Chapter Text
It is not a big day when it all gets out, it is not some great momentous event. Shouto wakes up at seven o’clock like he always does. His room is clean like it always is, he gets dressed and he goes down stairs.There isn’t tension in the air he can feel or anything. In the common rooms he finds quite a few people and their expressions change when they see him. Uraraka says something first.
“Todoroki, have you seen the news today?” He hasn’t, he doesn’t check the news often, he never felt the need to. He watched in the morning when he lived at home and occasionally on his phone but not often.
“No,” he responds. Uraraka looks anxious but Shouto can’t bring himself to care.
“I think you should check the news Todoroki.” She’s very adamant about this. It must be something important. He'll check it after he eats. He tells this to Uraraka who looks even more anxious. While he’s preparing his breakfast both Izuku and Bakugou come down the stairs. When Izuku sees him his eyes widen and he glances over to Uraraka who shakes her head. Shouto wonders what they have going on, maybe that news is more important than he still doesn’t really care. He keeps eating his food even as Izuku goes to sit next to him on one of the stools by the counter.
“I haven’t looked at the news.” He tells Izuku, taking a bite out of his food.
“You should,”
“It’s really important.” Izuku looks away after he says that, but Shouto still stares at him
“I will.” he replies.
He checks the news when he is done eating and he thinks he understands why everyone looked so stressed. Grand headlines, a big story, Shouto’s biggest secrets. It’s all there. He clicks on the tops story ‘House of Ash: An expose on the shocking conditions inside the home of the #1 Hero’ by AT. He thinks it’s a bit of a long name but it has everything. There are photos and videos he thought were lost to time and there’s an anonymous source that seems to know just a bit too much. It’s a good article, the journalist must have put a lot of time into it. For an expose it’s weirdly polite. He looks at some of the other articles, and it seems that they’re just retelling the big story.
He isn’t sure what to do so he just doesn’t. He gets up and he washes his dish and he sits back down next to Izuku and he doesn’t do anything else.
For a bit everyone is just sitting in silence and tension but Shouto then realizes that he needs to tell his siblings. He wouldn’t like to wake up and find out about a story like this.
As Shouto gets up to leave Izuku calls after him
“Where are you going?” Izuku asks nervously. About to get up and follow him
“I need to call my siblings.” Shouto replies
“It’s the weekend they might not be awake.” Shouto hums at that “I know but I still need to call them” He says walking up the stairs toward his room. It’s an awkward exchange but no one really knows what to do with it all.
First he calls Fuyumi but she doesn’t pick up. She wakes up at nine on weekends. So he calls Natsuo. He didn’t have Natsuo’s phone number until a couple months ago when they met for dinner one night. It was a nice dinner, just him, Fuyumi and Natsuo.
Natsuo picks up “Hey little bro why are you calling this early?” Shouto hears as he puts the phone to his ear.
“Hi, have you seen the news yet?”
“No, Is it important?” Natsuo questions “Has dad finally kicked the bucket?” He jokes trying to clear the tension
“Basically.” Shouto murmurs. “What was that, I couldn’t hear you?” Natsuo asks
“Nothing It doesn’t matter but you should really check the news.” He brushes off Natsuo’s question and stands up to pace his room.
“Okay. You're really insistent about this. I'll pull it up on my laptop. Happy?” Natsuo says as he opens his laptop “Before you called I was going to start working on an essay for this class about ethics in healthcare. And I feel like the topic I chose isn’t great but im-” Natsuo continues before cutting himself off. Shouto knows he must have seen the news articles.
He chuckles a little “I can see why you were so insistent.” Shouto can hear him stop to take a breath.
“Did you tell, I promise I won’t be angry if you did.” Natsuo doesn’t sound angry.
“No, I thought you might have.” Natsuo is quick to reply that
“I didn't, I would have told you if I did.” They sit in silence for a moment, just the sound of their breaths. Shouto bets that Natsuo is reading the article. The one that is probably going to ruin their lives.
Finally Natsuo asks “Does Fuyumi know?”
“No, I tried to call her but she doesn’t wake up till nine on the weekends. She does check the news each morning though.” Natsuo lets out a sigh of relief
“That good I don’t want to have to tell.” Shouto agrees with that. They talk for a bit longer and he can tell that Natsuo is trying not to linger on the articles and the news. He says goodbye to Natuso just as he hears a knock on his door.
He opens the door to find his teacher standing outside his room
“Hello Todoroki, you can probably guess why I’m here. We can talk here or in my office, whichever you prefer..” Aizawa asks before Shouto can even get a word in.
“I would rather talk in your office.”
Aizawa nods at that and they set off towards an office that Shouto didn’t know existed until halfway through the year.
They have to go through the common room and Shouto can feel his classmates staring at him. He doesn’t look at any of them.
Aizawa’s office is nice, clean. They sit down and they are silent. Both of them are quiet people. The silence isn’t awkward exactly but it isn’t pleasant either.
“Before we talk about anything else I just want to apologize.”
“I should have done more.” Shouto makes a sound at that and tries to cut in but he is interrupted “You don’t have to defend me. I had my suspicions and when my reports wouldn’t go through. I should have tried harder and for that I apologize.”
“A lot of things were happening but I should have pushed harder for you.” Shouto isn’t sure what to think about this. He always knew that what his father did wasn’t normal but even with that he isn’t sure how he’s supposed to think about the fact that Aizawa apparently hasn’t done enough. It makes it so everyone in his life hasn’t done enough.
“We do need to talk about quite a few things, most importantly your safety.” Aizawa explains
“My father is trying to be better.” Shouto replies even if he doesn’t know why he says it.
