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miracufic · 6 years

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A Broken Window

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There are few things that Uraraka Ochako hates more than love at the moment.

In point of fact there are only two things. One of them is pity.

The other is poverty.

And of course because her life is such a wellspring of light and joy and fun fun fun she gets to experience all three right fucking now at the hands of one Midoriya Izuku, who had come sailing through her window not three seconds earlier, trailing ribbons of smoke.

“I am so sorry,” he says as he tries to extricate himself from the broken, tangled mess that had been her coffee table, television, and fan. Plastic crunches under his sneakers, and he winces.

“Oh, shoot,” he says. “Uraraka, I am—crud, I am so, so sorry, look, I can pay you back, I am so sorry, I didn’t mean—”

He means well, she reminds herself. It was one of the things that makes him so—likeable, which was absolutely the word she’d been thinking of, he was earnest and compassionate and had a sense of responsibility that yes, sometimes was a touch on the broad side and she was spiraling again.

She takes in a deep breath and refocuses.

"Midoriya," she says, her voice much calmer than she thought was possible given the situation. “Go."

"Look, at least let me help clean this up for you—"

“I said go,” Uraraka repeats, and her voice snaps out this time, making Midoriya flinch away from her as though from a whip. He holds both his hands up as he backs towards the door, his palms towards her, until his back hits the smooth metal of her dormitory door. Then he reaches back and fumbles for the handle.

“Okay,” he says. “Okay, I’m sorry.”

The lock clicks against the reinforced steel of the frame as he opens the door, and clicks again as he carefully pulls it shut.

Right. Now.

Uraraka breathes in and out steadily in the sudden quiet filling her room. Wind whistles in through the shattered window, carrying in the sounds of a raised voice—Bakugou, she guesses, from the number of expletives being thrown around—and several other, quieter voices, their register low.

It does little to keep the lid down on the roiling mess of her emotions.

First comes the rapid set of mental calculations and the grim, mathematical realization, following on the heels of her dismay, that she has maybe enough slack in her bank account to cover the cost of her coffee table. And that assumes that the local thrift stores have something, that she can survive taking a chunk out of her food budget for the next two weeks, and that the school isn’t going to charge her for damages to her dorm. Second is the billowing, seething hurt that Midoriya would dare to condescend to her like that. Pay? As if she wasn’t responsible enough to handle her own finances?

The whole mess is irrational, of course. Irrational and distracting and exactly what she doesn’t need when she’s dealing with schoolwork and the sudden uptick in villain activity and the ever-present, ever-looming, and now ever-growing threat of death at their hands, coming swiftly in the night or brightly by day, by accident or malice or a little of both—oh, and her stupid fucking period on top of all of that, because this is exactly the right time to be a crampy hormonal mess. It is therefore something that she is going to push to the back of the mind until she has the time and attention to spare to it. Which is probably going to be a while, given things.

It had been cruel of her though.

The thought sneaks in unbidden as she stares at the mess with overwhelmed tears blurring her vision. Others follow.

He had just been trying to help, after all. And she knows Deku like she knows her own Quirk, and he isn’t the type to just burst into someone’s room and wreck all their things on impulse or for some stupid joke or out of malice. Which means that this is an accident.

And isn’t it reasonable to expect him to make amends if he’d broken something on accident? So it’s reasonable for her to accept his offer of repayment. So it’s not pity, and it isn’t as though her bank account actually has enough padding at the moment to replace her TV. And if she doesn’t let Deku help, the guilt is going to eat at him for weeks, because he’s just the right combination of kind and generous and stupidly self-sacrificing for that to be the case.

And of course that thought makes her chest feel tight and her breath stick in her throat and her head feel fuzzy because fuck love.

A stray thought flickers through her awareness involving Izuku and that particular verb, and she nearly combusts on the spot.

Uraraka shakes her head a few times to clear it and hears a knocking at her door. She wipes at her eyes and straightens her clothing before she gets up, navigates around the patches of shattered glass on her floor, and opens it.

“Hey, Ura,” Ashido Mina says as she pokes her violently pink and enormously fluffy head in through the doorway. “I just saw Midoriya leaving, what happened?”

Her gaze takes in the trashed room and the breeze blowing in through the smashed window, pushing gently at the curtains, half-torn from their hangings. Her lips purse thoughtfully.

“Oh, wow,” she drawls as she steps into the room. “You and—wow. Using his Quirk too from the look of it, that’s kinky—“

“If you’re not going to help, Ashido, then fuck off,” Ochako snaps. She bites down on her tongue a second too late. Her hands ball into fists at her side as she forces a flat neutrality back onto her face.

Ashido’s lips purse further as she regards her trembling friend. She nods once, slowly. “Okay,” she says, holding her hands up as Midoriya had. She nods again before lowering them.

“How about I help you clean up and you tell me what happened, then?” she says.

Uraraka swallows and bows her head.

