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Denki’s grandmother has always told him that he was a natural charmer. A good, kind boy with a kinder heart, she would tell him each night before tucking him in, accompanying the soft praise with an even softer brush of a weathered hand over his brow.
She’s never withheld love from him, always being the first person to cheer over — admittedly — abysmal grades or smile brightly whenever he came home from middle school with yet another card inviting him to one of his classmate’s birthday parties. Losing his parents at a young age did not, fortunately, mean that he would lose out on a loyal source of steadfast affection.
Denki has been raised in a loving home, under the watchful eye of a loving grandmother, and has not gone a single day without equally loving friends. He’s a lucky guy, all things considered. Sure, he’s just like everyone else; Denki’s had his fair share of bad days and insecurities, but at the end of the day he knows that there’s always at least one person around who adores him.
Denki is, in a direct result of his upbringing, something of an expert in love. The familial sort, the friendly sort, you name it and he’s felt it.
Up until now, the only type of love he hasn’t had the opportunity to experience was of the romantic sort, but the new student in his class — a boy a bit taller than him, with vivid purple hair and tired eyes that Denki would describe as soulful, beautiful, moving and a whole list of other pretty words given the chance to wax poetic — walked by him and Denki was left lovestruck.
The real, pre-quirk era Hollywood type of love. Love like L-O-V-E, emphasis on each and every letter. Explosion of color, head over heels, borderline embarrassing type of love. They always say when you know, you know, and Denki knows.
“That’s a bit corny,” Mina laughs after he tells her, bright-eyed and delighted.
Denki shakes his head and rolls over onto his side, burying his face into Mina’s pillowcase. Mina laughs a bit louder, mumbling something that sounds an awful lot like a teasing condemnation of his theatrics, but Denki doesn’t pay it much mind.
Bigger fish to fry. One fish, that is. The only fish in the sea for him, the —
“Y’know, you could just talk to him. This should be easy for you,” Mina cajoles. “Normally it’s hard to make you shut up.”
Denki scrunches his nose and groans, pressing the back of his hand to his forehead and tugging uselessly at his bangs. “I know, I don’t know what's wrong with me.”
“Well,” Mina starts. “And only since you asked, I can name at least a few things—”
“Don’t even start,” Denki cuts her off, the stern words softened by the laughter in his voice. “I’m being serious here, I don’t know what to do. My mouth goes all dry whenever I see him in class, and the words just — I dunno — disappear. It’s like, an entire thing. A messy, awful thing.”
Mina makes an appropriately commiserating sound. “Have you tried thinking about what you want to say before talking to him?”
Denki winces, a bit abashed. His cheeks warm with a red flush that he wishes he could hide, but his friend’s eyes are watchful. It’d be a waste of effort, and besides that, Denki doesn’t like to hide things from her. Even his own embarrassment. It’s not like she’d ever judge him — or anyone, really.
Mina is effortlessly good, in the same way that his grandmother calls him good.
“That’s the problem. I think I’m overthinking it.” He waits for Mina to say something, ears pricked for a — playfully — disparaging remark, but it never comes. When he chances a glance at her, he catches sight of the understanding look on her face and the gentle curve of her smile, and softens. “I just don’t want to mess this up. It’s pretty obvious that he doesn’t, like, feel great about being in our class. I want to be there for him.”
He wants to be a lot of things for Shinsou, Denki thinks. But his new classmate doesn’t come across like the type of dude who would jump into anything, and Denki would rather be a friend than a stranger. It wouldn’t even be settling, is the thing. Because being Shinsou’s friend sounds like it’d be a lot of fun.
He’s heard him exchange words with Midoriya a few times now, usually during lunch hour, and while Denki never thought dry wit and gallows humor would make his heart flutter, it totally does. Stranger things have happened, though, and by now Denki considers himself an expert in rolling with the punches.
And someone help him, because each time he managed to catch Shinsou’s eyes, it felt like he had been sucker-punched right in the heart.
Mina snorts, as if she can tell the mushy direction his thoughts have taken. Like the emotion is printed on his face, clear as day for all to say. It might be. Denki’s always been an open book.
“He might not want that,” she warns him. “He’s a little…closed-off.” Mina’s lips purse, drawing attention to the sparkly green lipgloss she’s wearing. Denki can tell that she’s trying to be kind about it, but the reminder still stings. Just a bit.
