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It was cold the day that Touya died.
It was cold the day that Rei was taken away in a heap of her own tears and sorries.
It was cold when Fuyumi never let the household temperature go above twenty-two degrees since the day that she learned how to use the thermostat.
The worst moments of her life happened in the cold, but the heat was still a pest that she wanted to go away forever.
The heat meant that an argument was happening, when shouts would fill the house and break through the thin walls. When her and Natsuo would hide in one of the spare rooms, furthest from the source of the shouting. That was when heat boomed through the house.
The heat meant that her older brother was hurting, as the quirk that was supposed to be his biggest strength became his biggest weakness. It was the temperature of the sobs she heard through the walls at night, coming from her youngest brother who didn’t even find safety in sleep.
The water that scarred Shouto was boiling, hotter than any water that should ever touch someones skin. It wasn’t the cause of the scar upon his eye, but it was as if Endeavor had touched his own flames to the stove to bring it upon Shouto.
When students at school whispered, gossiped, murmured, about the forest fire at Sekoto Peak. When their voices buzzed around the hallway, only growing like a steady fire in the shrinking halls. They spoke of the Todoroki son who passed, of how he did it on purpose, of how he was forced into it, all things that wasn’t their business and they had no idea of. Their words were hot and sharp, stinging in Fuyumi’s ears and dripping sweat down her neck. Hot enough to bring tears to her eyes, tears she could never shed in public.
In the hallways of a place that never felt like home, when her father walked past her as if she was only a ghost of herself—and maybe she was— heat radiated from his quirk. It brushed into her face and drew away the comforting chill that the air conditioners brought, leaving her short on breath as the cold was snuffed out, just as quickly as he was gone.
The heat that rested on toys and shoes of a child who was long gone. Heat which she felt from when her angry baby brother walked past her, and the sweating that came from overthinking her own guilt about him.
Heat which she saw when she looked in the mirror, bursting from the red spots of her hair and the sharper edges of her face. Heat which came from grief and anger, all pushed down beneath a layer of numbness.
The heat was everywhere, unavoidable and rising up to terrorize the Todoroki’s who still could be affected by it.
The cold was nice.
The cold could burn, if applied too much.
Even so, it was better than the nightmarish warmth that heat always brought as her largest irritant, all because of the genes that she inherited. The cold was comforting, a singular reminder of a gentle mother and times when smiles were still seen in a lively house.
Snow would fall in the winters, bleaching the sidewalks and grass in a beautiful white that Fuyumi’s hair blended with. She could take off her gloves and hat, letting the snow pepper her clothes and red spotted hair, while her skin anything but freezing.
That comforting cold was in Natsuo’s eyes when he talked about school or soccer, sometimes even Touya. It was in the smiles she would eventually see from her mother. It was the temperature of the children playing in the neighboring yard, carefree and joyous as any child should be.
Except, it faded quickly.
The cold that bloomed in the air when she saw children playing, quickly warmed to flames threatening to smother her as she was reminded that Shouto should be playing like those kids. The guilt that rose into embers, realizing she could do nothing but lie in an attempt to pretend her life was anything but what it was.
The cold from when Natsuo mentioned school always snuffed out when the front door opened heavily, and booming footsteps were heard from the entryway. When her and Natsuo would run to their rooms before he made his way through the house, sweat already dripping down both of their foreheads.
She could create cold in her own hands. Snowflakes, or tiny, thin ice towers within her palm. It was beautiful, and once she had loved it.
That moment of loving the cold within her palms lasted only forty-six minutes, before it turned to frostbite and the cruel truth of her quirk was revealed.
The cold, so beautiful and delicate, enough to burn as if flames had been lit upon her skin. Enough to leave her fingers stiff and aching, even days after the frostbite had passed.
She had the ability to create the only natural comfort that was ever provided to her, and it was too strong for her to handle.
Similar to how she had the voice to ask her father to leave her baby brother alone, or how she could have outstretched a single hand to Touya and supported him. Yet, when she opened her mouth to speak her mouth ran dry, heat rising in her throat enough to make her retreat back to her room, every single time. When she stretched her arm to her big brother it was cast aside, and she lacked the strength—or will?— to put it back.
She could do plenty to fix the mess of a family that she desperately wanted back together, but when the moments arose, she lacked any true ability to help.
She got older, and the walls never thickened. Her brothers cries stopped, but the heat never disappeared. When her schedule busied she stopped feeling the cold, only surrounding in a stress that brought an uncomfortable clamminess over her at all times.
When Natsuo left the house, his corner of the hallway became hot enough to burn. She understood why, and she’d never blame him for it, but a selfish part of her felt enough pain to cry every time she walked past and saw the relatively cleared out doorway.
Touya had left, her mom had left, but Natsuo never left. Then, he got his chance to leave, and he took it. She had denied her own chance. Yet warmth still arose in her eyes when she thought about the insistent loneliness too much, always in the form of tears.
Warmth was bad, and cold was good. That was one of the many lessons that the harshness of their family had drilled into her mind. When she felt heat around her, something bad was happening. It proved right every time as a child, and when problems always arose as she grew up, she continued to feel that heat. She had once enjoyed the true cold, but the absence of warmth was enough to bring a memory of that feeling of happiness back.
She could go to work and feel that indisputable cool feeling, true smiles blooming on her face when she saw her students. Yet, suddenly it was only her and the horrifying beacon of warmth that was her father in the house. The two other household inhabitants hardly acknowledged her as anything other than the role of a caretaker, one that anyone could take.
That was until she was sat on the couch, watching the Yuuei sports festival. Flames had taken up the screen, but she felt absolutely freezing, because Shouto used his flames. She didn’t know what happened, but it was something, and then her brother had come home and announced he was going to their mom.
Something had changed.
That indisputable feeling of warmth that never stopped spreading throughout the house had paused.
She began speaking to her father, Shouto was seeing their mother. Her mother smiled, and it was as if there was snow falling from the ceiling.
As a child Fuyumi had learned that warmth was always bad and the cold was typically good. Yet, flames blooming from her youngest brothers hand had been the catalyst to a long list of events, ones which stopped the impending warmth spreading over the house for the first time in her lifetime.
Somehow, perhaps the heat wasn’t truly terrible.