She and Mina set about cleaning up the glass, picking up the bigger pieces with their hands, sweeping up the smaller pieces with a brush and dustpan.

“Okay,” Mina says after they’ve swept the floor clean a final time and picked a few glittering fragments out of the gathered mess of lint and hair and dust. “So what happened? I mean, don’t need to say it twice, but this place is a wreck.”

Uraraka puffs out a breath and tucks a few stray bangs back behind her ear as she plops into her chair; Mina takes a seat on the bed.

“I was working on that essay on the development of the modern heroing system we have due Friday,” she says, her voice now steady, if somewhat hoarse. “I heard the boys shouting outside and I went to go close the window. Second later I’m ducking because Deku is flying right towards me, and then he goes through my window and trashes my room.”

Uraraka thinks she sees Mina’s expression flicker into an alien look of hard-edged fury, the edge of her lip twisting away to expose a gleaming incisor.

The moment passes. Her friend again has only the same blank look of open and neutral sympathy that she’d adopted at the start of their talk.

“And anyways,” Uraraka says after a pause, “that was basically it. He offered to help clean up, I told him to leave.”

Mina blinks at her. “Why?” she says.

Uraraka feels her lips twitch upwards into something resembling a smile in an instinctive and defensive reaction. For a second she considers trying to fight it down. Mina is a friend, after all, and you’re supposed to be able to talk to your friends about stuff like—like—not relationship issues, because she doesn’t have those, and not boy problems because she doesn’t have those.

She changes the subject.

“That reminds me,” she lies. She looks away from Mina and towards the shattered hole where her window had once been. “Who do you think we should contact to get that fixed?”

Mina looks at her askance but lets the subject drop. “I don’t know,” she says. “Probably one of the teachers knows. Let’s go ask Momo to make us some tarp or something we can use to cover it up first and then we’ll see.”

Later that night, the boys are thoroughly surprised when Mina barges into their common area and smacks Bakugou over the head.

“The fuck was that,” the boy snarls, turning to face her, but she’s already moving on. She hits Kirishima over the head to much the same reaction, then moves on to every other boy in turn, pausing only over Midoriya and Iida. The latter she eyes for a minute before giving him a light tap on the head; the former she pokes sharply in the head before pointing to the nearest door with the same finger.

“Out,” Mina orders.

Midoriya looks at her, then at everyone else, then back up at her, blinking bemusedly. “Um,” he says. “What’s going—“

“Out!”

He scurries out.

Mina watches him leave, then turns back to the group, who are by now either glaring at her or wearing expressions of bemusement.

“What the hell were you idiots thinking?” she hisses. “And don’t try to deny it. I know we have money riding on this bet but that was just going too damn far. For crying out loud, property damage? That’s Uraraka’s own stuff she’ll need to replace now thanks to you dumbasses.”

“What happened?” Iida asks, his usual demeanor subdued.

“Well, let’s see,” Mina says, her tone acidly sweet. “There’s a giant-ass hole in the wall where her window used to be, her TV is smashed, and her coffee table and her fan, and she was this close to breaking down and crying over all of it thanks to you morons, and I am this close to—to—“ she pauses, trying to think of an appropriately terrible revenge “—melting all of your shit and seeing how you like it!”

After a beat Kaminari points out, somewhat hesitantly, “Your fingers are touching, Ashido.”

“I know!”

Iida is on his feet and before her in a flash, bowing so deeply he looks like a sideways L. “My deepest apologies!” he belts out, forcing Mina to cover her ears to prevent an attack of deafness. “I was remiss in my duties as class president this afternoon and failed to rein in our classmates’ enthusiasm for ensuring that our friends find happiness in each other!”

“In each other,” Kaminari snickers. Mina glares at him, and his quiet sounds of amusement die away. He coughs and looks away from her.

“So here’s what you chuckleheads are going to do,” Mina says. “You’re going to buy a new TV for her. You’re going to buy a new fan for her. You’re going to buy a new coffee table for her, and—“ a vicious little smirk peels the corners of her lips up “—because it’d make someone suspicious if all of you showed up for no reason at all, you’ll send Midoriya and only Midoriya to deliver them to her.”

A chorus of grumbling comes up from the boys, but it dies away after a minute without much fuss.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Mina says, folding her arms across her chest, her ire somewhat fading now that petty vengeance had been dealt out. “I mean, the scheme to fake his heart attack and to get Uraraka to do rescue breathing on him was stupid enough, and the Twister game was—actually pretty good come to think of it. All right, throwing the two of them into a janitorial closet and locking the door was stupider. The heck was the idea here?”

Bakugou grunts and folds his arms across his chest, marinating in his own sullen wroth. Iida looks embarrassed and clams up, seating himself back on the couch with a thoroughly preoccupied air; Kaminari tries not to catch her eye. Everyone else in the room takes a sudden and intense interest in either the floor or the ceiling.

In the end, it’s Kirishima who ends up trying to explain.