It’s not like he isn’t aware that Shinsou seems like he’d rather chop off his right arm than involve himself with any of his peers beyond the required participation. Denki will never claim to be the smartest person in the room, but he’s a friendly guy and with that comes social awareness. So yeah, he knows that Shinsou doesn’t want to hang out with the other students in 1-A. Including, or perhaps even especially, him.
Denki still wants to at least try to convince the newbie to come out of his shell, but it’s… well, it won’t be fine, but he’d understand if it doesn’t play out how he wants it to. He’s got a good group of friends to fall back on like a safety-net, need be. It’s difficult to be optimistic about potential heartbreak, but Denki has always vibed with the whole ‘glass half full’ outlook. So, it’d be cool either way. Cool, cool, cool. At least he’d be able to say that he tried.
And besides, heartbreak is part of the teenage experience. Denki is prepared for the learning curve.
“Him being standoffish now doesn't mean he’ll be standoffish forever. No permanent mindsets in heroics,” he says, deepening his voice to imitate Yamada-sensei, “here we’re all about personal growth.”
Mina’s eyes light up like Denki had just given her a gift. Which, yeah his impressions are fairly good but they’ve never made her react like this before.
“Dude, wait. That’s it! That’s your answer!”
Mina stands up suddenly while spreading her arms out at her sides and wiggling her fingers. The chair she was sitting in topples over, and from the next room over Uraraka yells out a ‘lower down, please!"
Mina hollers back an apology, before switching her attention back to him.
Denki shrugs. “Share with the class?”
“Yamada-sensei!” She shouts. “You can sit with him in class! It’s the perfect cover.” At Denki’s doubtful look, she continues. “Stop making that face, this could work! He always sits in the back by himself, so you won’t even have to fight someone out of their seat.”
Which all sounds well and good but, “What if he doesn’t want me to sit with him?”
Denki hates how insecure he sounds. He knows his doubts are getting the best of him but he can’t help it. Their first meeting doesn’t need to be perfect, that’s probably asking too much, but it needs to go well enough that Shinsou will want to talk to him again.
“Then he’ll tell you that, and then you and I can ask Aizawa-sensei for a permission slip to leave school grounds this weekend for some TLC.”
It takes Denki a minute to remember what the English abbreviation stands for, but once he does, he shoots Mina a reluctant smile.
“If this fails, you’re paying for my pity ice-cream.”
Denki hardly got any sleep last night, too nervous about the plan Mina helped concoct the day before.
He’ll be talking to Shinsou for the first time today. This feels monumental. He’s been careful not to build his expectations up too high, still worried that his classmate will turn him away. He’ll be disappointed either way, but if he can subdue how much he wants this to work out, then maybe it won’t hurt quite as bad if it doesn’t.
When he woke up this morning, there were deep purple bags beneath his eyes. Mina had been kind enough to help him apply his concealer to hide the evidence of his less than stellar night this morning before class, but now that they’ve gone through half the day, Denki starts to worry that the makeup needs to be touched-up.
The brand isn’t the best, since he bought the cheapest one available, so before he talks to Shinsou he should really request a bathroom pass to—
“Your anxiety is giving me anxiety, bro.” Eijiro says with a deep laugh. Denki envies his friend for the rumbling quality of his voice. The redhead always sounds so confident and cool; it’s the perfect voice for hero work.
Mina perks up, abandoning her desk in favor of throwing an arm around Denki’s shoulders and poking his cheek.
“Still worried, Denks?” Denki smiles ruefully, avoiding the questioning eyes of Eijiro and Hanta. “You got this, babe. If he doesn’t like you, I’ll—”
“Do nothing, because threatening your peers isn’t heroic,” Eijiro interrupts. Mina scowls exaggeratedly, but Eijiro doesn’t seem to be paying her faux dour expression any mind. “What’s up with you today?”
“Yeah man, you’ve been all out of sorts for the last week,” Hanta adds. “Meant to ask you about it, but I got wrapped up in some letters from home. Sorry, dude.”
Denki waves away the apology. He knows that it’s hard on his friend to have to wait for letters to arrive from home. His mom’s quirk doesn’t mesh well with technology, which leaves Hanta having to take the ancient route of keeping up to date with his family.
