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When most people saw Eijiro Kirishima, they never assumed that he would be a soft hearted person. Even his smile looked intimidating, due to his sharp, pointed, shark-like teeth. For most people, it seemed to make sense that he was good friends with someone as angry as Katsuki Bakugou. But looks often deceive, and Kirishima had one of the friendliest, cheerful personalities.
Something else that people wouldn’t assume about Kirishima; he was a stuffed animal loving person. This as well couldn’t be further from the truth. Kirishima loved the soft plushies. When he was a young child, it was one of his dreams to collect as many stuffed animals as he could, but once he gained his quirk (and his appearance), visitors would often the boy more mature gifts, like books or sports equipment rather than Kirishima’s one true want, a stuffed animal.
As he grew older, Kirishima’s thoughts began to become more occupied by school and dreams of his future, as it often happens for people his age. Once he was accepted into Yuuei, he got even busier, preparing and learning about how to become a hero.
During his third year however, during a peaceful afternoon, Kirishima passed a toy store window while shopping with the Bakusquad, and his eyes caught it boasting a big whale plushie. It was cute and fuzzy, and was in a light blue color, with a small smile sewn in. Kirishima grinned a huge grin as his eyes had lightened up and dragged his friends inside the store, weaving his way through people and enthusiastically purchasing the soft toy.
Kirishima loved that whale, whom he had named Wilbur, and everyone knew that. During the first few days of having him, he constantly took him everywhere, but that quickly ceased on Monday morning when Mr. Aizawa yelled at him for bringing Wilbur to class.
After that day, he brought Wilbur everywhere, except school.
Mina fueled Kirishima’s love for Wilbur by sewing a small bow tie onto him, which he proudly donned, and made Kirishima look like a proud mother seeing her son go to prom. With no date, but we don’t shame people for that in this household.
A few months after Wilbur joined the Yuuei Class 1-A family (“He’s our personal cheerleader!”-Eijirou Kirishima, 20XX), Bakugou was staggering around their dorm with his arms full of groceries.
“Fucking hell-”, Bakugou muttered, as he finally dumped the paper bags full of produce on the countertop, without knowing that the force of the heavy bags shoved the kitchen knife to topple over the edge.
To be clear, the events that happened next had a very low chance of occurring, which honestly just emphasizes how awful Bakugou’s luck was.
The knife flew, sharp side down, grazing an innocent, unsuspecting Wilbur. But you see, Bakugou had sharpened that knife right before leaving to get groceries, which meant that even the slightest graze had cut through Wilbur’s soft belly.
“Shit.” Bakugou said, hearing the impact of the knife and lazily strolled around the countertop but stopped in his tracks as he saw the horrific sight in front of him.
The knife laid, clattered, on the floor, while Wilbur was laid on his back with soft plushie filling spewed out of him, free from the cloth constraints. Bakugou could swear that his eyes looked like a tear was slipping out of them, sliding down Wilbur’s blue face, his small, sweet smile making the whole sight even further heartbreaking.
“Shit. Shit. Shit. Holy, fucking, shit.” Bakugou knelt to frantically pick up the stuffing.
Bakugou was a strong guy, but he was sure that Kirishima would be furious after discovering that his best friend had sliced open the light of his life. But he would be too nice to assault Bakugou in anyway and would just smile that fucking awfully sad smile of his and walk off to bed and that would be worse any day.
He heard the door open.
As Kirishima entered their dorm, Bakugou swiftly kicked Wilbur’s remains under the sofa.
“I’m home!” Kirishima exclaimed, flashing a wide grin at Bakugou. He mustered a nervous smile in return. Kirishima, not noticing his roommates paranoid behavior walked over the couch his stuffie was currently shoved under. Bakugou held his breath.
“Do you want help with making dinner?” Kirishima asked turning his head around.
Bakugou found his words again. “I can handle it, Shitty Hair. What d’you want?”
“Baku, anything you make is delicious.” Kirishima said, giving Bakugou a sickeningly sweet smile that caused Bakugou’s stomach to flip.
“Shut up or get out.” Bakugou mumbled, as he began to take out some vegetables.
“By the way, where’s Wilbur? I remember leaving him on the couch.”
“Uh, ah! Um, Pinky came over and took him to dry cleaning. She’ll bring him back in a week.” Bakugou lied through his teeth, facing away from his preppy roommate.
Kirishima frowned a bit but smiled softly once more. “Well, I suppose that was nice of her. I wish she’d asked me first though.”
“She wanted to surprise you.” Bakugou said, still lying.
~~~~~
“PINKY.” Bakugou gasped slamming his hands on Mina’s desk the next morning, having run a few laps around the school that morning to calm his nerves a little.
“Bakuboo. How can I help you?” Mina asked cheerfully.
“I killed him.” Bakugou whispered shakily. He looked up and stared Mina right in her eyes. “I killed Wilbur.”
Mina’s face went through 50 Shades of Shock™ until they landed on concern. She opened her mouth to say something, but Bakugou cut her off.
“I need you to teach me how to sew him up.” he pleaded with her.