“Right, so, uh,” he stammers out, looking around him for support and finding none. “Right, so we noticed that Midoriya was always really nervous around Uraraka, every time we got them close together, so we figured that, uh, maybe they just needed a bit of a push, to you know, get comfortable with each other—“ he pauses a moment, trying not to wilt under the force of Mina’s glare.

“—so we invited him out to the lawn for a quick free-for-all spar and then Katsuki blew him through Uraraka’s window,” he finishes in a rush. He drops back down onto his seat and fiddles nervously with his fingers.

“Do you guys ever think things through beyond step two?” Mina says into the awkward silence. “Or step one for that matter? Good grief, what did you think was going to happen, he falls into her lap and instantly seduces her and they’re making out in public by the end of the week?”

She sighs and shakes her head. “Look, whatever. Can we just agree not to do it again? No property damage, no psychological scarring, nothing like that. We just want them to get together, all right, we’re agreed on that?”

A silent chorus of nods passes around the room.

“All right,” Mina says. “End of the week for Uraraka’s replacement stuff, all right?”

She leaves.

“Fucking damnit,” Bakugou says after the door closes behind her. “All right, how much does a fucking TV cost.”

By the close of their first year, it was completely obvious to everyone in Class 1-A that of the potential romances in their social circle, the one growing between Midoriya Izuku and Uraraka Ochako was the most promising. Okay, sure, there was some mileage to be had in shipping Todoroki and Momo; there was always fun to be had when mentioning Momo to Jirou, of course. There was even something to be had between Bakugou and Kaminari, although given Bakugou’s propensity to try and murder you in as messily a manner as possible at the slightest provocation it was advised to poke that particular wolverine with a very long stick indeed.

So of course, it had taken all of two minutes for a betting pool to spring up.

The first two weeks were chaotic, as people tried to negotiate rates and odds and tried to negotiate exchange rates for favors, with at least one fistfight breaking out over an unfavorable bet—Bakugou, as it turned out, getting pissed that no one would accept his low, low offer of eternal servitude should “Chubby Cheeks” and “That Asshole” get together within the next year.

Iida and Momo made sure to take over after that, and quickly instituted a cash-only rule.

Things somehow managed to consolidate themselves after that, the various bets and bargains merging and growing until two distinct blocs had formed, with the boys opposite the girls.

And then, of course, the competition had started.

It had begun innocently enough, with Bakugou’s brag that he could easily arrange matters so that “those two fuckers” would be “eating each others’ dumb faces” by the end of the month. Iida had protested that it’d be unfair to the spirit in which the betting had begun—only with about two or three times as many words—Bakugou had flipped him off, and then while Momo and Todoroki were trying to keep that fight from breaking out, Ashido had countered that while he didn’t have a chance in hell, she was perfectly capable of pulling something like that off. Matters deteriorated from there.

They managed to quell the argument only when Jirou suggested that they turn the entire thing from a horse race into a competition.

Three months later it was debatable as to whether making everyone even more hyperfocused on trying to get their friends together, now that prestige and money were both on the line, had caused or solved more issues between them.

What wasn’t as debatable was that Midoriya and Uraraka were both stiff-necked idiots who couldn’t recognize their affections for one another if you got the both of them shitfaced drunk and shoved them in a closet together.

The time had therefore passed with little to no progress, and with increasing amounts of desperation from all participants. It was now less a matter of money and prestige, but a matter of honor and duty, at least for anyone who wasn’t Bakugou—or Mineta, but they’d banned him from participating at all after he’d half-buried Midoriya’s bed in condoms.

The situation was becoming dire. No one was willing to go so far as to outright tell either Midoriya or Ochako about the others’ affections—that would be rude, and besides, Iida had made it very clear that anyone even considering doing so would be given a lecture. But it was getting close to the point where they were willing to risk having the brains drilled out of their skulls by such punishment, if only to get those idiots together.

Still, there were options still available to them that didn’t involve a horrible, slow death at the hands of Iida; they would exercise them.

“Thanks for helping me set up everything, Deku,” Uraraka says.

“No, it was really no problem,” Midoriya says as he scratches at the back of his neck. “It’s the least I could do after wrecking your stuff.”

“About that,” she says. She coughs and kicks at the floorboards with the toes of one of her socked feet. “I heard the whole story from Mina, and I think that I owe you an apology for how I treated you the other day.”

“Oh, no—“

“No,” Uraraka says, cutting him off. “It wasn’t your fault, and it wasn’t fair of me to treat you like everything was your fault, and I really do need to apologize. So, um, yeah. I’m sorry.”

They stand there at the threshold to Uraraka’s room for a little while, until Midoriya swallows down the lump in his throat and says, with entirely too much brightness, “Well, if there’s nothing else that you need me for, I’ll be off then. I’ll see you later?”

“Yeah, I’ll see you later,” Uraraka says. “Uh, at class later, right?”

��Yeah, yeah,” he says, “at class.”

Mina pops up about half a second after Midoriya rounds the corner.

