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“Your turn, Uraraka! Truth or Dare?” Mina grins, poking her tongue out. It was three hours into their girls' night, and so far, Ochako had escaped unharmed. Until now, at least.
Uh oh. Mina is known for her crazy dare ideas, so that was definitely off the table. Why couldn’t it have been Yaomomo asking her that question? The dare she had given Jirou was just to pat her head and rub her stomach for half a minute, whereas Hagakure’s fingers were still stained from Mina’s last dare. A truth couldn’t be that bad, right? These were the girls whom Ochako trusted the most; she had literally fought in a war with them! Any truth she told, she was sure, would be safe.
“Truth, please!”
“Hmm, okay, a truth, huh?” mutters Mina, rubbing her temples with two fingers from each hand. It’s as though she’s trying to source a question to ask Ochako telepathically. “Oh, I’ve got one!” Mina says after thinking for a couple of seconds, “Have you had your first kiss?”
“No, I haven’t,” Ochako admits. She can’t help but feel a little embarrassed now that she’s in her second year and is almost seventeen, but Ochako has never felt that drawn to romance, especially once her crush on Deku started to fade after the war. And yeah, she also fought in a war! So, between reconstruction efforts, grieving Himiko, and trying to graduate UA, she hasn’t had a lot of time to start dating or anything.
Mina looks a little surprised, before promising to fix that at Yaomomo’s upcoming party (whatever that means, but Ochako can’t say that she isn’t a little curious and nervous to find out). The game carries on until Tsu asks Yaomomo if she has ever had a crush on Todoroki.
“Ha ha, I haven’t at all, actually. And that’s because, well, I’m a lesbian.” Yaomomo is blushing a little, but refuses to hide her face in her hands. The reaction is completely positive. Tsu apologises if she made Yaomomo feel awkward, while everyone else cheers and hugs their friend, blurting out their congratulations. Everyone except Ochako. She says that she’s proud of her, weakly, but spends most of it in a daze. Lesbianism had always been a vague and far-off concept to Ochako. Sure, she knew that theoretically, lesbians existed out there, but she had never considered that she could know one. Because, statistically, there weren’t that many, right? That was why she had never paused to consider her own sexuality after all, because out of the billions of people on earth, to be a lesbian, Ochako wouldn’t be one of them, could she? She had just assumed that she was straight after her crush on Deku, and it wasn’t like she had experienced any attraction to women, not that she really knew what that felt like. Her crush on Deku revolved more around his personality rather than his looks (sorry, Deku).
For some reason, Yaomomo’s coming out sticks with her for the rest of the night, but Ochako never figures out why. What is so important about her friend coming out to her? Does this mean she’s homophobic? No, Ochako can’t be homophobic. It’s not that she hates Yaomomo now; Ochako is just surprised. Confused? Worried about how the world will treat her friend? Ochako has a million questions to ask, such as how she knew, how long she has known, her celebrity crushes, and if it’s statistically possible to have multiple lesbians in the same class, but Ochako doesn’t know why she’s so concerned about that last question. Her previously assumed lesbian statistics were obviously wrong. And she shouldn’t bother her friend with such invasive questions anyway.
-
Unfortunately for Ochako, Yaomomo’s coming out completely distracts her from whatever plan Mina has for Ochako’s first kiss at Yaomomo’s party. The whispers between Mina and Hagakure about the mechanics of spin the bottle go completely unnoticed while Ochako ponders over whether Jirou knew if Yaomomo was a lesbian before she came out to the rest of the girls.
Fortunately for Ochako, Mina’s plan becomes glaringly clear as soon as she downs an entire bottle of beer almost as fast as it takes Ochako to figure out what’s going on. Which is how she finds herself hidden behind some of the fanciest curtains she’s ever seen in a small room that only she occupies while Mina looks for her.
When the door slams open, she almost jumps, and stays achingly still while footsteps approach her hiding spot, not before closing the door behind them.
“Yo, is someone like, behind there?” A voice echoes in the empty room, but the voice is not one that Ochako recognises. There’s an itch in the back of her mind telling her that she should know who this is, but whether it’s the small drink that she’s already had or the general panic that she’s about to be found out, she can’t quite place it. The footsteps get closer, and the curtain is yanked back while Ochako yelps. It turns out that the person who has found her is that girl from Shiketsu. Utsushimi? All Ochako remembers is how she had gotten kind of jealous when she and Deku had talked during the provisional licensing exam because of how beautiful she is. And also the realization that it had been Himiko the whole time.
Somehow, Utsushimi has managed to look more gorgeous than before. Her spaghetti strap top is pink and lacy, and her black flared jeans show off how strong her thighs presumably are. Ochako blushes as she looks away from how low-cut her top is, only to land on her glittery lips, which she also has to look away from so that her face doesn’t end up as red as the hoodie she has tied around her own waist.
