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The smell of burnt eggs and spices filled Hizashi’s nostrils. Unlike most semi-chaotic mornings in the Yamada-Aizawa household, which were full of sleepy yawns and sugar-hyped ramblings of the latest saga in Eri’s playdate dramas, this morning was loud.
Really loud.
Like, Hizashi couldn’t yell this loud in the morning even if his quirk was magnified by 110 percent loud.
Loud shouts and clanking pots interrupted the blissful atmosphere and trampled on his wish for one peaceful Saturday morning, and one singular voice—that degrading voice that raked his brain until only hatred and anger were left—cut through the air.
“My bad, tío!”
As he stretched and walked down the hallway, he passed the living room where their comfy blue couch and the fluffy blankets he impulsively bought were scattered about.
His nephew had spent the night and was now brewing a tsunami to destroy his quaint home. The boy had probably used his scheming smile and deceitful puppy eyes on his infuriatingly kind and loving uncle to shimmy his way into their home. And based on the amount of Spanish conversing and cooking, he had no plans on leaving any time soon.
Sure enough, Hizashi rounded the corner and saw two heads of black hair crowding the stovetop, with eggs, spices, Shouta’s homemade tortillas (he still wasn’t sure how the man didn’t burn his fingers off every time he flips them over with his bare hands), salsa, beans, and cheese. From the back, the only thing distinguishing the two of them were the gray hairs that littered his husband’s head.
Seemingly unaware of his presence—he knew that they knew he was there. Hero training made them constantly aware of their surroundings—the duo bickered back and forth in Spanish and laughed.
“Are you going to stand there all day or make yourself useful and set the table?” Shouta’s voice interrupted his leering.
“Yeah, Mic, are you?” Shouta’s henchman taunted. Hizashi gritted his teeth and stalked toward the table, the same annoying rush of anger flooded his veins.
Shouta’s stupid little nephew, Sero Hanta, was the biggest nuisance in his life. It was bad enough that he had to see the little shit at school, now the kid thought it was fine to invade more of his life, barge into his safe spaces, and claim his couch and food and husband for himself? Not on his watch.
If Hizashi had it his way, the kid would only be around during holidays, if that. The kid was pure evil, and it killed him that Shouta never saw that side of him.
Hizashi grumbled to himself as he roughly grabbed the placemats. The kid was now hunched over the pan, moving back and forth to avoid the playful swats Shouta “tried” to land while sprinkling cheese onto the tortillas. He grinned from ear to ear, his shoulders completely relaxed, and occasionally shook his head to get the bangs and hairs that fell from the ponytail, which held back his god awful greasy unstylish helmet hair, out of his eyes.
Hizashi scoffed. The kid had even mimicked Shouta’s hairstyle.
“Morning, dad.” Hitoshi yawned as he stumbled into the kitchen.
Hizashi looked up and smiled. His son had a serious case of bed head, multiple strands stuck out everywhere while a few stranglers clung to his forehead. The purple and silver headphones he was almost never without hung around his neck. Every time Hitoshi wore them, Hizashi lit up. It was a Christmas gift from Shouta three years ago and to see how much the kid treasured them made his heart fill with joy.
“Is your sister up?” Shouta asked as he scraped the food out of the pan and onto a plate. Hitoshi shrugged behind the man, stretching his hands toward the ceiling. He cracked his back, another yawn escaped his mouth with the crescendo of pops, before letting his arms drop back to his side and holding out his fist to Sero.
“Hey man, the guys and I are thinking about going to the mall later. You want to come?” Sero gave him a fist bump and a slight smack on the back.
“Why? And hang out with your dumbass friends?” Hitoshi laughed.
Sero rolled his eyes, lightly elbowing the insomniac in his side, which caused the other boy to feign pained groans.
Shouta stifled his grin—an Aizawa signature one that could brighten Hizashi’s skies at the drop of a hat—and continued to slide the crispy tortillas onto the plate. At some point, he must’ve switched with his nephew. He could picture it now, his husband shoving the boy out of the way while the kid held his hands up in playful surrender.