“You don’t owe me an apology for that. It’s all cool, I know you’ve got your own stuff. But,” he points a finger at Hanta’s nose. “If you didn’t pass on a hi for me to Mama Sero, we’ll be having words.”
Hanta snorts. “Oh yeah, don’t worry I made sure to write back that you said the cookies she sent last week were ‘totally delicious, Mrs S, you have no idea’.”
Katsuki, who had been silent up until now, barks a loud laugh at Hanta’s impression, before cutting Denki a scowling glance that would have been intimidating had Denki not learned by now that it’s simply Katsuki’s concerned face.
His friend’s got something of a mean mug. Denki doesn’t know how to tell him that he’ll have to work on that; it won’t translate well into comforting civilians, that’s for sure. Bedside manners are a must for their future career.
“Seriously, what’s wrong with you today?” Then, in a much quieter, almost gentle tone, Katsuki continues with, “I can see the cracks in your concealer. Nightmares again?”
Denki’s friends all grow somber at the reminder, and it’s clear on all of their faces that each of them are thinking of why he’d be having nightmares.
Before the sour mood could stick, Denki shakes his head in denial. “Nah, it’s not that. I mean, I didn’t sleep well, but not because of nightmares.” At Katsuki’s raised eyebrow, Denki looks to Mina for help, only to find her staring rather pointedly behind him.
Denki doesn’t have to turn around to know that she’s eyeing Shinsou.
His other friends soon turn to see what — or rather, who — has caught Mina’s eye, and then Denki finds himself the recipient of two amused faces. Katsuki just looks mostly done with all of it already, now that he's not worried about Denki’s well-being. Which, totally sweet bro, but maybe talk me through this too.
Except then Denki remembers that Katsuki can’t seem to sort out his own mixed feelings for Eijiro, let alone confront their friend about it, so maybe it’s for the best that Katsuki doesn’t help Denki with this.
Katsuki snorts. “Right. Have fun with that.”
“Yes, Denki,” Mina sing-songs while shoving him out of his desk, forcing him to his feet. “Have fun with that. Over there.”
Denki stumbles to his feet, eyeing Mina in mock betrayal, but she just narrows her eyes at him and yeah, okay, Denki is totally going to get this over with. Rip the bandaid off. He’s got this in the bag. Shinsou is only a few feet away. He can do this. He’ll just walk right over and play it real cool, totally nonchalant and —
“Hi!”
And maybe that was too perky, because the unimpressed twist of Shinsou’s mouth could rival Katsuki’s on his moodiest days.
“Can I help you?” Shinsou blinks up at him, and Denki hurries to sit down at the desk beside him, not wanting to tower over the poor guy.
Shinsou appears to be a bit gratified by not having to crane his neck, which Denki hopes is a good sign, but he’ll be continuing on regardless at this point. He’s got one foot in the door already, no sense in slamming it shut on himself before he can even attempt to…
He’s really not sure what he’s aiming for here, exactly. He’d like to date him, but he’d be happy to be friends. Both would be the ideal, if he can manage to impress his new classmate enough.
“I just wanted to meet you,” he says, figuring that’s honest enough. He can feel the weight of his friends’ eyes on him, and the back of his neck starts to heat up. He hopes that his ears aren’t turning red. Denki raises a hand in a cheery wave. “I’m Kaminari Denki. I’ve got an electrification quirk.”
He gestures at the signature lightning bolt in his hair, smiling.
Shinsou quirks a brow before snorting.
“Yeah, I know. It’s a bit on the nose, but at the same time, the hair would just be weird if my quirk was anything else, right? Like, can you picture a dude with a water quirk walking around like some pre-quirk era Pikachu cosplay? It’d be weird.”
“Shinsou Hitoshi,” his classmate responds, bypassing Denki’s word vomit. Probably for the best, Denki concedes. He doesn’t know why he said all of that in the first place.
He’s unable to say anything else, again probably a good thing, due to the arrival of Yamada-sensei.
Denki is quick to pull out his copy of their English textbook, and out of the corner of his eye he can see Shinsou mirroring his movements.
The lesson seems to drag on forever; Denki knows that English isn’t his best subject, but he normally finds himself enjoying this class despite his poor grasp on the topic. Yamada-sensei is good at what he does, and the cadence of his voice is quiet enough not to overwhelm while still managing to keep him entertained.
