the substance down quickly.
Ochako keeps her own pouch sat in her lap. "So, what does it mean? That writing on your hand?"
He hums again, wiping his mouth against his jacket. "It means, 'Hello."
"And the other hand?"
He chortles. "That one says 'Goodbye'."
Ochako's eyes catch onto another tattoo that is equally as interesting to her. "What about this umbrella? What's this for?" She asks, placing her finger just above the old man's wrist.
(Something like lightning shoots up her spine, and for a second, her own wrist burns white-hot.)
He eyes her strangely. Then he pulls his sleeve away, allowing the girl to see the tattoo in its entirety, curved handle and all.
"Would you believe me..." he starts, "If I told you I used to be a superhero?"
A giggle slips out from her. At the serious look on the old man's face, her eyes widen.
"Really?" she asks, and he nods intently. "Well, what does that tattoo have to do with you having been a hero?"
He seems to ponder this for a minute. His forehead wrinkles somehow multiply. "Well it was my team's symbol."
She tilts her head forward, bangs falling over her eyes. "You had a superhero team? What, were you guys named after types of Umbrellas?"
The old man's eyes roll back as he roars, swiping at the air beside him like he was pushing someone away. "Named after umbrellas, did you hear that?" he asks to the air, which, predictably, provides no response. "I bet the old bastard would've liked that one."
"Well, not Umbrellas then..." Ochako insists impatiently, "...but who were you guys?"
He rests his back against the wall. "You wouldn't know us; too before your time, kid. Besides, the rest of em are all dead and gone; it's just me and this asshole now." He points at the air beside him, which almost...simmers? in response. Weird.
Ochako rolls her eyes. Adults are so odd sometimes, with their proclamations of what she could and could not understand. "You can't be that old; tell me."
The man rolls his eyes right back. Then, he lowers his voice to a whisper. "It was 200 years ago, give or take a few odd timelines."
Ochako eyes him with disbelief, leaning her back up against the wall as well. They're mimicking each other's stature now. "Is your quirk immortality or something?"
He snorts. "Something like that." He doesn't seem very thrilled about it; Ochako guesses she wouldn't be either, if all of her superhero teammates were dead.
It must be very lonely.
An idea dawns on her then, so mind boggling it takes her a few seconds to wrap her head around it. "So, what, you were part of the first generation to develop quirks?"
He rubs at his nose with his hand. "If that's what they're being called now, yes."
That statement sits in the air for a few minutes, comfortably blanketing the silence between the two. Ochako is suddenly aware that an hour has inexplicably passed. The sky is steadily darkening. Her parents would have expected her back quite a while ago.
Strangely, Ochako is not eager to leave this odd man and his odd stories alone.
Reluctantly, she stands, brushing off her skirt and reaching into her blazer pockets to withdraw the rest of her meager pocket change. She dumps the few crumpled bills onto his lap.
"Thanks for telling me about your tattoos." She scuffs the toe of her worn shoe against the sidewalk, chewing on the inside of her cheek. "I'm sorry, by the way."
He stares up at her, not yet touching the money in his lap. "For what?"
"About your immortality thing. That sucks."
His face relaxes. Something in his eyes softens. "It does."
Ochako's mouth runs before her mind can keep up with it.
"I hope you die soon."
The man's mouth puckers into an circle as his eyes widen. His head sinks into his chest, and his shoulders begin to shake. For a moment, Ochako thinks this nice old man is crying, and she feels like the scum of the earth.
Then, his head roils back upwards, and Ochako sees the red flush across his cheeks and hears his ugly guffaws of laughter. Her own shoulders begin to shake and soon the two are laughing in tandem, old man and young girl hunched over with identical amusement, drawing speculative looks from the few passersby.
Finally, Ochako manages to wipe the tears away from her eye, just as the shriveled old man unfolds, and stands up. He's gigantic; almost impossibly tall and thin, and as he steps out from the shadow of the banner, Ochako can see that his skin glints blue in the late afternoon sunlight.
Their eyes meet.
They share a smile, before he begins walking backwards away from her, waving the hand with the word that Ochako recalls means 'goodbye.' His gigantic, multicolored coat sweeps after him as he walks.
He's such an odd sight, that for some reason, Ochako's heart seizes up tightly in her chest, and she feels a rush of affection for this old man she's known for only an hour.
"Take care of yourself, Klaus!" she yells, shaking her hand at him, and running, newly energized, away, in the direction of her apartment.
She doesn't look back to see the old man frozen on the sidewalk, staring after her, his hand frozen in mid air and his smile creeping up his wrinkled cheeks.
"You too, Spaceboy."
It's only when she is laying in bed that night that Ochako realizes the old man never told her his name.
(The moon shines brightly in the sky, its' beams falling over her bedsheets. If the girl looked close enough, she might see the glittering blue figure of an old man there, his carefree smile stretched across the surface of the gigantic rock.
Who's to say she doesn't sneak a glance?)