“I’m pretty sure there’s one dumbass you actually want to see.” Sero smirked. “Blond hair, about yea high, has a weird fixation with saying ‘kachow’ at any given moment?”
Hitoshi glared at the raven-haired boy and snatched the plate Shouta held out of his hands. Sero’s smirk widened, his body standing taller in his victory and cheekily moved to the fridge to grab drinks.
In turn, Hizashi smacked his teeth and grimaced. There was nothing cute or kind about Sero’s smile. It was full of taunts and smugness, the same malicious and condescending look a predator gave to his prey once he cornered the poor bastard. It was full of teeth—straight out of a true crime documentary about serial killers if anyone asked him—sharp, pointed, and crooked.
Fitting, Hizashi thought. He wouldn’t dare say any of this to Shouta though. He remembered the first time he commented on the menace’s smile, and his adorably blind husband practically puffed out his chest in pride and said he had an Aizawa smile ‘through and through.’
He scoffed at the memory. Their smiles weren’t the same. An Aizawa smile was warm, while Sero and his mother’s were ice cold, capable of refreezing the ice caps with the slightest glimpse. Polar bears shivered at the mere thought of it.
Hizashi flinched at the clattering of a cup in front of him. His husband—his wonderful, thoughtful husband who was never selfish unlike his spoiled nephew—had made a pot of coffee just for him. Hizashi smiled lovingly at the man. What he had done to deserve him, he would never know.
“Thanks for the coffee, love.” The blond grabbed his husband’s arm, squeezing it slightly at the smell of his favorite brown sugar, apple, and caramel syrups.
Shouta smiled and slid into the seat next to him, leaning back into the homemade cushions. It was rare for them to have a moment to themselves, where they could be wrapped up in each other’s presence without the weight of the world looming over them. It was calming, something that he basked in.
“Where are the kids?” Hizashi asked as he reached for the cup and brought it up to his lips.
“Toshi and Hanta are waking Eri up,” Shouta hummed.
Hizashi choked on his mouthful of coffee, the hot liquid burned the back of his throat. Of course, they were. They would probably gang up on her and tickle her awake or something heinous like that.
Tickling could be dangerous. He would know. He was an expert tickler.
Shouta shot him a confused look during his coughing fit, one eyebrow raised in offer of help, but Hizashi waved him off. “Just went down the wrong pipe,” Hizashi weakly chuckled, playing off his discontent as anything but bitterness.
However, his husband always saw through him, straight to the beating pumps of his heart and the firing neurons in his brain. Shouta sighed, one singular puff full of disappointment, but was otherwise silent.
Somehow, that was worse.
Hizashi shook his head, willing his vengeful mind to let go of a stupid grudge against a sixteen-year-old boy who had proven himself to be anything but evil. But every time he looked at him, he wasn’t greeted by the laid-back demeanor everyone else regarded him as. He faced the same nine-year-old boy with a devious grin who brought chaos that washed over every part of him until the wounds were forever drenched in resentment and fear. Shouta’s nephew was a spider he found behind his lover in their midnight embrace. A bad omen that paralyzed his very thought of closure.
“Shouta…” His words drifted off into the current of Sero’s storm, drowned out by the aftershocks and dragged under the force of his presence. Shouta waited patiently for him, unbothered by the waves and destruction his husband was buried under, with a sad glint in his eyes.
“I’m trying,” Hizashi spoke quietly, fearing the reaction from the man he loved. The man in question hummed, his tongue dragged along his top teeth, and murmured “I know.” His words sounded compassionate, but his body language said otherwise. Once again, Shouta closed himself off, shutting down any further conversation into his thoughts toward Hizashi’s feelings, and refused to directly acknowledge his displeasure.
They were right back to square one, on the brink of a decade’s old fight that was constantly thrown in Hizashi’s face whenever he walked into work or had the misfortune of listening to his son’s adventures with the “Bakusquad” or talked to his husband’s side of the family he tried so hard to avoid.
He will never understand.
The sooner Hizashi got that through his mind, the better.