“See,” she says reassuringly. “He doesn’t hate you.”

“Yes he does,” Uraraka moans, trudging back into her dorm. She doesn’t bother shutting the door behind her, and Mina takes it as the invitation it was intended to be and follows her in, throwing herself spread-eagled across the bed. “Did you see him? He couldn’t have gotten out of here faster if Iida had been dragging him by the legs.”

“I did watch him leave,” Mina says. “Although I must admit that I was focused more on his very nice butt than I was on whether he was trying to get out of here especially quickly.”

She grins toothily as she watches her friend’s face go completely blank.

“Relax, I’m not intending to steal him from you,” Mina says. “He’s really not my type.”

Uraraka’s face remains blankly neutral even as her cheeks color slightly.

“Although honestly,” Mina muses innocently, rolling herself upright and tapping her heels together, “he is really sweet and nice and thoughtful and everything. Kinda generically so, but there’s a lot of people out there who’d be fine with something like that.”

“Not me, certainly,” Uraraka says, a little too quickly. “Anyways, did you do the extra credit on the essay?”

“Nah,” Mina says with a dismissive flick of her hair. “The essay itself was enough of a chore, so I didn’t bother. I guess you did, what topic did you choose?”

“I had to choose a major case and explain how it helped to shape the legal powers given to us as heroes,” Uraraka says. “There was an argument that I was a little worried was too weak, do you mind if I run it by you and see what you think of it?”

Mina tries her best to follow her friend’s argument but finds her eyes glazing over as the stream of wherebys and therefores flow past her with only the minimum amount of comprehension.

“Ura,” Mina says after five minutes of this. “Ura!”

Uraraka stops. “It was weak, wasn’t it,” she says. “Ugh, I knew—“

“Ura, you’re one of the smartest and hardest-working people in our class,” Mina says. “I’m sure your argument’s fine, I just can’t make sense of it.”

Uraraka blinks at her. “So you do think it’s weak?”

“I’m saying that if you want some actual good feedback I’m probably not the best person to ask about this,” Mina says. “You should really be going to Iida or Todoroki or—“

A thought traces its way across the forefront of her thoughts like silent lightning, and she has to fight down the giant, shit-eating grin that threatens to bisect her face.

“—Midoriya,” Mina says. “Yeah, Midoriya is probably your best option, he’s smart and overachieving like you and he’s probably done with his essay so he’s got lots of free time, you should drop by and see if he’ll help, plus he’s probably still feeling really guilty over wrecking your room so you can totally guilt-trip him into helping even if he doesn’t have free time. And I mean you’re friendly with him and all, he’d totally help you.”

“I’m not going to bother him about this,” Ochako says, her expression set, her lips pressed together. “And Momo finished hers two days ago, I’ll run my argument by her.”

“Yeah but you know that she’ll just nitpick your argument to death,” Mina says quickly. “And I mean, neither of us want that, do we?”

“Uh,” Uraraka says as she closes her laptop and tucks it under an arm. “I mean, yes. It’ll make my essay stronger in the end if it can stand up even to Momo’s analysis. Look, thanks for your help, Mina, I’ll be back in a bit.”

Mina sits primly on the bed with her hands folded neatly in her lap, and does not dive desperately for her phone the instant the door closes.

“Don’t help her,” she hisses into her phone the moment that Momo picks up. “Do not! Help! Her!”

“What?” Momo says after a blank moment.

“Do not help Uraraka just trust me on this,” Mina says, and hangs up.

Momo calls back thirty seconds later. “Okay, so I told her that I was busy,” Momo says. “What is this all about?”

“We need her to go to Midoriya for help,” Mina says.

“Ah. I see.”

“Look, she might be going to Iida or Todoroki next,” Mina says.

“I’ll head off Todoroki,” Momo says.

“I’ll handle Iida,” Mina says. “Should we get the girls to run interference on anyone else?”

“Bakugou is the only other one I can think of, but he and Kaminari are over at the gym right now,” Momo says. “I can get Tsuyu to run surveillance on them in case they’re just finishing up, but we should be safe.”

“Cool,” Mina says. “If the situation with Ura changes I’ll update you.”

“Okay,” Uraraka says to herself. “I can do this, it’s just sitting in a room and going over some homework, and it’s not like we haven’t done it before.”

Of course, the other times they’d had other people around. And back then she’d at least been able to function halfway normally for three minutes together when in close proximity to Deku.

Fuck crushes. Fuck them sideways.

Still, everyone else was busy and she needs to get this stupid essay done, so she needs to get over herself right now.

She knocks on Deku’s door with a quick tap-tap-tap and steps back. After a second the door opens.

“Oh,” Midoriya says. He stares at her.

“Uh,” Uraraka says, waving her hand in front of his face. “Hey, Deku, are you okay?”

“Huh? Oh yes,” Midoriya says. “Oh, uh, sorry. Did you need something?”

She needs him to stop making her heart do backflips when he has that adorable look on his adorable face.

