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Ochako takes Himiko aside before they enter the grocery store. She leads her gently out of the path of foot-traffic, takes her hands, and looks her in the eyes.
“Remember, if it starts to feel overwhelming, you can tell me at any time and we can leave right away—”
“Yes, yes, I’ve got it!” Himiko bounces on her toes, swinging Ochako’s arms where they hold hands. “I’ll tell you right away, I promise, please?” The charms attached to Himiko’s sandals jingle. Loud enough to probably attract attention, but Ochako doesn’t care; she’s only got eyes for Himiko.
“I just want you safe,” Ochako says, and presses a tentative kiss to Himiko's forehead. Himiko beams. Ochako kisses her again.
"Let's go!" Himiko says, still bouncing enough to attract glances in their direction.
"Let's go," Ochako confirms, and fishes the grocery list from her bag, trying not to
jostle the folded shopping bags. She holds it out.
"Right, clearance first," Himiko says, inspecting the list as though she wasn't there when Ochako wrote it the night before. To be fair, it's a decently complex set of instructions—there's an entire flowchart dependent on today's sale items. “Can we get a trolley?”
They don’t need one, but Himiko hasn’t been in a grocery store without hiding and stealing since childhood, so Ochako says yes. She knows she’s made the correct decision when Himiko wheels one out from the stack and immediately leans over the handlebar and lifts her feet off the ground. Ochako steadies the front of the trolley without judgement.
Himiko grins wide, taking up most of her face while she throws her legs up behind her. Ochako can’t help but return the smile.
“To clearance!” Himiko declares, plants her feet on the floor and marches the trolley forward as though she’s going to war.
***
Ochako has made a huge mistake.
In the frozen aisle, where Himiko is leaning over at the waist to look at the vegetable options, Ochako is moments away from throwing herself headfirst into the freezer.
Himiko bending over is a force of nature. Her skirt rides all the way up to the hem of her underwear—which Ochako had bought her—and she can see the marks left from the previous night. Bites, bruises; everything a testament to the hours Ochako spent worshipping her skin rather than the household maintenance they were supposed to be doing.
She shouldn't be thinking about this when she's responsible for taking Himiko out on her first post-probation shopping trip, but then she shouldn't be romantically involved with her charge anyway.
She’s spent too much time with Himiko to be reticent about moving forward with her own happiness.
"Um," she says, while Himiko dips particularly low to read an ingredients list. Ochako is proud of her for that, as it's a far cry from the Himiko that would simply pick the prettiest packaging, but she has to drag her eyes back up to Himiko’s thoughtful expression.
And somehow that also gets her hot under the collar. Thinking about a Himiko that's learning to navigate this dumb world that doesn't cater to her fills Ochako with pride, and warmth, and definitely something lower.
"S’up Ochako?"
"I think. Um. You seem to really have the hang of this so I might just wait outside to let you shop in peace. Since you're doing so well! And I'm so proud. And I’m just. Going to. Let you get on with it."
Himiko tilts her head.
"Of course, Ochako! I'll make sure to get us everything we need for the next few days!"
Ochako nods and flees. She’s got to calm the hell down.
***
Himiko insists on carrying everything alone. She's balanced all the shopping between a rucksack and two tote bags, one hanging off each arm, and still walks with a bounce in her step despite the items clattering around with Ochako’s zero-gravity assist.
“Are you sure I can’t—”
“Nope!” Himiko grins, and dodges all Ochako’s attempts to steal anything. “I want to know I’ve done it all properly. I want the full ‘shopping with my girlfriend’ experience!”
Ochako knows this: Himiko has a bucket list straight out of a teen girl magazine, and she’s made it her duty to help Himiko fulfil as many of the items as possible. They’ve checked off ‘doing hair and makeup at a sleepover’ three times by Ochako’s count, but Himiko insists on redoing it for nebulous reasons.
“At least let me get the door,” Ochako says, and plucks her spare key out of Himiko’s skirt pocket before she can argue. Himiko allows this, although Ochako can’t tell whether it’s because Himiko physically has no way to retrieve her key or because Himiko’s bangs are sticking to her forehead with sweat and she just wants this task to be over. Still, she doesn’t give up her shopping, even after the first flight of stairs.
Ochako lets Himiko in through the front door first, and follows quickly after, basking in the cool air in their flat. She kicks off her own sandals in favour of her house slippers—resembling some character from a show Himiko likes, while Himiko herself owns hand-made crocheted slippers from Ochako—but Himiko marches ahead with her shopping bounty.
Ochako waits for Himiko to set the bags down on the kitchen table before coming up behind for a sticky hug. She presses a kiss to the nape of Himiko’s neck, where baby hairs have escaped her buns, and she feels goosebumps rise underneath her lips.
“How was your first solo shopping trip?” Ochako wraps her arms around Himiko’s middle.
“It was fun. I’m glad I can cross it off the list, but I’d rather shop with you next time.” Himiko rubs the side of her head against Himiko’s cheek.
“Definitely. Did you find everything on the list? And payment went okay?”
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Himiko says, wriggling out of Ochako’s hold. “Wanna see what I got?”
“Yes,” Ochako says, folding her arms across her chest. “The things on the list, right…?”
Toga Himiko, with a grin bright enough to convince a stormcloud to stop raining, unzips the bag to reveal her spoils: not the items from the carefully curated shopping list, but ten big tubs of ice cream.
And five more in each tote bag.
“Surprise!” Himiko says, throwing her arms in the air. “Date night!”
Ochako wants to laugh about Himiko’s endless ability to surprise her, wants to cry about the cost of so much ice cream, wants to worry about what they’re actually going to eat for the next several days.
“The list? How much did this cost?” Ochako says in a small voice. Himiko shrugs. “Not that I’m not excited, I just—”
Himiko grasps Ochako’s hands in hers, the way Ochako had outside the grocery store.
“You can be mad,” she says. “You don’t have to pretend you’re not worried. But I would never do anything to hurt you when I know how important the budget is to you.”
“How…”
Himiko slides one hand away from Himiko, reaches into her pocket, and pulls out an unfamiliar debit card. Ochako squints at it until she reads the name ‘Todoroki Enji’.
“Dabi stole it from Endeavor but they search him, so he gave it to me so they wouldn’t find it. He says I’m a magpie. Well, the word he used was ‘hoarder’, but I think magpie is much cuter.”
A laugh slips through Ochako’s pursed lips.
“That’s—you can’t just—they’ll stop you all seeing each other if they find out!”
Himiko spins the card between her fingers, passing it between them until it vanishes before Ochako’s eyes.
“What card?” Himiko says. “Anyway, I wasn’t sure which flavour of ice cream you like best, so I got them all. There was a special Ryuukyuu one that I got three of since I think you like her. Where do you want to start?”
Ochako closes her eyes and presses a tired kiss to Himiko’s mouth.
While she’s going to have to return the card and apologise, she wouldn’t change her Himiko for the world.