“Daddy!” Eri’s giggles filled the air. Hizashi turned his head at the bundle of joy who skipped into the room.
“Good morning, Eri!” Hizashi picked up his abandoned coffee, sipping it once more. He braced himself for impact, the weight of the forty-five-pound girl crashed into his arms in a flash.
“Good morning, Papá!” The girl grinned to Shouta as she buried herself into Hizashi’s side.
Shouta hummed in acknowledgement and returned her smile, lips tight while picking up his own coffee to hide behind.
“How’d you sleep, little listener?” Hizashi asked, leaning his head on top of hers, mindful of her horn.
Heavy footsteps walked into the kitchen nook from the hallway, the tail end of arguing echoed off the wall and overwhelmed the deceptive peace he and Shouta fell into.
“Dude, I already told you! I’m not playing another horror game with you!” Sero shook his head at Shinso’s exasperated antics. “Not after last time.”
“I didn’t think a future pro hero would be so scared over a little game,” Hitoshi snickered as the duo flopped down onto the empty kitchen chairs.
“First off, it was creepy as heck.” Sero glanced quickly at the little girl—who stared at him with wide eyes and the telltale tattle tell expression forming on her mouth—and picked up the fork next to his plate. He made eye contact with the purple haired teen, levelled a mischievous stare, and pointed the utensil at Hizashi. “And, I wouldn’t have been on edge is someone hadn’t rattled the doorknobs every five minutes!”
Hizashi’s mouth dropped in outrage as the rest of the table snorted at Sero’s accusation. How dare he?
It wasn’t like the rattling was intentional. He was simply being a good dad by checking in on his distressed son—and, begrudgingly, his nephew—especially when the previous screams died down. And so, what if he managed to accidentally time it with potential jump scares or correspond his movements the same way the animatronics crept down the hall? (If anything, it was Hitoshi’s fault for talking about those games all the time as a kid. His mother must’ve let him play them at her house originally because Hizashi sure as hell wouldn’t have let the boy play it. He didn’t know who Freddy was or why they were spending five nights.)
It was a mere coincidence! One he shouldn’t be held responsible for!
“Okay, okay! Fair point. We’ll just have to play it in the dorms.” Hitoshi started eating, his demeanor entirely normal except for the slight purse of his lips. “You, me, your friends, especially the pink one so she can hang off your arm during the scary parts.”
Hizashi locked eyes with Shouta, who quietly chuckled to himself and shook his head. Oh, he could already hear the infamous “Alien Queen’s” shrieks that would keep the whole dorm up with them. Sero’s painfully obvious crush was always so interesting to watch, especially when the boy would fall over himself and stumble on his words around her.
Eri shrieked, giggles filled the room as she watched her brother smirk at her cousin, who was surprisingly playing it cool.
“She’s actually pretty good when it comes to messed up things, so I’d probably be the one hanging off her.” Sero shrugged, stabbing his food with his fork.
Shinso blinked, but returned to his food, otherwise dropping the topic, and moving onto Sero’s plans for later that day.
Hizashi frowned at the boy, his stare honing in on the tension that settled in his rigid shoulders and his furrowing brows. The boy’s face pinched the same way Shouta’s did whenever Oboro was brought up or when he had just visited a student in the hospital.
Sero was…shutting down, becoming a stone wall in the face of his problems instead of being headstrong like Hizashi was used to.
The conversation went on like nothing happened: Eri elaborately explained an outlandish recent episode of her favorite TV show, Shinso complained about his classmates as if they weren’t becoming friends while poking his stepfather for holiday plans, and Aizawa groaned about having to talk to his sister about potentially coming over. But Hizashi couldn’t take his focus off his nephew, who pushed his food around on his plate and grimaced at the mention of his mother.
No, not his mother. Hizashi realized after Sero’s face dropped when his husband groaned. He was upset that his uncle—the man he practically worshipped as a kid, who he dressed up as for Halloween, who he would beg his parents to spend time with so often that his father joked about dropping him off with a bag and a toothbrush permanently, who he fought constantly with his other classmates for attention, the man who always stopped whatever task to talk to him as a boy when no one else would—was not going to be there.