“You’re Ochako, right? Todoroki and Bakugo’s friend? I heard about the stuff you did with Ryukyu, and I’m like totally obsessed! Oh, I love your shoes by the way, the glitter is totally giving winter fairy, which is just too adorable! I’m Camie, it’s so nice to meet you!”
“Um-” is all Ochako can fit in, though Camie’s enthusiasm does strangely put her at ease. She doesn’t mention how they kind of already met since that technically wasn’t Camie, after all.
“Oh shoot, are we hiding from someone?” Camie continues, now getting behind the curtain, before loudly whispering, “Who are we hiding from?”
Ochako had originally chosen this hiding place because of how small it was, with the window meaning that it didn’t feel too claustrophobic. The curtains being so thick that no light shone through them meant that Ochako thought her hiding spot was a pretty good one, but apparently, it was not.
“How did you know someone was behind here?” Ochako asks.
Camie just smiles and says, “The curtain is kinda not long enough to cover your fab shoes, girl!”
Oops . Camie hops onto the windowsill and pats the spot next to her, encouraging Ochako to do the same.
“I’m totes right about you hiding from someone, aren’t I? Spill!”
Something about the way that Camie is so unabashedly herself makes Ochako trust her. After going through everything that happened since her first year at UA, it’s nice to have such silly teenage problems, and it’s nice to have such a fun first meeting with someone as cool as Camie.
“Well, basically, one of my friends found out that I haven’t had my first kiss, so she’s trying to make it happen tonight, but I think her plan is spin the bottle which would normally be fine because it’s just a game and it’s just a kiss, but it’s my first kiss so I’m kind of worried about embarrassing myself in front of everyone which is making me too nervous to join the game, especially as she’s actively looking for me…”
Ochako manages to give a garbled explanation that’s essentially word vomit to Camie, who seems to have listened to and understood the whole thing, somehow.
“Aww, Ochako, you shouldn’t worry about things like that! Kisses in spin the bottle don’t usually last long, plus you’re just so cute that nobody will notice if you kiss a little weird!”
The punch to the gut Ochako feels after hearing the word ‘cute’ feels so palpable, it knocks her breath from her lungs. She disguises it as a gasp from how nice Camie is being and tries to move on.
“Thanks, I know that logically, but I guess I can’t help myself from being a little anxious with all those people watching me, you know?”
“Would it help if your first kiss was more private?”
Ochako doesn’t know where she’s going with this. “Yeah, probably?”
“Well then, I can help you out!”
Face burning, Ochako blurts, “Help… out?” Is Camie saying what Ochako thinks she is?
“Yeah, I could kiss you and also let you know if you do kiss weird, but don’t sweat it if I’m not your type, I could totally find someone to smooch you behind these curtains, easy! Then you can go to the spin the bottle game, kissing like a pro!”
Wow, Camie did mean what Ochako thought she meant. She doesn’t know what to think or what to say. All her thoughts are chaotically darting around in her head, just out of reach. So when Ochako responds, she doesn’t think at all.
“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea!”
Good idea!? Has she gone crazy? Is she that much of a lightweight that one beer has left her incapable of intelligence? But something about Camie is painfully comfortable, her bubbly personality, her intimate intensity, the way she leans closer with every word she says. It all means that Ochako doesn’t take back what she had just said.
Camie tilts her head to the side as she grins, and the light shifts on her face, revealing that she has glitter on her eyelids and cheeks, too.
“Okay, so scooch closer and put one hand on my cheek and one on my waist,” Camie says softly, quiet enough that Ochako has to move closer anyway, just to hear the rest of her instructions. Ochako wonders if her hand is going to have any glitter on it after this. Meanwhile, Camie places one hand on her shoulder and the other low on her waist, grazing her hip bone, which makes Ochako shiver. “Then you just lean in. Follow my lead, okay?”
Too stunned to say anything else, Ochako just nods. And leans in.
At their first brush of lips, Ochako doesn’t know what to think. She’s too busy focusing on moving her lips correctly and not coming across as too eager. Their first kiss is short, but sweet, and Ochako can feel a warm, tingly feeling in her chest. It feels good, really good. When they part, the sticky feeling of gloss that wasn’t originally on her lips makes her blush. Ochako can’t help but glance back down at Camie’s lips, who seems to be thinking something similar as they both lean in together again.
Their second kiss is a little faster and much longer. Ochako thinks she gets the hang of it now, the gentle push and pull as she focuses on Camie’s bottom lip. The soft smacking sounds and the way that Camie’s thumb draws circles on her hip make her break out in goosebumps, while the warm feeling that started with their first kiss spreads throughout her entire body, giving her this energy that pushes her forward into Camie and makes their kiss seem almost a little desperate. When Camie brushes her tongue against her bottom lip, Ochako gasps, opening her mouth and then trying to copy what Camie just did, so that she can feel as good as Ochako does. She moves her hand too, up Camie’s back, to her shoulder, then back to her waist again. The one she originally put on her face stays, in the hope that some of the glitter will stick to her hand.