It helps that Denki is a huge fan of his teacher’s after school gig with the radio; he isn’t as dedicated a fan as Midoriya, but Denki will always be careful to show Yamada-sensei the proper respect in class.
Today, though, part of Denki’s focus has been pinned on his deskmate.
He becomes even more focused on Shinsou after Yamada-sensei announces to the class that he’s assigning a final project for the term. Denki is only half-listening to the details of the assignment, already angling his body towards his purple-haired peer and resting his chin on his hand.
All that he’s missing to complete the longing rom-com look is a pitched sigh, but Denki isn’t ready to go that far. Baby steps.
Yamada-sensei continues talking, and Denki continues watching Shinsou. It’s actually a bit unfair how pretty 1-A’s new student is; his hair looks soft to the touch and his eyes are a deep-set violet.
“It’s a collaborative project,” Yamada-sensei tells them jovially, his mustache twitching as he talks. “I’ll be allowing you to choose your own partner for this assignment, but would like to remind you all that this will be graded, and as such you should choose someone that you would work well with. You’ll be required to share some personal details as to what convinced each of you to pursue a career in heroics. From there, you’ll each be putting together a short, 500 word minimum essay — in English — on your partner’s journey.”
Denki’s smile dims a bit at the reminder that this is English class, and so of course the project needs to be done in English, but the momentary upset doesn’t last long.
This is it, he thinks, the opportunity Mina talked about, it’s here.
Denki feels a bit nauseous all of a sudden.
His nerves must be showing on his face, because he can hear Eijiro shouting out an offer of partnering with him — even though he knows his friend is aware that Mina would destroy him for ruining Denki’s chance with the cutie — but Denki doesn’t want to back out. No more playing chicken.
Without looking away from Shinsou, Denki turns his friend down. “Not this time, Kirishima! I want to get to know Shinsou-san!” His classmate’s face does something complicated, and Denki hurries to give the purple-haired boy an out. “I mean, only if you want to. Of course, we don’t have to partner up, but I thought it could be—”
Shinsou’s brows raise even higher, and Denki squeaks. “Nice. It could be nice, y’know, for us to work on this together. Yeah.”
Denki’s pretty sure he electrocuted himself. His nerves feel pretty friend, and his thoughts are a bit mush, in the way he only gets after overusing his quirk. Compared to his unease, Shinsou looks cool as a cucumber.
Denki is losing his mind.
“Sure,” Shinsou agrees easily.
Denki’s eyes widen comically, but he hurries to make plans, not wanting Shinsou to back out. Or worse, feel like Denki is just trying to use the new guy for an easy grade. He’s not like that, but Shinsou doesn’t know him well — yet ! — and he doesn’t want to get off on the wrong foot.
"What would you like to do your essay on? Like, is there a specific topic you want to focus on?” Denki is so excited he might vibrate out of his seat. Yamada-sensei is the best, Mina was right; this is the perfect way to get to know his taciturn classmate.
"We can start with you, can’t we?" Shinsou sounds defensive, and Denki flounders, unsure of what he said wrong to incite such a reaction. “I mean other than Midoriya, I haven't talked to anyone in this class much until right now. It’d be better to get to know one classmate before having to share stuff that’s…”
Denki mentally fills in the blank. A bit personal . And yeah, he gets it, probably should have expected this response anyway. Shinsou comes across as pretty shy once you get past all that snark.
"But you had to talk to Ojiro, right?" Denki asks, wanting to show the guy that he has — maybe not friends, but acquaintances in the class already. But Shinsou’s expression becomes even more guarded, and Denki is left to remember how unhappy Ojiro was with Shinsou’s actions during the Sports Festival.
Right.
Moving on. Don't look the trainwreck in the eye, Denki, it's rude.
“Alright,” Denki concedes. “We can totally start with me. I’m not going to turn down the chance to regale you with my origin story.”
He says it like a joke, voice lilting in all the right places, but Shinsou just looks eerily expectant.
Denki scratches the back of his neck, suddenly a bit shy himself. “I don’t really know where to start.” Describing himself to his classmate presents an unusual set of problems. He doesn’t want to bore the guy to tears, but he also can’t risk sounding cocky or dismissive or any other thing that would surely turn him off.
