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Papa and Tou-chan alternate who takes Akira to school in the morning. This morning it’s Tou-chan, so Papa’s on his way to work while Akira’s still in bed, and he can hear his parents’ hushed voices out in the living room. It’s still dark outside and everything looks blue in the light.
Akira slips his feet into his house slippers and gets out of bed. Then he runs to Papa, who sees him coming and scoops him up with a big smile. Akira feels warm all over, because this means he was right, Papa didn’t wanna go to work without seeing him.
“Oi, oi,” Papa says. “Gettin’ heavier on me already, huh?”
(This is good too. Akira wants to be as big and strong as Papa someday).
“I eat my vegetables,” Akira says (they must be working).
Tou-chan sighs. “It’s four am. You’re going to be tired later.”
…Maybe.
Tou-chan is usually right. He always seems to know when Akira’s going to be sleepy or hungry (or scared).
But Akira doesn’t care about how sleepy he might get later, because when Papa works he’s gone for hours and sometimes he comes home with cuts and scrapes (or worse, Akira doesn’t like to think about that if he can help it). Akira has to see him now, or he won’t feel right all day.
“Be safe today,” Akira orders sternly.
Papa ruffles his hair. “Don’t worry. I’ll kick some villain ass and then I’ll be right back here with both of you, make no mistake.”
“No mistakes,” Akira nods, then he throws his arms around Papa’s neck and hugs him tight.
When he lets go he can’t help but yawn, and for some reason this makes both Tou-chan and Papa smile at each other. Grownups are weird and they find a lot of stuff funny that Akira just doesn’t understand.
“Katsuki, let me take him back to bed,” Tou-chan says and he opens his arms, after which Akira is passed to him.
Which is…okay.
Akira sometimes thinks he’s too big to be carried, because it makes him feel like a baby, and he’s not a baby, but Tou-chan is warm and it’s only a few steps to his bed, where Tou-chan puts him down and tucks him back in again.
“Papa’s very careful,” Tou-chan says, soothing the worry that’s already pushed its way to the surface of Akira’s mind. “And he has support.”
An image of a green blur flashes in Akira’s mind. A familiar freckled face. He feels better.
Akira nods, and then his stomach rumbles and his attention drifts. Dinner was a really long time ago.
“Pancake breakfast?”
(Tou-chan’s pancakes are almost as good as Papa’s pancakes now.)
Tou-chan drops a kiss on Akira’s forehead. “Sure.”
Akira falls asleep again thinking of a warm stack of pancakes with blueberries, cut strawberries, and his lunchbox full of something Papa made the night before with a carton of strawberry milk.
*
When the morning comes he gets out his uniform and gets dressed all by himself. Tou-chan is awake in case his head gets stuck (like it did just the one time). There’s already a stool in their bathroom so Akira can brush his teeth, and he uses the exact same toothpaste as his parents now, and not the children’s kind.
He and Tou-chan have breakfast together at their kitchen counter, and when Tou-chan finishes first he starts moving around the kitchen: first packing Akira’s lunch, then bringing out a comb to fix up Akira’s hair.
“Don’t comb down my spikes,” Akira mentions.
“Of course not,” Tou-chan promises. “I love your spikes.”
Tou-chan put the extra blueberries that didn’t go in the pancakes on his plate, so Akira stuffs them all in his mouth at the same time.
He’s seen Papa eat like this before, with his spicy peanut snacks.
“Did you pack my new pencil bag?” Akira asks.
It was a gift from Izu-chan from America. Red white and blue with white stars.
“Mhm,” Tou-chan confirms, and he pops a kiss on Akira’s head once he’s done combing his hair.
“Thanks,” Akira says, and then he feels another hit of worry. “Are you going to work after this?”
“Yes.”
“You be safe too,” he thinks back to what Papa might say, even though he doesn’t quite know what it means. “Or else.”
“Or else?” Tou-chan asks, amused.