“Are you done?”
A hand appeared in Hizashi’s line of sight, blocking the sad view of cold chilaquiles that bled into his fruit.
He looked up, a carefully crafted nonchalant expression was on Sero’s face as he waited for him to respond. The table grew quiet around them.
“Uh...,” he balked. Eyes bored into his soul. He wanted to shrink and hide under the table. Maybe flee the country while he was at it.
“Here.” With shaky hands, he lifted the plate, barely brushing fingertips as Sero took it from him, quickly as if his effort to meet halfway didn’t matter.
He felt so small, so miniscule compared to the sixteen-year-old in front of him.
And the greater the distance grew between Sero’s retreating form and his at the head of the table, the more ashamed he felt, especially as he dodged both Shouta and Hitoshi’s perplexed stares.
“Anyway.” Hitoshi cleared his throat. “We better head out. Meet up with his friends and stuff.”
Shouta hummed across the table, and Eri, sweet little Eri, looked like she was about to burst into tears, doe eyes filled with fear from the tension in the air.
Another perfectly good morning was ruined, and the root of it had the audacity to sulk in the kitchen.
***
The bed was cold, far too cold for his liking, but he supposed that was his punishment for the incident earlier that morning.
It wasn’t his fault. He maintained that he had no cause in the meltdown Eri had at the kitchen table.
It was Shouta’s punk nephew who ruined it all.
Naturally, his husband hadn’t agreed with him. The man had given him the cold shoulder in the kitchen while they cleaned up and spoke cuttingly short sentences for the rest of the day. The bitterness was still laced in Shouta’s voice when they whispered outside of Eri’s room after bedtime.
The blond sighed and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He snatched the gray robe from end of the iron bed frame and wrapped it around his body. Quietly, he tiptoed out of the bedroom, flinching as the door hinges groaned, and slid down the hallway.
His feet softly hit the wooden floor, echoing down the hall with the daunting ticks of the clock on the wall.
Thankfully, Hizashi didn’t have to worry about waking up his insomniac child. Hitoshi stayed in the dorms now that he transferred into the hero course. And Eri slept like the dead once she knocked out.
It left the two parents with a rare sense of stillness—one that was usually cherished, but instead hung over them heavier than their inescapable dark cloud.
The dim light of the living room lamp greeted the blond as he nervously reached the entryway.
His husband was hunched over the side of the somberly blue couch, blankets and decorative pillows thrown haphazardly from his tossing and turning.
Shouta had tried to sleep on the couch instead of going to bed.
“Sho.”
The man in question didn’t answer, his shoulders visibly tensed as he lay facing away from Hizashi.
“Sho,” Hizashi whispered, his voice wavering in defeat. “Come to bed”
The clock ticked on—just like it had for the past ten years. And, like always, no one moved.
Is this it? Hizashi panicked. In all their ups and downs, they had never not slept in the same bed. No matter how angry or upset they were, they always reconciled at night, or at least, called a truce. But now, as he watched the still frame of his husband, Hizashi didn’t know where they stood.
“I have never understood why you don’t like him.” Those words, so calmly spoken like they couldn’t shatter Hizashi into pieces, pierced him like a knife.
“I have tried for years. I’ve tried to be empathetic toward your feelings.” Shouta’s voice harshened as the words came toppling out. “I stopped bringing him around despite how well he and Toshi get along. I took down the photos and ignored the calls when you’re around. I’ve tiptoed for years around it for your sake—”
“Sho—” It was becoming harder to breathe.
“-thinking it was worth it. That I could keep you both at bay and that, now that he’s older and you two have been around each other more, you two could at least be cordial with each other.”
“Sho, please—”
“No, Hizashi!” The man finally turned around to step toe to toe with him—to face this storm that eroded at their relationship ever since Hizashi was first introduced to the Seros—eyes filled with anguish only seen in isolation after tough battles and comrade losses. “This ends now! What is so bad about them that you can’t even stomach being in the same room as them?”