Shinsou looks disappointed, pushing his notebook away from him in favor of opening a textbook. He drums his fingers on the pages, drawing attention to chipped purple nail polish, and sighs. “Whenever you’re ready, then.”
And Denki means to try and work out a response, he really does, but his eyes catch on the name of Shinsou’s book, and he can’t help the way his jaw drops in amazement.
“Oh wow. That looks really advanced.” He’s not even exaggerating in an attempt to pay his crush a compliment; he knows that English isn’t a strength of his, but even he knows enough to recognize Shinsou’s chosen study material as advanced.
Shinsou doesn’t play demure, and Denki is pretty sure he’s in love with his classmate’s confidence. “It is.”
Denki sucks in a breath as the idea forms, a plan so perfect that it would get a Mina stamp of approval. “Tutor me!” He blurts out. And then flushes a deep, shameful red because he didn’t mean to make it sound like a demand.
Denki’s ears are ringing, and he can hear the bell go off in the background, signaling the end of class, but he can meet up with his friends after. Now that he’s made the request, he needs to get Shinsou to agree.
“Why would you want that? Doesn’t 1-A already receive tutoring from the third years?”
Denki’s mouth twists, pulling into a petulant frown. “Well, yeah, but the stuff you’re reading casually is more advanced than I’ve seen any of the older students studying. If I’m ever gonna learn, it should be from the best, right?”
For a long, tense moment, Denki thinks that Shinsou is going to say no.
“Fine,” Shinsou says instead, the answer to Denki’s prayers. “After classes today, we can meet at the library for an hour or two. But we’ll be working on both the paper and the tutoring.”
Denki can practically see stars burst behind his eyelids. “Great! That’s great! Maybe then you can tell me about yourself.” Shinsou tilts his head, and Denki stammers. “Y’know, for the project. So I can write about you. Like Yamada-sensei said.”
“Right,” his classmate nods, already turning away from Denki to pack up his belongings.
"Awesome! See you after school!"
He can’t wait to tell Mina about this.
“Dude, I can’t believe you managed to convince him to spend more time with you,” Hanta says with a laugh.
Denki squawks in mock offense. “People love spending time with me.”
Hanta quirks a brow, thumbing through a selection of Mina’s yarn. She’s been trying to teach all of them to crochet, but so far only Hanta and Katsuki have shown any talent for it.
Denki enjoys it, though. It’s nice to have something to fiddle with that’ll keep his hands occupied while his mind runs a mile a minute.
Besides, he and Eijiro are normally the ones to be gifted their friends’ creations, since neither of them can make their own scarves or stress plushies.
Katsuki snorts. “Sure, but Soundbox doesn’t seem to want to spend time with anyone, let alone a…” Katsuki’s brow furrows.
“Chatterbox?” Mina suggests, helpful to a — major — fault.
Around him, his friends all explode in laughter, but Denki knows that it’s all in good fun.
“Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up all you want, but I’m making moves.”
“A move. You’ve made a singular move,” Eijiro corrects.
Denki leans over to steal a chip from Hanta’s bag, and says, “Slow and steady, bro. One step at a time. I’m already growing on him.”
“Like fungus,” Katsuki huffs.
Denki waits for the other blond boy to meet his eyes, and then pointedly cuts a glance at Eijiro. Katsuki, understandably, shuts up.
Mina finally tears her eyes away from her patterned scarf — the yarn is in Aizawa-sensei’s colors, and Denki wonders if an important day for their homeroom teacher is coming up — to grin at him, bright and toothy.
“When are you seeing him next? Have you gotten anything down for your essay?”
“Not yet,” Denki admits. “We met at the library after class yesterday, but we mostly just talked about our schedules so we can plan better. I made a few notes but not much got done. He’s been helping me with my English, though!”
“Yeah,” Eijiro says thoughtfully. “I heard he was good at it. I overheard him and Yamada-sensei talking and dude is, like, fluent.”
“So what I’m hearing is that Denki has no excuses if his grammar is shit this time,” Katsuki says.
The explosive blond ducks the pillow Denki aims at his head.
“He’s so smart, you guys have no idea. The way he explains English makes it actually make sense. Yamada-sensei is good, but the way Shinsou teaches it…” Denki fumbles for the right word, not wanting to downplay his classmate’s efforts.