“Yeah. Like Papa says it.”
“I see. Do you remember what else Papa told you…about me and him, and hero work?”
“Heroes save to win and win to save,” Akira says, excited to show how well he remembers. “And you work as a team, so everyone gets help, and no one gets left behind. He also told me…well I already knew, but he told me that you’re so strong…and he even used to be intimidated by how strong you are. So I should know that you’ll keep yourself safe.”
His Tou-chan isn’t just Tou-chan, but he’s also Pro Hero Shouto, and when he’s being a hero he’s a lot different than the soft, warm Tou-chan who cuddles Akira when he’s scared and reads him stories at night. Akira thinks of the heaven piercing ice wall. About Flashfire Fist.
“And you’re strong too,” Tou-chan reminds him. “Don’t forget that.”
“Never,” Akira shakes his head and promises.
*
In class at school, Tsumi-chan scooches her stool close to Akira’s chair again. She keeps doing this and Akira doesn’t know why. Maybe she wants to be friends? That might be nice.
She doesn’t even talk to him much though, she just likes to look at what he’s drawing.
Until today.
“I like your pencil case,” she says.
“Thank you,” Akira says, then continues to color.
“Can I see it?” she asks.
Well, he doesn’t see any problem with that. He hands her the case.
“Where did you get one like this?”
“It was a present,” Akira says. “Izu-chan, gave it to me.”
He pauses a second, and realizes she probably doesn’t know who Izu-chan is, so he clarifies. “Izu-chan is Deku.”
“From Deku?” she asks, and her eyes grow wide, wide, wide. “That’s so cool!”
By lunch she’s told everyone else. All of his classmates keep asking to see it, and at first Akira is okay with that, but it starts getting annoying. He doesn’t see why it’s such a big deal that he got a present from Izu-chan. Izu-chan gets him presents from all of his trips.
He didn’t mean to be a show off.
At least everyone’s attention goes to their teacher after lunch. She’s going to announce two class monitors today. She makes a small speech about how she’s going to pick the kids she thinks are showing great responsibility, and how after a few weeks, they’ll alternate so everyone gets a turn eventually.
Akira doesnʼt expect to get picked. He follows rules and he tries to do his work on time but he doesnʼt think heʼs anything special.
But the teacher calls his name.
He gets to go up to the front, and wear a special pin, and when he gets up there with everyone’s eyes on him he’s scared for a moment, then remembers what Tou-chan told him. He’s strong. He can do this.
By the time he walks back to his spot, he feels pretty good about the whole thing. Even if the other class monitor is Tsumi-chan, and he’s still sort of frustrated that she told the whole class where he got his pencil case.
When he gets home…he can tell Papa and Tou-chan, and he can’t wait to see their faces. He’ll tell them that his teacher said he was responsible, and that he’s going to have important stuff to do every day.
He smiles to himself as he goes and gets his coat from his cubby. But before he can reach the row of cubbies, he hears his name.
“Aki-chan just gets everything and it’s not fair,” it’s Sato-chan’s voice. “All because he’s Dynamight Jr.”
That’s the name the people with cameras who camp out outside their apartment building call Akira. Because Akira looks like his Papa, and Dynamight is Papa’s name.
“Didya see how he was showing off his pencil case today?” another boy says. “So lame.”
Oh.
Akira feels his eyes sting. He’ll go and get his coat later then.
*
He thinks about it during dinner. Instead of eating he spends time moving his vegetables around the plate.
Tou-chan has a new bandage on his cheek that wasn’t there this morning, and before dinner Papa needed Tou-chan to ice and numb a part of his leg, so he doesn’t want to bother them with what happened at school.
“I’m not feeling good, can I go to bed?” Akira asks, and his voice comes out smaller and shakier than he would like.
He doesn’t want that. He’s not a baby. He’s strong. He’s—
“What’s wrong?” Papa gets up, and crouches down next to Akira (he winces as he does it, he must have put his weight on his hurt leg). “Head hurtin’ ya? Stomach?”