Bile rose in Hizashi’s throat. If Shouta found out, he would hate him. He would leave and take Eri with him, never look back, and the highlight of his day, the love of his life, the only person besides his kids that has truly seen him and loved him would be gone. He wasn’t sure if he could take that hit. How could he live with himself if he knew—
“Hizashi!” Shouta’s tearful beg snapped him out of his hyperventilating. “Please! Say something!”
“I...” The words refused to leave. Hizashi couldn’t—no, wouldn’t—force them out. He could only stare in distress, eyes wide as the love of his life begged for some sort of closure to his own narrow-mindedness.
The blond froze as the anxiety waves crashed harder, each hit creating more distance between him and Shouta.
Was this the end?
“Fine.” Shouta’s face hardened; the previous desperation drained from his eyes. “I’ll go to bed. It’s late any way.”
Stiffly, the raven-haired man picked up the dull dark blue blanket off the floor and made his way down the hall to the bedroom, barely brushing shoulders with Hizashi as he passed the clock on the wall.
Hizashi’s melancholy bruised heart leapt out of his waterlogged chest and followed the man down the hall, leaving his body alone with the crushing weight of the fight.
***
Some said it was easier to fear what you didn’t know. But whenever Hizashi looked into Sero’s eyes, he knew it was far worse to understand it.
The disappointment disguised as nonchalance. The pain played off as apathy. The child-like naiveness that lingered despite having every reason to prove it wrong.
It was a cruel fate to have. To prepare for the worse only to be disappointed when it happened. The fear of not being wanted and being a burden from the one person you wanted approval from most.
It was something he had felt his whole life. He never felt like he was enough for his parents to be proud of. He didn’t fight hard enough or save enough people to be worthy of his pro-hero status. He was never there enough to save his students.
Present Mic—no, Hizashi—should’ve been there at the USJ attack.
He should’ve been next to Shota during the summer camp ambush.
He should’ve been right there acting as a shield when Midnight died.
But he wasn’t.
He could empathize with Sero in that regard.
The kid had so much pressure on him, both familial from his uncle and father, and internal from his need to help and prove himself, and he was finally learning to decipher fact from fiction.
It was a hard truth to learn that the people Sero trusted the most—the people who taught him right from wrong—would lie to his face.
But, to the kid’s credit, he grew from it. He was kinder, considerate, even apologetic for his actions, and treated Hizashi with nothing but respect, care, and tasteful teasing like family would.
It was a journey that was as emotional as it was jarring for Hizashi, but as Sero learned, he would too.
Shouta would never understand them, and Hizashi envied and adored the man from it.
The spider in the corner of the ceiling hung menacingly across from the bed, and each time a scream crawled up Hizashi’s throat. He couldn’t move. It was some sort of emotional paralysis; a freeze reflex he had never experienced before in all of his run ins with “fight or flight” adrenaline situations.
He had no choice but to face this. No husband to hide behind. No child to use as an excuse. No hero work to front with.
It was now or never, time to rise to the occasion and all the other nonsense he spewed to his students, but if he did it, if he just opened his goddamn mouth and said those fucking words—
It would be over.
Hizashi didn’t want it to end yet.
But wouldn’t it be over if he didn’t say anything? Would they not stew in this same argument, drenched in pain and avoidance until nothing but bitterness and resentment remained between them?
Wasn’t that exactly what they were on the brink of?
The blond pro hero nervously glanced over at the corner again. The spider had moved closer, twirling dreadfully on its fragile line of web.
He needed to clean it off: to clean all of it off.
“I’m afraid that I’ll lose you to him, that you’ll turn against me too.”
Shouta rolled over, eyes boring into the side of the blond’s face, but Hizashi couldn’t bring himself to meet his gaze.
“Sero.” Hizashi cleared his throat and took the time to sort through his words. “Hanta was such a happy kid. All he wanted to do was be around you and sure, we didn’t always get along all the time, but he was fun to be around. He got along with Toshi, was so curious about anything and everything he could get his hands on.”