“Dumbs it down?” Denki glares at Hanta’s teasing, and his friend is quick to relent. “I’m glad you’re getting to hang out with him like you wanted, honest. It’s good that he’s being good to you, but if that changes.”
Hanta allows his words to trail off, but Denki understands what his friend is getting at even with the thought going unfinished. And if he didn’t, the cut throat motion Mina’s making behind him with her crochet hook would clear any misconception up right away.
“Nah guys, it’s… really good. Like, I’m happy with it, y’know.” Then, before his friends can collectively tease him some more, Denki changes the subject. “So, what’d you guys think about the fight Edgeshot had with that fox villain?”
Shinsou is already in the library when Denki arrives, ten minutes late.
“Dude, I’m so sorry, I know I’m late but I have a really good reason, I swear.” Denki announces, probably a bit too loudly if the reproachful look the librarian shoots at him is any sign.
He can feel the weight of Shinsou’s stare leveled at him as he hurries to unpack his notebook, pens (neon green glitter pens, from Mina) and some sticky notes to jot down any basic English vocabulary on the fly.
When the silence starts to feel more heavy than companionable, he chances a look at Shinsou only to find that, once again, his classmate is staring at him with a silent question present on the sly quirk of thin lips.
It seems like Shinsou is always looking at him like that, like Denki is always confusing and amusing him. Simultaneously, because Denki never does things by halves.
“Well,” Shinsou says. Denki offers a puzzled smile, which prompts Shinsou to continue. “What’s the reason?”
“Okay so maybe it’s not the best excuse, but I got held up by Hound Dog. I have some trouble with my quirk,“ Denki huffs a laugh, rubbing the back of his neck, a little awkward. “And he likes to talk it out with me whenever I get a bit fried. I don’t, like, need a quirk counselor or anything, but talking about the drawback helps. So, do you forgive me?”
Shinsou hums. “I haven’t decided yet.”
Denki feels a surge of electricity shoot up his spine. That was flirting, right? It must be. He’s pretty sure it is, at least, which totally makes the impromptu share circle worth the minor embarrassment.
Ignoring the heat in his face, Denki grins. “So, we should probably get started.”
Shinsou nods in agreement. “You mentioned last week that you were raised by your grandmother, right?”
“Oh, yeah!” Denki says, pleased that Shinsou remembered. “She’s totally awesome, you’d like her, I think. Everyone who meets her does. My parents died whenI was little, so she has always been basically my mom.”
Denki doesn’t feel any of the sadness one might expect when mentioning his parents; he really was young when they had passed, and barely remembers them. His grandmother talks about them often, but it’s not the same as having his own memories of them.
He mourns their loss, but more for the effect it continues to have on his grandmother than anything else. He’s happy with the way things have turned out for him; he can’t imagine not living with his loving grandmother. She’s always been there for him.
Even thinking about being raised by anyone but her would feel like a betrayal to the unconditional kindness she’s shown him ever since he was dropped off at her doorstep at three years old.
“How did they die?” Shinsou looks like he regrets asking almost as soon as the question escapes him, but Denki doesn’t mind.
“They got caught up in a villain attack,” he tells the other boy. “Wrong place, wrong time.”
Shinsou drops his pen, pushing his notebook to the side in favor of reaching across the table and resting his hand over Denki’s. “I’m sorry for your loss, even if you don’t remember much. Your grandmother sounds like a kind woman.”
Denki squeezes Shinsou’s hand, a bit choked up. “Yeah, she really is.”
“Why did you choose to become a hero? Was it because of what happened to your parents?”
Denki shakes his head, “No, I actually wanted to be a healer at first. But then my quirk came in and that put a stop to that dream.”
Shinsou tilts his head. “You don’t need a healing quirk to become a doctor, though.”
“Oh yeah, that’s true and all, but it definitely helps. And besides that, I think I wouldn’t be able to remain impartial enough for that career. It was a good childhood dream, but I’m like, a deeply emotional dude,” he shares with an easy laugh. “I’d get too attached to every person I see.”
“Won’t you have the same problem with heroics?” Shinsou doesn’t look judgmental, only thoughtful, and Denki’s heart swells a bit at how genuine his classmate’s interest seems. Like he’s not just asking for their assignment, but because he actually wants to know these things about Denki.