Her face looked hesitant. “Um, no offense my guy, but…I mean, do you really think you want to? Why don’t I just sew him up myself? Honestly I don’t even think tha-”
“NO!” he yelled out once more. At this point a few people had been staring at the exchange in confusion, with the only context they had for the conversation being a yelled out “pinky” and “no”. Bakugou quieted down. Hell curses him if the others found out about Wilbur. He would be pinned down on a circus wheel made by Satan himself while they threw darts made out of the seven fires of hell at him.
“Kirishima has this whole thing about being “manly”. I have to be the one to sew him up.” he said, his face set in a straight line. Also, I want to kiss the fuck out of the man and if you sew it up I won’t be able to take credit for liking him in any way was left unsaid.
Mina looked resigned but looked up to Bakugou’s eyes and said, “We’ll start after school.”
~~~~~
“Jesus Christ, Bakugou, what’s wrong with you?!”
“The string won’t fucking go in, what am I supposed to do?!”
“ Thread it. Like I showed you .”
“Goddamnit, what the hell does threading mean?”
“...”
Bakugou had been struggling learning to sew. And he hadn’t even sewed yet. Mina kept guiding his fingers in, but his fingers, rough, and used to blast fire, weren't dainty enough to even thread the string through the eye of the needle.
It took Bakugou 32 tries to get the string into the needle. Mina suggested that he go home and practice before they moved on but Bakugou refused.
“Hey Shitty Hair. I’m staying out for tonight, so uh, order takeout or eat leftovers if you don’t feel like cooking.”
“Oh, okay, sure Bakugou! But where will you b-” Bakugou cut off the call.
“I’m learning how to fuckin’ sew, even if I stay here all night.
Bakugou stayed all night.
By the end of 6 hours, he had achieved:
- Threading needle; 14 xp earned
- Knots; 25 xp earned
- Starting the first stitch; 20 xp earned
- Running stitch, proficiency lvl: 3; 50 xp earned
- Overcast stitch, proficiency lvl: 2; 35 xp earned
- Invisible stitch, proficiency lvl: 4; 60 xp earned (It’s super effective!)
- Stabbing his fingers 200+ times; 85 hp lost
- Earning 11 bandaids; 70 hp lost
- Sleep deprivation; 12 hp lost
- Coffee; earned one healing item!
Yes, he was truly a natural born seamster.
~~~~~
“Ashido-chan!” Kirishima exclaimed when he saw Mina practically collapse on her desk. “Are you okay?”
Mina turned over and looked at Kirishima. “Boy, you have one hell of a roommate.” she said before dozing off, leaving Kirishima looking at her in confusion.
“Is Ashido-chan okay?” Tsu said, taking her side beside Kirishima.
“I think she’s just really sleepy.” Kirishima said.
“Isn’t she always?” Tsu and Kirishima giggle a bit before Aizawa enters and starts class.
~~~~~
Three days later, Bakugou and Mina were having their last lesson.
“Bakugou. I think you’re ready.” Mina said grimly. She set her hand on his strong shoulder. “Be careful.”
Bakugou nods. “Thank you sir.” Mina raises her eyebrow. “Maam.”
Bakugou grabbed Mina’s sewing kit and went off to face the enemy.
He stared at Wilbur, assessing the damage. Bakugou had dragged the plushie from under the sofa where it had been concealed this whole time.
First I need to re-stuff him . It would take a while to scour the floor for all the stuffing, so Bakugou decided that he’d just use Ashido’s, and buy her a few new bags. Once he had re-stuffed Wilbur, he measured the gaping rip on his belly. He unstrung some blue thread he found matched his coat well enough.
Threading the needle (masterfully, if he did say so himself) he put in the first stitch and tied a knot from there. He went through his skillset. He would need an invisible stitch for Wilbur so he could look as normal as possible, but he had never attempted one this long.
Taking a deep breath, Bakugou started stitching. He kept going, using all the techniques Mina had taught him. He kept poking his fingers (“Holy fucking hell-”) but he had some bandaids near him so he didn’t bleed all over Wilbur.
After putting his bandaid on, Bakugou recovered, adapted and overcame the next few stitches, keeping sure he didn’t knot up the threads underneath.
~~~~~
It was Friday and Kirishima was hella excited to have Wilbur back. When he had asked Bakugou where he could get him back, Bakugou had just said that Mina would give it to him during work and he’d give it to Kirishima. Which Kirishima thought was kind of odd, but whatever.
He opened the door to his and Bakugou’s dorm, but his usual “I’m home!” died in his throat as he took in the sight in front of him.
Bakugou was perched on the couch, paying no attention to Kirishima, with a pair of earbuds in, no doubt listening to some sort of loud R&B, a genre he knew Bakugou enjoyed after catching him dancing to it once. In his hand, he was holding Wilbur , and stitching him. Only then did Kirishima notice the huge rip on his child’s belly. He managed to keep in his scream, and counted backwards from 50 to 1. He wasn’t really mad, just more shocked.
But then Kirishima realized. Wait. When did Bakugou learn how to sew? He knew that the boy was good in many things, but unfortunately, sewing was not one of his many strong points, backed up when he had to stitch his uniform before ultimately giving up and sending it in to a professional tailor.
But now, he was doing it expertly, with a focused gaze and looking pretty adorable, not gonna lie.
Kirishima now smiled, when he realized why Bakugou had learned to sew.