Hizashi smiled slightly, a wobble rippled along his bottom lip. “And then, your sister didn’t want him around us anymore. She told him stories about the cruel things I did—some true, some false—and, well, it was only a matter of time before he started to believe them.”
“When he turned on me, started acting colder and his bright cheerful laughs turned into taunts—” Hizashi’s mind raced as the spider climbed across its web, moving closer to him with each word he spoke.
It was the same way his father had turned against his mother, vicious eyes watching gleefully as the woman stumbled around the man to make him feel tall. It was the same way Toshi’s grandparents talked about him when they thought they were out of earshot, whispers of disgust that lingered for days to come.
And it was no different with his sister-in-law, Veronica, who held a perpetual claim on Shouta due to the sacrifices she made for him. To move across the world and leave her career and life behind, knowing nothing about Japanese culture or the language with a husband, a toddler, and one more on the way to support her brother when no one else would, well, Hizashi didn’t know if he would ever be strong enough to do that.
But as Shouta grew into herohood, the bitterness did too. And, since the first moment Veronica and him locked eyes, he knew that she placed most of the blame on him.
So, he could take the punches, the eyerolls, the condescending whispers, and the glares at family functions from her. He would be the delusion she desperately sought to prove, the poison that lingered in every spoonful she sipped.
It was a burden he carried for his husband. It was one he gladly took, especially since he knew Shouta already felt indebted to her and her husband, Toni.
But he never intended to let it affect the way he viewed Hanta nor the way Hanta viewed him.
When he saw his nephew, he didn’t see the little kid who he played Mario Kart with or grinned at in the rearview mirror. He saw the same daunting eyes his sister-in-law greeted him with, laser focused on any and all weakness Hizashi exhibited and gleefully waiting for him to trip next.
“I know that he’s a good kid—a kind person. I’ve seen it myself way before he started at U.A., but all I see is her and her influence on him…and it paralyzes me.” Hizashi closed his eyes and waited for the weight of his blow to sink in.
Fear crawled over his skin, its prickly legs raised shame-filled goosebumps and left cascading “what if’s” in its wake.
It was over. He was sure of it.
“Vero is a bitch.”
Hizashi choked on his saliva and whipped his head toward Shouta. His long raven hair fanned around his face as the man gazed intently at the blond, his arms breaking through the barricade for their limbs to crash together.
“She’s pushy. She’s extremely overprotective. Worst of all, she acts more like my mother than my actual mother does. But she loves me, and because of it, she hates you on principle.” Shouta huffed, but the earnest determination in his eyes remained focused on Hizashi. “It’s the reason I don’t like being around her.”
Shouta took a breath, his eyebrows bunched up as he pursed his lips, but Hizashi was mesmerized.
“And…I know she makes you feel small, but I didn’t realize that bled into Hanta as well. I’m sorry for not listening sooner.”
“It’s okay, Sho.”
“It’s not.” Shouta said it as confidently as his vows at the altar. “And I should’ve put an end to it a long time ago, hell, even followed through with that no contact threat if she kept it up.”
“She’s your sister, Shouta. You should have a relationship with her.” The words left Hizashi’s mouth before he could selfishly take them back. He so desperately wanted to tell Shouta to cut them off, to never look back and focus ahead, but it would all be a lie.
As messed up as their relationship with the Seros were, Hizashi never wanted them to disappear completely. He didn’t want to strip that part of Shouta’s identity.
Shouta chuckled lowly; a smirk crept onto his lips. “For someone who doesn’t like my family, you sure do advocate for them a lot. You remember the first couple of months Hanta was at U.A.?”
Hizashi huffed. “You were such a jerk! The kid was clearly trying to get your approval, but you ignored him at every turn.”
“He needed to prove himself first.”
“Yet you trained Toshi with no problem.”
“That was different.”
“Sure, it was,” Hizashi whispered sarcastically as he scooched closer, baring his body to the cold air where the top sheet drifted lower on his torso. “While Toshi and I both appreciate your effort, you wouldn’t even look at Hanta when he started training to get into U.A., let alone help outside of class when he did get in.”