“Yeah, but you gotta admit, it’d be less weird for a hero to check in on fans he saved than it would if a doctor was like, writing letters to past patients just to chat.”
Shinsou huffs a startled laugh. “I guess.”
The two stare at one another for a minute in silence. Happy as Denki is to have Shinsou’s eyes on him, especially when it feels like he’s finally getting somewhere with his purple-haired classmate, he feels the need to break it before it becomes awkward.
“So, is that enough?”
With a quick glance at his notes, Shinsou nods. “Yeah, I can definitely write a five-hundred word essay with this. I’ll let you read it before we have to turn them in, though, just in case we need to add something last minute.”
Denki nods, pleased, and starts to pack up his materials when Shinsou stands up. That covers his side of the assignment, then; all that’s left is getting Shinsou to open up enough for Denki to write his own paper.
He thought that they were going to cover both of them today, but if Shinsou is done, he won’t push.
He’s about to zip up his book bag and make his way out of the library when his classmate calls out to him.
Confused, Denki turns around and shoots Shinsou a questioning glance. “What’s up? Did you change your mind about wrapping up for the day?”
Shinsou shakes his head. “I have to get home,” Shinsou denies. “But I thought that maybe we could get an early lunch tomorrow instead of meeting up here. I can get a pass from Aizawa-sensei, if you want.”
Shinsou is staring at him like he’s expecting Denki to say no. Denki can’t imagine why anyone would ever turn down the offer of a — friendly! — brunch date with him.
“Sure!” He says, not bothering to censor the genuine excitement in his voice. “Did you have somewhere in mind?”
Shinsou hums. “The café near the station?”
“Alright! Eleven?” At Shinsou’s agreeing nod, Denki cheers and salutes. “Just give me my pass tonight during dinner in the dorm after you get it from Aizawa-sensei, okay?”
Despite Denki’s best efforts to arrive first — and seriously, he tried so hard, even going so far as to set his alarm to go off earlier than usual — Shinsou is already halfway through a latte by the time he arrives. He spots a second untouched drink on the opposite side of the table. Well then , he thinks, that has to be a promising sign .
Surely, his aloof classmate wouldn’t bother with ordering a drink for Denki if he didn’t have at least a passing interest in him.
Grinning shyly, Denki raises a hand in hello. “Thought we agreed on eleven?”
Shinsou shrugs. “You’re here early too.”
Touché.
“Yeah, well,” Denki says as he pulls out a chair across from his classmate, “I didn’t want to be late for our first official...”
Picking up where Denki’s voice trailed off, Shinsou huffs. “Outing?”
Denki would really prefer to call this a date, but outing works. Outing is great, in fact. He hopes that the two of them can have many more outings, and he really hopes that eventually he’ll be able to convince Shinsou to use the four lettered D-word instead. D-A-T-E. It’ll be great.
“So,” Denki says, “are we ordering food or…” Truthfully, he doesn’t think he could stomach much right now with his stomach roiling in nervous pleasure.
He’s relieved when Shinsou shakes his head.
“Not yet,” Shinsou says. “I want to talk about the assignment first. You still need to hear about my reasoning behind choosing heroics.”
Denki nods and leans back in his seat. He doesn’t bother to grab a pen and paper from his book bag; with how reticent Shinsou has been regarding personal details, he feels like it’d be a dick move to take notes while his classmate opens up.
Denki is a huge hero nerd. He knows that origin stories are rarely happy.
Shinsou doesn’t mince words.
“I have been in foster care for years. I will most likely age out at eighteen and have to figure things out for myself as soon as that birthday comes,” his classmate says lightly, as if that isn’t one of the most horrifying things Denki has ever heard.
He almost blurts out something he knows Shinsou has probably heard half a dozen times by now, like ‘oh, I can’t imagine how hard that must be’ but manages to bite his lip before the stupid can flow out like word vomit.
Instead of offering support through words, Denki reaches across the table and takes Shinsou’s hand in his, smoothing his thumb over the other boy’s pale skin. There’s a small scar he never noticed before cutting across Shinsou’s knuckles, and he wonders if he’ll ever get to hear about how it got there.
After taking a deep breath, Shinsou continues talking. It seems like now that he started, the truth won’t stop spilling out.
