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It’s about half way through the semester when Izuku gets the idea. The thought came to him in bits and pieces, but the mere idea didn’t pop in his head like a light bulb. No, the original idea sprouted similar to a weed, it started with roots. And by roots he means the bad thoughts, suicidal thoughts that make his guts squeeze and his throat dry. The roots were the base of the weed, and with a little water and sunlight the roots grow bigger and deeper into the ground. That’s when the idea, or shall he say weed evolved into a magnificent dandelion.
He watches from the sidelines as it grows and turns into a fountain of hope, opposite from the darkness the fills his head. And with that hope comes more roots, roots that Izuku knows not even the sharpest sheers can cut.
Thats probably when the reality of this whole situation hits him, because as magnificent as the dandelion may be it is, him blindly following and trusting this new hope will truly will be his downfall. For hidden under the seeds that flowers new hope there are still roots, and somehow while Izuku was watching the dandelion grow he must have forgotten that even though it is beautiful it is still a weed.
The idea comes slowly after the recognization that he’s been tricked by his own mind. And during that time the depression he’s been dealing with seems to skyrocket, just as his bullies attempts to push him down farther.
He still doesn’t know exactly why or maybe what brought him to do this incredibly stupid idea in the first place. All he knows is that slowly his mind switched from wanting to become a hero like All Might to wanting to not become anything at all. And yeah maybe it’s stupid how his mind just decides randomly one day just to give up on living, but on the other hand Izuku has never felt so happy to just give up.
Izuku finds it tiring to look back up at his tormentors face every single day, but thinking about his roots feels different than before. The thought of dying gives him something to look forward to, the fact that there’s a way to just end all of his suffering makes his bad days go by just a little bit easier.
So maybe that’s why he’s doing this, standing in front of his camera clicking the white button watching it blink back red, on the roof of his apartment building, eleven stories up.
Izuku turns away from the camera and walks back over to the stairway entry wall, he lets his back hit the wall, and he slides down into a crisscross. The sky above him is painted navy, there’s barely enough light to even see and maybe that one of the reasons why Izuku started recording. Because secretly he knew that even if someone watched this they wouldn’t have enough information to stop him when the time came.
Izuku sighed as he looked back up at the camera, he feels emotionally numb as the words on his mind fall out like a gumball that has been stuck between the machine’s gears for years.
“Every breath I take is killing me, and every time I wake up from another nightmare I find myself waking up to a worse one.” Izuku pauses because he feels wet tears falling down his face but no strong emotional connection to the sad memories he is reliving. His hand brushes the droplets away harshly and sighs in disappointment before slumping more against the wall.
“Sometimes when I go to bed, I wish I didn’t wake up. And maybe today that bullying is just get to me, but seriously every time I find myself looking out a window I think about how nice it would be to just jump. I think about how nice it would be to fall and how when I hit the concrete I wouldn’t have to deal with societies sick standards.” He sighs and lets himself succumb to a smile, but just briefly before he looks up towards the sky.
“I think about how nice it would be to breathe again, to let the pain fall away. And when I think about it there only really one way for me to feel like that.” His arms shake as he lifts them inspecting the scars that litter them. There are hundreds most of the are old and starburst shaped from his classmates but there are a few new ones that stick out, there’re jaggy and raw and they fill up most of the space between his hands to his elbow. His throat goes dry with shame as he draws a finger against the misshapen lines.
After a few silent moments Izuku looks up at the stars and huffs out a horse laugh. “You know when I start recording this I thought that it would help me mentally… you know like somehow venting my pain would take my mind off of everything. But Satan blessed this is so awkward, like I can just imagine some random person clicking onto their homepage looking at the title of this video and asking themselves ‘should I call the police?’. Or maybe someone out there is searching for away out so they find this video and they’re hoping that I’ll quote some famous person like Endeavor. And somehow, magically my wisdom and way with words will save them from the mid life crisis they’re having.” Izuku giggles a little at the thought before continue on with his train of thought.
“You know what? Now I feel dumb, I should have just wrote some poetic shit about how life sucks and I failed, and then go jump off a roof.” More tears slip down his face and Izuku turns away from the camera even though he know no one would be able to tell because on the lack of light. Each breath he takes is forced as he hooks a hand in his hair.
“But here I am being a worthless deku,” Izuku hisses the words out like they are venom on his tongue, “breaking down in front of and audience of nobodies.” There’s a pause and that when something in Izuku brain just clicks.
“Why is my head so fuck up, that for some strange reason I can even ask someone for help? Why can’t I be fucking normal like everybody else? Why does everyone I meet hate me? And why-“ Izuku’s breath hitches.
“Why is it that every time I at myself in the mirror I wish I’d never been born at all?”
Izuku head is spinning as he finally looks back up at the camera red light still blinking, signaling that the battery is dead. Tears are rolling down his face as he stands up. The cold night breeze is calming against the sound of cars passing by below him. Izuku picks up the camera and heads back towards the stairs, but right before he goes he turns back to face the open rooftop.
And there right where the camera use to be is a notebook. It’s old and burnt, the word written on it are now no more than mere ashes. Izuku smiles as he turns away and walks towards a new home, and he’s still smiling even after he exited the roof. Because today really was one of the worst days he’s very had, but some how Izuku had changed and this time is wasn’t for the worst.
This time he stopped trying to cut the weed out, instead he gave up and planted a new seed. And Izuku know as he walks away from his home, his old life, and his roots that all he needs is a little water and sunlight and his new seed will grow up to be something better then a dandelion.
And maybe one day he’ll finally know the answer to why he hated himself so much. But today that doesn’t matter, because he can create his own latter, because sometime it’s not worth the fall. And really the answer is a simple one at that, all he needed to do was put his hope and trust in someone else, because wishing on a dandelion gets him no where.
So Izuku walks away from the rooftop that day, putting his hope and trust into himself as his feet take him far away from his roots. And yeah he’ll still have bad days but the good ones are the only ones he plans on counting. And so far there’s only one weed in his garden full of flowers.