“Like I said.” Shouta inched closer; his eyelashes kissed the rough edges of the jagged scar underneath his eye. “He had to prove that he wanted it enough outside of me. And clearly, he did since you came marching into my office and dropped his first intern report on my desk without a single word.”
“Nemi wouldn’t stop bringing it up to me!” The blond defended himself, accosted. “You know she loved to tease me about the kid.”
While Nemuri used to poke the both of them about Hanta at any given point, especially when she learned that she was their nephew’s childhood crush much to her amusement, Hizashi still wasn’t entirely sure why he stormed in Shouta’s office that fateful day. The intern reports hadn’t been out for long, and it wasn’t like he was searching for it. In fact, he had been looking for Kaminari’s report or Shoji’s.
But, as soon as he read the words Sero, H. on the top right corner in neat scrawny handwriting, his stomach curled with anxiety that wouldn’t dissipate until he knew what the paper held. What if they didn’t like him? What if they were mean to him? What if he scared them off with his obnoxious smile and goofy laugh? What if they didn’t want him too?
He tore into the report, despair festering in his chest as his nerves ate away at his resolves. And, luckily, as soon as the fear climbed, it plummeted as the first comment on his sheet was a personal message from Kamui Woods himself about how much potential he saw in Hanta. They liked him! And thought he had great instincts and recounted his experience with high regards!
Yet, unlike the other reports that had scribbled comments about their progress or conversations of improvement for their teacher to hold, Sero’s page was empty. Completely detached like he didn’t matter.
And Hizashi shot down the hall, shoved his way into the stuffy room of cubicles where Kaminari and Shinso—who were most definitely not supposed to be there—jumped at his sudden intrusion, slammed the damn report down on his stupidly blind husband’s desk, and left an exasperated open-mouthed Shouta behind.
But it wasn’t like Hizashi was letting a personal conflict dilute his thinking. In fact, he was forcing his husband to drop his averted impersonal tactics toward anything that involved his nephew and teach the damn kid. Nephew or not, he had a responsibility to review the document and make notes of improvement areas or strategic approaches to use next time and simply not interacting with the document wasn’t going to help anyone.
“I understand not wanting to pander to him because he’s your nephew wouldn’t be fair to everyone else, but acting as if he’s not there is unfair to him. You found a balance with Toshi so you can find it with Hanta too.” Hizashi sighed.
“I know you disagree with my approach, but just like how measures were implemented with Toshinori and I about discussing Midoriya’s progress due to his clear bias, he leads Hanta’s evaluations. I provide my observations and comparisons to class metrics, but I’m not as involved.” Shouta grunted and learned his head on Hizashi’s chest.
“Besides, Hitoshi is in Vlad’s class anyway. I have no influence over his evaluations and in-school performance.”
Instinctively, the blond’s right hand wrapped around his husband’s body to stroke the raven locks that tickled his collarbone. With each pass, the waves stilled, and the pounding rain softened into a drizzle—one that he could finally bask in.
They could survive this. They could weather this. And, slowly, they would rebuild together.
***
The July air was humid outside, and Hizashi had never been more grateful to teach inside the cool air-conditioned building than ever before.
Excitement buzzed through the air alongside the painfully obvious murmurs of summer plans and groans of much needed breaks. While the disruptions and constant attempts to redirect conversation back to the lesson might’ve annoyed him in years past, relief coursed through his veins.
They were children again; despite fighting in a war they had no business being in or experiencing more violence firsthand than most pro heroes did in their entire career. Their juvenile display would be one he cherished.
“All right, listeners!” Hizashi cleared his throat for the eighteenth time that day. “As we all know, summer break is only a couple hours away and I, for one, plan on enjoying the time off as much as the rest of you.”
Cheers filled the room, but quickly died down when he opened his mouth again. His students eagerly sat on the edge of their seats, hanging onto the suspense he’d built.
“But I do have some homework for you.”
Outraged cries and choruses of “no way,” “you gotta be kidding me,” and a particularly loud “Jirou, I thought you said he was cool!” followed by a flabbergasted stutter from said girl had Hizashi suppressing his grin.