“It’s…not common, exactly, for parents to give up their children over quirkist biases, but my quirk isn’t all that common either.”
Denki’s voice starts to rise up in protest, but Shinsou shakes his head. “Even with the help of a quirk counselor, brainwashing is still dangerous and in the hands of a child… Well, people agreed that my birth mom was right when she said she couldn’t continue raising me after my quirk developed.”
Shinsou’s eyes take on a faraway look, and Denki would question if his classmate even knew that he was still sitting with him if it weren’t for the fingers digging into his hand with urgency.
“She was a single mother, young and on her own. It made sense that she was scared. I’m not excusing it,” Shinsou says, probably reading the disgusted look in Denki’s eyes. “But her quirk was apparently similar. She couldn’t brainwash people, Persuasion apparently doesn’t allow for that much control, but she knew that the bias against me would be even worse than what she must have faced. So yeah, I guess I can understand the fear even if I don’t understand anything else.”
Denki squeezes Shinsou’s hand in reassurance.
“You can take a break if you need to.”
“It’s fine,” Shinsou says, “but maybe don’t go including all of this in the essay.”
Denki grimaces. Yeah, Yamada-sensei doesn’t need all the gritty details. “You can read it over before I turn it in,” he offers, recalling Shinsou’s promise to do the same.
“I’ve been in foster care almost my entire life, and like I said, I am under no delusion that it’ll change.” The twist of Shinsou’s lip turns sardonic. “Turns out, people don’t want to adopt a kid that was destined from nappies to develop into a villain.”
Denki can’t keep his silence any longer, even though his gut sours at the thought of interrupting the impromptu share circle they’ve got going on here.
“You’re not a villain, Shinsou,” he tells the other boy, hopeful that his classmate will believe him if he sounds serious enough. “Being part of class 1-A has given me some up close and personal encounters with real villains, and you’re nothing like those idiots. A villain wouldn’t have ever fought as hard as you did to get into the heroics course.
Shinsou looks shocked, and maybe just a little touched.
Denki grins at him. “I mean, damn. You got your ass kicked by Midoriya— that wasn’t for nothing, y’know. It’s good that you’re here. It’s where you’re meant to be, if you wanna talk about destiny or whatever. Though fair warning if we’re getting into the magic of fate: there’s a pre-quirk era game I think you’ll enjoy if this is a common topic for you.”
He must’ve said something right, because Shinsou chokes on a laugh, almost like the sound was startled out of him. Denki wants to hear it again, immediately, but it’ll have to wait.
“It’s not all bad, anyway. I get to travel a lot, going from foster home to foster home,” Shinsou says, his frown revealing how he really feels about that. “I’ve definitely seen more of Japan than you. And my current foster parents are fairly…”
“Good?” Denki questions hopefully.
“Fair,” Shinsou says. “They’re scared of what my quirk can do, but I’ve been with them for a few years now and it’s improving, bit by bit. I mostly use English at home; they can’t answer a question they don’t understand.”
Denki gasps in horror, but Shinsou waves off his displeasure, like this is normal. And while it is for Shinsou, as Denki is slowly realizing, that doesn’t make it okay.
“It’s not perfect or anything, but it’s not like I want people to be afraid of me. There’s food on the table and a warm bed to sleep in. It beats some of the other foster homes.”
“Is that why you got into heroics, then?” Denki isn’t asking for the essay; he just wants to know. He wants to know everything about Shinsou.
He really, truly, undeniably wants it all.
It’s very sappy. He loves the feeling.
“A lot of it was spite,” Shinsou says, and his tone almost sounds apologetic like that’s a bad thing. “But I fought tooth and nail to get here and I guess along the way I started to want to pursue it for me, instead of because of what’s said about me.”
His classmate’s grip on his hand loosens, and Denki throws caution to the wind and hugs Shinsou once the other boy starts to tremble.
“I want to speak against quirkist rhetoric, and people are more likely to listen to someone at the top over some nameless bottom feeder,” Shinsou shrugs. “So heroics it is.”
Denki squeezes the other boy even tighter in response, a bit surprised he hasn’t been pushed away yet. He supposes the conversation has been emotionally draining for the both of them.
“I think you’ll do well, Shinsou.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Denki says, “I think you’ll do really, really well.”