“Do you have a couple minutes?” she says. “I was having a little bit of trouble with the extra credit essay and I just needed to run through the argument with someone and try to work out the kinks in it, and everyone else seems to be busy with something else and I was hoping that you wouldn’t be.”

“I was, uh, actually planning on starting that myself,” Midoriya says. “Come in—oh, sorry, do you want to work in the common area?”

“No,” Uraraka says, trying to keep the word from coming out as a squeak. “There’s nothing wrong with—your room is fine.”

“So do you want anything to drink or anything?” Midoriya asks Uraraka as he ushers her in. “My mom brought some barley tea last weekend, do you want the chair?”

“I’ll take the bed,” Uraraka says, and perches herself on the very edge. “And thank you, I’ll take some tea.”

“Uh, okay,” Midoriya says. He kneels and pries open his minifridge and pulls out a glass bottle filled with an amber liquid. His other hand searches atop his desk and comes down with a relatively clean mug as he pops the bottle open with his thumb. He pours the mug half-full and hands it to Uraraka as he places the bottle back in the fridge.

“Right,” he says. “So, uh, what did you need to go over?”

“My extra credit essay,” Uraraka repeats after a moment and an askance look. “On the Tanaka v. Japan case, the one we skimmed over in class?” After another second without any response she adds “You know, the one that—“

“That eventually led to the establishment of the professional heroing system in Japan, yes,” Midoriya mutters to himself, his brows knitting together. “I did that too, what are you having trouble with?”

Uraraka sighs. “Not so much trouble, as—well, I’m just not sure that my argument makes any sense.”

He nods. “All right, walk me through it then.”

“Right, so background, this was when the use of Quirks was still banned nationwide, Tanaka was smuggling drugs into the country and was caught by a police officer with a mild telepathy Quirk. He appealed his case after his conviction, arguing that because there was no evidence of drugs or drug paraphernalia in the car the officer could only have had probable cause to search his car if he’d used his Quirk illegally to find out that he was smuggling, and when his appeal was denied he eventually managed to bring his case to the Supreme Court, arguing that the search was a violation of Article 34—”

“The ‘nor shall he be detained without adequate cause’ clause,” he says, nodding. “Right, right. Adequate cause was obtained but only through illegal means, so it was invalid.”

“—right, and that the use of the officer’s Quirk in general was a violation of Article 35, arguing that his private thoughts were covered under ‘effects’ in that article, and obviously since it was initially just a stop on the freeway there was never any warrant. Supreme Court eventually decided in favor of Tanaka.”

“Okay, so what argument are you making about the case?” he says.

“I’m arguing that the narrowly-worded decision that was eventually handed down by the court is what drove the development of heroes as privately-funded rather than government-funded organizations,” she says.

“What bit?” he says. He turns to his laptop and after a few seconds of searching brings up a copy of the decision. He hands the laptop to Uraraka, who sets her own computer to the side.

“Uh, this one here,” she says after a moment, highlighting the passage and passing the computer back to Midoriya.

He scans the screen, murmuring under his breath. “—whereby we recognize that the arresting officer’s actions were, given the legal standard previously set, et cetera et cetera—“

This goes on for about a minute or so. Uraraka amuses herself in the meantime by trying to count the freckles on Midoriya’s cheeks.

“Stop jostling,” Kaminari hisses as he, Bakugou, and Iida fight to get an ear to the door leading into Midoriya’s dorm room. “Stop it, they’ll hear.”

“Why don’t you fucking back off then,” Bakugou snaps. “I have better hearing than you do anyways.”

He elbows Kaminari out of the way with many a quiet protest and presses his ear against the door.

“What,” Jirou says, “are you idiots doing?”

The three of them turn to face her with expressions between surprise and irritation; she quirks an eyebrow at them in return, but otherwise remains expressionless.

“Round-cheeks went in a few minutes ago, we’re trying to see if she and Worthless are doing the nasty yet,” Bakugou answers. Behind him, Kaminari makes a number of quiet, frantic gestures which more or less translate to “no we are not”.

“We are trying to hear what our friends are conversing about,” Iida says, glancing towards Bakugou, “and yes, seeing if what they are conversing about concerns their relationship. I assume that Uraraka being here is part of your plans?”

“Not mine,” Jirou says with a shrug. “Momo or Mina’s probably, I’ll ask.”

“While you are here,” Iida says. “Do you mind if you assist us?” He gestures towards the door.

“Sure,” Jirou says. One of her earphones spools out and punches delicately through the drywall beside the door as the other raises itself and points towards the boys.

“—so the issue I have here is,” Midoriya says, his voice somewhat muffled but still understandable, “that it seems to me that your entire argument hinges on literally one word and some vague wording in the prior Yamamoto decision.”

“Right,” Uraraka shoots back, “but it’s an important one word, because by mentioning specifically public enforcers of the law in the Tanaka decision and with the whole “urgent need” clause they mention in Yamamoto it basically meant that privately-owned and –operated security companies could deliberately throw people into situations where they would be in mortal danger, have them use their Quirks, and then claim self-defense as their urgent need if they got slapped with any lawsuits.”