“Your grand task is…” He drummed his hands on top of his desk. Annoyed glares pierced into his body, but it only fueled his hammering further. But all good things must come to an end, and his students were saved by the bell. “… to have fun! And be responsible! I don’t want to hear about anyone being in the hospital!”
As Hizashi gathered his supplies to make way for their last teacher of the day, his students quickly became absorbed into their previous hijinks, taking the short break as an opportunity to stretch their legs or, in Kaminari and Ashido’s case, bolt to their friends and plant themselves on top of available desks.
That, of course, sparked a reprimand that went ignored by their class representative, and playful fighting ensued.
“Oh, Sero.” Hizashi beckoned the boy to the door with a hand. Hanta looked up from Ashido’s elaborate story and hand motions, eyes wide as the duo leaned back to whip toward the classroom door frame.
“Oooo!” Kaminari lightly pushed the kid in question while Kirishima smacked his back with a wide smile. Hanta grumbled something to the group before nonchalantly walking over with the slightest clench of his jaw.
Hizashi led his nephew out into the hallway, away from the eyes of his friends and classmates while he fiddled with the notebooks in his arms.
He could do this. There was no need to be nervous.
And judging by the slight twitch of his left eye—a tick that developed after the first sports festival—Hanta was just as uncomfortable as him.
“So, uh, what are your summer plans?” The pro hero grimaced as the words left his mouth. They sounded so ingenuine, so needlessly conversational and polite that he wished he could take them back.
Hanta blinked, visibly thrown off by the simple question.
“Well, Kiri and Denki want to plan some hang outs and then Abuelita’s coming into town for a couple of weeks. Nothing big.” The kid nodded his head slightly with his gaze on the ground. A hand came up to rub the back of his neck before he quietly asked, “How about you?”
Hizashi mimicked his nephew’s actions, unsure of how to phrase the chat he tediously constructed in his head until perfection.
Why is it like pulling teeth? Hizashi thought, rubbing the spines of his books.
“Um, your uncle and I are taking the kids to Osaka for a few days. To go shopping and to amusement parks and such.”
“Cool, cool.” Hanta looked at his shoelaces, rocking back and forth on his heels.
“And we were wondering…if you would like to come with us?” Hizashi’s voice pitched embarrassingly higher at the end of his question.
There it was. Hizashi had laid all his cards on the table.
Hanta glared at the floor, silent as the offer hung over them.
“We already cleared it with your mom, so you wouldn’t have to worry about permission or anything, and you would be sharing a room with Toshi so if you wanted a night to explore, you could do so without waking up Eri, but curfew would still apply and everything.” Hizashi cut off his rambling and stared at the clock behind the mop of raven hair.
Time ticked, and Ectoplasm should be here by now for their final math lesson before break, and he really needed to get back to his cubicle to get the last bit of paperwork done before their vacation—
“Why?” The phrase was uttered so carefully indifferent until only the silence ricocheted its weight.
“Osaka is a really fun place.” Hizashi’s mouth filled in before his brain caught up.
Hanta didn’t care about the destination. He wanted to know why they would invite him.
“Was this Shinso’s idea or my father trying to get me out of the house?”
“It was actually mine.”
The kid’s head whipped up, perplexed.
“So, what do you say?” Hizashi asked, his mouth smushed together to prevent any more awkward words from spewing out.
“Sounds like fun. Thank you,” Hanta said.
“Great! I’ll go ahead and let Shouta know and I’m sure Shinso will spam you with the details, but it’ll be fun.” Hizashi placed a tentative hand on his nephew’s shoulder and squeezed lightly. “Now, I have to finish the mountain of paperwork and assignments to grade. I’ve already stalled enough.”
Hanta chuckled and smiled earnestly. “Sweet. I can’t wait.”
The kid slipped by him and back into the classroom, where loud chatter and Kaminari’s “you’re alive!” provided a lively break into the stuffy hall.
It will take some time, Hizashi thought as he made his way to his desk, but it would be worth it in the end.
Finish this section