Ochako has completely lost track of time when Camie pulls back, leaving Ochako in a daze. They smile at each other as it takes a second to detangle themselves.
“I think I hear your friend calling for you, Ochako. You ready to join her?” Camie’s eyes give her a once-over before patting her hair down and tucking a strand behind her ear. Were Camie’s hands in her hair at some point, enough to mess it up? Ochako wouldn’t know.
After managing to bring herself back into reality, Ochako responds. “I’ll be okay, um, thanks for your help. It really, uhh, helped,” she finishes lamely.
Camie just giggles. “Don’t worry, ‘Chako, you’re a great kisser, don’t doubt yourself, okay?”
It’s then that she hears Mina bellow, “OCHAKO URARAKA I AM LOOKING FOR YOU!”
She takes a second to remember the moment, the way Camie’s hair falls in her face, how her hand felt on her hip, and how her lip gloss tastes, before getting up and saying, “That’s my queue!”
As Ochako gets off the windowsill, her hoodie falls to the ground; somehow, at some point, the knot holding it around her waist had come undone. Sheepishly, Ochako gathers her hoodie off the floor, tying it around her waist again, before waving a final goodbye to Camie, who smiles and waves back. It only takes a couple of seconds for Ochako to find Mina after she leaves the room.
“Finally!” Mina exclaims. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you! Come on, the game is almost over, where have you been, girl?”
Ochako shrugs. “Sorry, I was just wandering around a little. I got a bit nervous.”
“You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. If it's too much, then we can just hang out until the game ends,” Mina says, looking Ochako in the eye to make sure that she understands.
“No, it’s fine. Just a game, right? It’ll be fun!” Ochako is ready for the teenage experience she’s been promised. Sure, the game is stupid, but it’ll be funny. Now that she’s had her first kiss, the stakes are way lower. Ochako checks her hand secretly, and sure enough, her palm sparkles.
“That’s the spirit!” Mina grins and hands Ochako a drink, and unlike the beer she had earlier, this is in a cup, probably some kind of liquor concoction. She takes a sip and immediately screws up her face, gross .
After heading down at least two flights of steps, Ochako and Mina find a bunch of their classmates, among a few others, sitting in a circle with a beer bottle in the middle.
“You’re just in time!” Hagakure squeals, “It’s Midoriya’s turn!”
And sure enough, just as Ochako and Mina are scooting in between Hagakure and Kaminari, Deku places the bottle in the middle of the circle and spins it. It only gives three and a half rotations until it lands squarely on Ochako. Her stomach drops, but not in the pleasant way that she was expecting. Just a year ago, she would’ve gone bright red and have been so excited that she might have even started floating, but now she just feels hesitant. Ochako never did figure out what caused her crush to fade away, whether it was the stress of the war and trying to keep living afterwards, or maybe that her crush was just an amalgamation of people’s expectations of her, made tangible through her own feelings of admiration and respect. Getting her feelings off her chest felt good, but realising that she might not have faced the true reality of them felt better.
Deku blushes a little before asking if she’s okay with this. Ochako just nods while he closes the gap. This kiss lasts all of three seconds, a simple press of lips incomparable to the kiss she’d had less than fifteen minutes ago. Afterwards, Deku leans back and goes to sit in his original spot, before passing the bottle to Sero, who’s sat next to him. There’s no warm, tingly feeling, or fevered energy, and the remnants of sticky lip gloss disappear with every sip of Ochako’s drink (and she also spots Deku discreetly trying to wipe what she left on his lips off). It felt clinical, almost.
It’s not long until Ochako gets up, telling Mina that she’s going to refill her drink, and goes to join a rather strange debate between Tsu and Bakugo about rivers. She doesn’t see Camie again, but she doesn’t look for her, either. After spotting a couple of other Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu students around, she acknowledges that it wasn’t a dream.
That night, Ochako struggles to fall asleep. All she can think about is Camie and the kiss, to the point where she lives it over and over again so that she can commit every single detail to memory. And wonder why kissing Deku would never compare. Camie is practically a stranger, whereas she used to have feelings for Deku. Sure, they had faded, but shouldn’t that have meant that his kiss should’ve been better, even if it had been shorter? Weirdly, her brain still keeps snagging on Yaomomo’s coming out. The images in her mind churn together into mush, and as honey blonde hair grows brighter, a pink top gets replaced with a school uniform, and lip gloss gets replaced with blood, there is only one thought that grows louder than the rest.
Oh fuck, I’m a lesbian .