“Your father is trying to be better?” It was a question
“Yes” He fixes his posture in the chair.
“Do you feel safe around your father Todoroki?” Shouto wants to say yes so badly and he doesn't understand why. He doesn’t understand the way in which he feels the need to almost defend his father. To say that it’s just the way that it always works.
“I’m not sure but he’s trying to be better. He won’t hurt me.” He doesn’t like the way that his voice almost wavers at the end and he doesn’t like the way that Aizawa stares at him like he is a thing to be pitied.
“But he has hurt you.” and there is no question to answer
“Yes” They leave the conversation at that.
They talk about a couple of other things after that. He doesn’t want to talk to the press, he’ll think about legal charges, Aizawa can do a press conference if he wants, he doesn’t want to take a break from school and then it gets to a therapist.
He doesn’t want to talk to a therapist, Aizawa says that it will do him good.
He says he won’t, Aizawa says that that might not be his decision to make.
He wants to storm out. He doesn’t. They both calm down and Aizawa says that he really thinks that it would do him good and he would much prefer if Shouto made the choice himself.
Shouto leaves after that. He leaves and he goes back to the dorm and he ignores his classmate and goes to his room and lays on the ground in the dark on the tatami mats and he lets himself float. Let himself sink into the static. After a bit Fuyumi calls and they talk, it grounds him. He isn’t sure how she feels about it all; she avoids the topic and he was always terrible with tone. She is going to try to visit him tomorrow. She hangs up. He lays on the ground.
He gets up and goes to the common room for lunch. They turn off the news when they see he’s down there. Bakugou takes one look at the sandwich he was about to eat and makes him soba. Izuku had told him a while ago that making food was one of the ways that Bakugou showed he cared. It’s a nice thought that Bakugou cares about him.
He decided to stay for a bit and watch the Pre quirk movie that had put on. They all seemed so shocked when he told them he had never heard of it. He doesn’t like the way that everyone seems to know these things that he just doesn’t.
He’s enjoying himself sitting on the floor leaning against a couch watching a movie he’s quite confused about. Everyone is laughing and he would say that he’s enjoying it and right when that happens his father ruins it.
He gets up from his spot and goes to his room to answer the open.He waves off the question of his classmates with a quick “It’s important” and they all leave him be.
Once he is up in his room he sits leaning against the wall and answers the call. They sit in silence for a minute before his father starts to talk.
“Shouto, you’ve seen the news.” It’s not a question but at least he doesn’t sound angry.
“Yeah, I’ve seen the news.”
“Were you the one to tell that journalist about it all?” Shouto wonders what his father would do if he was.
“No, I never told anyone anything.” He tries not to sound too annoyed.
“Okay. You can if you want. The press if you want to, you can talk to the press. I won't be angry.” His father isn’t angry but for some reason Shouto is. And all he can hear is static but his father keeps talking.
“And Shouto I just want you to know that I’m sorry and you don’t ha-” He hangs up on his father.
He’s not sure why the conversation set him off. It was short but there’s ice spreading across his face and up his hand and he can feel it crack as he squeezes the phone. And he takes a breath, hold, a breath out hold like Izuku told him. He sits with his back to a wall and breaths. He ignores the fact that his father has texted him an apology.
He doesn’t know how much time passes with him sitting on the floor but after a bit there’s a knock on his door and then Izuku appears
“Hi Shouto I was just checking up on you. I can leave if you want.” Izuku squeaks out nervously
“It’s fine Izuku. You can stay.” and with Shouto’s words Izuku comes and sits next to Shouto.
They sit in silence and it’s not awkward. And this time Shouto is the one to start a conversation.
“My father called me.”
“What did he say?” Shouto leans farther back and looks up at the ceiling
“He said that I could tell the press if I wanted to.” He keeps his voice steady
“Do you want to?” Shouto chuckles a little at that and Izuku turns to him
“ I don't know. It doesn’t really matter if I do. It’s all out there anyways.” He voice wavers a little
“But it does matter if you want to tell the press your story you should be able to.” Izuku presses on and Shouto wants to explode.
“But they already have my story and even if I tell them everything, even if I show all the scars and pictures, what will it change?” He stops for a second to breathe and there is ice spreading across his face and Izuku grabs his hand. “Endeavor has his license removed, he doesn’t. He goes to jail, he doesn’t. And in the end he’ll say he’s sorry, he’ll say he’s changing.” He squeezes Izuku's hand and Izuku squeezes back.
“And maybe he is sorry and maybe he is changing and maybe I shouldn’t even care. What’s done is done”
“You don’t have to forgive him.” Izuku is looking at him again.
“I know.” He looks at Izuku too. “It’s just it doesn’t really matter if I forgive him or not because he’ll still be sorry and if he’s sorry and he’s number one what does that make me?”
“It makes you Shouto.”
They're both silent after that. Shouto thinks that this is the closest to a pleasant silence he has heard in a long time.
“I think Shouto.” He stops and Shouto turns to him. “I think that you might want to talk to someone about all this.”
“I’m talking to you aren’t I?” Shouto says frowning a little
“I mean an adult. A professional.” Izuku looks away from Shouto, picking at the tatami mats on the floor with his free hand.
“Aizawa-sensei wants me to see a therapist.”
“Do you want to?” Izuku stops picking at the floor.
“No.” Shouto replies
“I still think you should maybe talk to someone.” Izuku concedes and Shouto leans over to rest his head on Izuku’s shoulder.
“Stay”
“Of course.”