“Yeah, but they closed that loophole within a month of the first big companies starting to advertise their services,” Midoriya counters. “And besides—just playing devil’s advocate—that doesn’t explain why the police couldn’t do the same thing, since the Tanaka decision was interpreted as forbidding only the use of Quirks that could go against Articles 35 or 38, and being able to punch someone really hard or blow them up doesn’t really translate to unlawful search and seizure or compelling someone to confess.”

“Oh my god,” Bakugou gripes. “This is fucking useless.”

“No, no,” Iida says, nodding thoughtfully, “she makes a good point with the—“

“Oh fuck off,” Bakugou says. He gets up from his half-crouched position in front of the door and shambles away, his hands in his pockets.

“Well, those two are dense as hell,” Jirou says as she retracts both of her earphones. “Or maybe they’re just such enormous nerds that that’s their version of foreplay or something.”

“Or perhaps they really do merely want to focus on their academics,” Iida says.

“Eh?” Kaminari says.

“I am saying that perhaps the reason that our efforts have been fruitless up until now is because our friends are not interested in romance,” Iida explains. “And if that is the case then perhaps we—“

“Five words or less, Iida,” Jirou says. “We don’t have all day.”

He blinks at her, but takes a second and chooses his words carefully.

“They care about finishing school,” he says. “I accept that it doesn’t necessarily preclude the formation of a romance while we are here, but that is their focus, and they are driven and highly motivated, and given our current lack of success I find it difficult to imagine that they will shift that focus anytime soon.”

“Okay,” Kaminari says, clapping Iida on the back, “I think that was way more than five words, buddy, but yeah, sure, that sounds right.”

Jirou’s eyes go wide. “You idiot,” she hisses, “they heard that!”

“Scatter,” Iida orders. The three of them dive for cover.

A few seconds later Midoriya opens the door and glances from side to side, frowning slightly.

“Sorry, I must’ve imagined it,” he says as he turns and lets the door swing shut behind him. “Where were we?”

Iida, Kaminari, and Jirou peek out from around the corner they’d bolted around.

“How about we just leave them to it,” Kaminari suggests. “That was way too close.”

“For once I agree with you,” Jirou says. “Come on, let’s go see if anyone knows what’s actually going on.”

“Look, we’ve been arguing over details for the past three hours,” Midoriya says. “I think that your core argument is fine, and if you do lose any points it’ll be over little nitpicky things that even actual lawyers don’t really agree on.”

Uraraka’s mouth flattens into a line, almost a pout. “You’re sure about that?” she says.

“Positive,” he replies. “We’ve been over every word in this eight times and all we’ve changed is maybe a couple of sentences. It’s a good essay, it’s well-argued, you build it up logically, you cite appropriate precedents, it’s a really good essay, Uraraka. You can worry over it until next week but it’ll still be a good essay.”

He sighs as he sees her expression. “Look, if you insist, we’ll go over it one more time, okay?” he says. “Let’s just take a break, get something to eat or something, come back at this when we’re refreshed. There’s a new ramen bar that’s opened up not too far from here and Iida says that their prices aren’t bad—”

Midoriya’s teeth clack together as his exhausted brain catches up with his tongue and a blush works its way onto his cheeks. “—I mean,” he adds a little hastily, “if you want, or we can just go and grab something from the convenience store and come back.”

Uraraka’s brain takes a minute to break from its loop of “essay essay essay freckles essay essay legal jargon freckles”, but when it does she flushes riot red.

“Uh,” she says. “Um, sure. Ramen sounds good.” She closes her laptop with some care and stands up with it clutched before her like a talisman. “Let me just go grab my coat and my wallet.”

She scurries out.

“So I’ll see you in a few minutes?” Midoriya calls after her. He looks around his little room and runs a hand distractedly through his hair. Right, a comb maybe, and a clean shirt. Jeans, probably wouldn’t be a good idea to go out in sweatpants. Should he brush his teeth, no that would be dumb.

Mina brightens as Uraraka scurries into the common room.

“Hey, Ura, what’s the rush?” Mina asks as the girl hurries past, her laptop clutched to her chest.

She blinks and turns her head to follow Uraraka as she fails to slow or to even acknowledge the friendly greeting, but instead disappears down the hall leading into the girl’s dormitories.

“Uh,” she says. She turns to Momo, seated off to the side at one of the tables scattered around the room. “The heck was that all about?”

Momo doesn’t look up from where she’s typing away on her laptop. “Was what all about?”

“Ura just went through here like a shot.”

“Oh.”

Momo looks up as quick footsteps patter back across the carpet—Uraraka, now with one arm in a big, puffy coat, the other hanging onto a small clasp purse.

“Oh,” Momo repeats as Uraraka hurries past them with a kilometer stare. “A date.”

“Eh?”