“Stomach,” Akira says, and it’s not even a lie, because his stomach’s been hurting ever since he heard what Sato-chan said about him near the cubbies.
About how him being the class monitor is all fake.
Papa presses the back of his hand against Akira’s forehead, and he looks at Tou-chan, who’s on Akira’s other side. “He’s not warm, Shou.”
“How bad does it hurt?” Tou-chan asks. “A lot or a little?”
“Just a little,” Akira says, already guilty about making them worry.
“You havenʼt eaten a lot. Are you up to eating something else, something easy?” Tou-chan asks.
“Yeah.”
“Katsuki, you think you can make him a strawberry milkshake?” Tou-chan turns to him. “You think you could eat that?”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Put it by his bed, if he’s hungry at night he can have some, maybe he’ll feel up to it in a few minutes,” Papa suggests.
Akira likes this idea. So that’s what they do. Papa disappears off into the kitchen and Tou-chan tucks him into bed.
Tou-chan asks him a few other questions about what hurts, and then later when Papa brings the milkshake and sets it on Akira’s nightstand, Papa tells Akira that if it starts hurting more, then heʼs gotta wake them up right away.
He ruffles Akira’s hair before he goes, and Tou-chan is about to go with him, when Akira sits up and grabs his shirt sleeve. “Could you stay a minute?”
Akira still feels guilty about making them think he’s sick, but he does feel sick…so maybe, no, he’s definitely been bad.
Everything feels wrong, and he’s overwhelmed, and his eyes start stinging again. Tou-chan knows even before Akira does, and he scooches closer right when Akira needs to be close, and he hugs Akira tightly and doesn’t let go.
Akira loves Tou-chan more than anything else in the world.
“Can I tell you a secret?” he whispers.
“Yes.”
“I’m the class monitor,” he explains, still holding on to Tou-chan’s middle.
It sort of feels like the heaven piercing ice wall is around him and Tou-chan (even though it really isn’t) and no one else can get at them.
“That shows a lot of responsibility,” Tou-chan hums approvingly.
“What if…what if I was just picked because I look like Papa?”
“You know…neither me nor your Papa were class monitors at your age,” Tou-chan says.
It’s a shock.
“What?” he looks up at Tou-chan.
“Really,” Tou-chan smiles. “Your Papa…wasn’t quite suited to it. Neither was I. And…even if we were, that doesn’t have anything to do with why you were picked. You have a good teacher, you like her, right?”
“Right.”
“You think she’s smart?”
“Mhm.”
“Then you know that she wouldn’t pick you for a bad reason. She picked you because she thought you would do a good job. The only thing that matters now is if you think you can do a good job.”
“I can,” Akira insists. “I will.”
“I don’t doubt that at all,” Tou-chan smoothes down Akira’s hair. “You know Aki…I call you mini Katsuki sometimes, but I don’t love you because you’re like your Papa. I love you because you’re Akira.”
Akira likes just listening to Tou-chan’s voice sometimes, so he snuggles closer. He can also hear Tou-chan’s heartbeat. It’s nice and even. Steady.
He listens as Tou-chan names all of Akira’s unique hobbies. His puzzle solving. How much he loves fruits. His hat collection (only three so far).
He listens as Tou-chan points out times he’s seen Akira be fair and kind and helpful. And when all that’s finished Tou-chan kisses his head and just rocks him. Everything’s alright.
Akira doesn’t feel sick at all.
Hm. Maybe he should have that milkshake? Or...no. He has a better idea.
“Can you stay with me?” Akira asks.
He wants to keep Tou-chan. Hopefully Papa won’t mind.
They squeeze into the twin bed, and Akira cuddles into Tou-chan’s chest again and starts to tell him about everything else that happened at school: Tsumi-chan and the pencil case. He talks about their lesson for the day, and the coloring he did, and he falls asleep without even realizing it.