“Coat and wallet, so she’s going out and she’s expecting to have to buy something, she’s gone completely stone-faced so something’s happened to make her emotionally overwrought, and really the only thing we might reasonably assume would do that these days is Midoriya.”

“Ah.”

“Also she’s headed straight for the boy’s dorms with her coat and wallet while being emotionally overwrought, and what does that all indicate for you?”

“Okay,” Mina says, nodding. “That makes sense.”

They fall silent again as Uraraka, now accompanied by a quietly red-faced Midoriya, pass them by and exit the building.

“Someone’s smug,” Momo notes as she turns back to Mina. “Well, it’ll hopefully be well-deserved.”

“I haven’t heard of them pulling anything,” Mina says, “that’ll be a yes.”

“You said that about your last three plans.”

“My last three plans weren’t sure-fire.”

Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god.

Uraraka tries to keep herself from losing it as she walks next to Midoriya, the chill in the air turning their breath into a fine mist that hangs in the air before them for a moment before floating away.

It isn’t a date that they’re on, it’s just a quick meal and then they’re heading back and finishing up their essays and there are zero romantic implications to this whatsoever.

Midoriya’s hand brushes hers and she nearly jumps off of the sidewalk and right into the path of a passing car. He jerks away so viciously that he nearly trips into the little concrete drainage trench bordering the road.

“So, uh,” he says a minute later. “I know it’s a bit early for that but are you looking at any agencies that you want to join up with?”

“Yes, actually,” Uraraka says, relieved at having something so utterly normal to talk about. “I spoke with No. 13 and he helped me get in touch with a few companies that do rapid response for disasters, rescue work mostly since that’s what my powers would probably be best for, lifting rubble off of people and everything—“

Okay, Ochako, get ahold of yourself, you’re starting to babble.

“—but I’m looking into groups that do more direct crime prevention and crime response too ever since I got some training from Gunhead,” she says. She mimes a couple of quick jabs and a rising uppercut and immediately feels foolish for it. “Some of them do community service and outreach, some work with the police and respond directly to urgent scenes, you know, the usual.”

She pauses to take a breath and asks brightly, “What about you?”

“I—well, I don’t know, actually,” Midoriya says. He looks down at the sidewalk and massages the back of his neck with a hand. “I haven’t really thought about it, ever since, uh. Ever since—we rescued Eri.”

He doesn’t need to tell her his real thoughts.

“But I was thinking that I’d find someone to take me on as a sidekick,” he says. “Get some street experience first, get my name out there before trying to sign on with an agency as a full hero.”

Uraraka can’t help herself—she chortles, sticking one of her hands over her mouth in a vain attempt to stifle the noise as Midoriya turns a bemused expression towards her.

“Um,” he says. “Sorry, did I say something?”

“No, no,” Uraraka says through a burst of giggling, “no. It’s just that you realize that you could walk up to any group and ask to be signed up as a hero and they’d write you a check on the spot, right?”

His expression becomes more bewildered, like that of a puppy confronted with an unfamiliar squeaky toy. Uraraka can’t help herself—again she bursts out giggling.

“You’ve been involved in three or four major fights at this point,” she explains. “Big-league guys too, and that’s making people sit up and take notice. I mean, every time I mentioned our class, the first thing that everyone said was ‘Oh, with that Deku boy?’”

She pauses, then adds “except that one guy who said ‘Oh, you’re in the same class as that insane kid?’ Look, my point is that people know you, and—okay, well most of them—think well of you. You could go up to any of them and ask and they’d give you a job just like that. You’re the guy who does the impossible, wins the unwinnable, uh, punches the unpunchable, I guess. You set your sights on a goal and you let literally nothing stop you from achieving it, and people admire that.”

Midoriya scoffs. “I think you’re overestimating me, Uraraka.”

Uraraka’s smile thins out to a line. “I think you’re underestimating yourself,” she says in soft rejoinder.

“Well, what about you, then?” Midoriya counters. “You helped take down Chisaki, and you’ve been doing as well or me or better academically. Your performance during the Sports Festival was a lot more impressive, too, since you actually used your head instead of just running straight in and breaking your arms and most of your fingers.”

“I lost that fight,” Uraraka says.

“There’s always going to be a fight that you can’t win,” Midoriya says. “And I lost to Todoroki, too.”

“Yeah, but you’ve also done a lot more winning than I have,” Uraraka says. “And let’s face it, you’re a lot more inspiring than I am.”

“Oh come on—“

“I mean it,” Uraraka says, continuing doggedly. “You inspire people to do things that they know they’re going to get in trouble for, you inspire them to keep fighting even when they would be perfectly justified in just lying down and letting someone else handle it, you inspire them to—to try to be better than they are.”

She flushes as she realizes that Midoriya is staring at her, his eyes wide, his mouth hanging open very slightly.

“What?” she says. “I mean, it’s all true.”

“I didn’t know,” he says, looking down at his feet.

Silence descends again between them before Midoriya breaches it. “Um,” he says. “Do you feel like that?”

Before she can answer a man steps out in front of them from a darkened alley with something shiny and pointy in one clenched hand—a knife, more a machete, roughly the length of her forearm with a simple curving drop-point tip.

Uraraka feels something click into place in her head. She shifts her feet slightly apart and rises onto the balls of her feet, letting her purse drop away as her hands come up to the level of her waist.

“Wallets and purse,” the man says, the tip wavering between her and Midoriya. He licks his lips. “Now!”

Okay, so they just need to keep calm and not make any sudden moves and oh dear Midoriya is stepping in front of her and now he has a knife buried up to the hilt in his stomach.

Okay, so it is important to not freak out and now the mugger is pulling the knife out—

She darts forwards and kicks him in the knee; something makes an awful and satisfying crunch, and the mugger screams and drops the knife. He takes a roundhouse swing at her, which is ridiculous he’s well out of range and fuck her he’s got her with his nails or claws or something and now she’s got two or three hot streaks of pain across one cheek, but now she’s got a hold of his arm by his wrist and upper arm and twist—

The man feels his shoulder joint twist painfully before he hits the concrete face-first, hard enough that something crunches in his face. He screams in agony—at least until Uraraka kicks him sharply in the jaw, knocking him out cold.

Okay, primary threat has been neutralized. Now she can freak out.

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” Uraraka babbles. She drops to her knees beside Midoriya as he curls up around the spreading red stain in his gut.

Oh god, what does she do? Pressure on the wound, right? Apply pressure with something, stop the bleeding—oh god, there’s so much blood—make sure he doesn’t pass out on her. She needs something to staunch the bleeding—not her down-stuffed coat, needs to be something with a dense weave, something that’ll help stop the bleeding

“Uraraka,” Midoriya hisses between gritted teeth.

She stares at him, wide-eyed.

“Recovery Girl,” he manages.

Fuck her, right. An ambulance wouldn’t take long to get here but the wound was deep and he was losing a lot of blood very quickly, and it was no guarantee that they’d be able to stitch him back up in time even if they got him to a trauma suite in the next five or ten minutes. His best chance of not bleeding to death here on the concrete was to get him to Recovery Girl—the teachers lived on campus now, after all. There was always the risk that she’d be off at the hospital of course, and wouldn’t that be deeply ironic if they fucked up and brought him back to campus only to find no Recovery Girl, only to have him bleed out there—fuck her if she’s going to spiral again.

She fumbles out her phone and dials Iida. It rings twice.

“Hello?” Iida answers.

It takes her a precious few seconds to explain, and another thirty seconds to get Iida to stop freaking out. Uraraka fights down the urge to scream.

“Just get here as soon as you fu—as you can,” she snaps. She tears Midoriya’s shirt off as gently as she can, but the movement still elicits a pained scream from him. “Sorry, Deku,” she says. “Stay with me, all right?”

Such a stupid thing to say, she thinks, as Iida hangs up. “Stay with me”, as if that would actually do anything to stop the fucking bleeding.

She folds the blood-stained shirt into a rough compress, trying to keep as much dirt off of it as possible.

“You are going to hate me in a moment,” she informs him. His eyes flicker down to the shirt in her hands.

Then she presses it hard against the wound.

He screams, his hands tightening into fists. She hears his knuckles pop.

Iida arrives at speed a couple minutes later with a rolled-up canvas stretcher tucked under an arm and a roll of duct tape around his wrist like a bracelet. He screeches to a halt and together they slide Midoriya onto the stretcher, secure the impromptu compress with several layers of tape, then secure Midoriya to the stretcher with the liberal application of more duct tape around his legs and shoulders.

“I sent Todoroki to inform Recovery Girl, she should be ready and waiting by the time we get back,” Iida says brusquely as Uraraka slaps her hand down onto the stretcher, then onto Midoriya. “I have also informed Momo, who is calling the police and directing them to the location of this criminal.”

“I’m coming with you,” Uraraka says. She slaps a hand onto her own shoulder and grabs the other end of the stretcher as she feels the familiar sense of queasiness come over her. She swallows hard.

“Of course,” Iida says, tucking the stretcher, Midoriya and all, under one arm. “Hold on tight.”

The three of them probably break a couple speed limits on the way back to campus, but Uraraka doesn’t care. They get back before Midoriya loses too much blood, and that’s what matters.

“He’ll be fine,” Recovery Girl tells them a few tense hours later, with the addition of a very worried and extremely teary Mrs. Midoriya. “My powers don’t do anything for blood loss, so I’m putting a few units of blood into him right now. My powers also don’t do much for infections, so in case that knife wound punctured anything I’m going to be putting him on intravenous antibiotics.”

“But he’ll be fine?” Iida asks.

“Yes,” Recovery Girl says. “Shouldn’t take more than a week before he’s out of here.”

She directs a little nod towards Uraraka. “You’ll also be pleased to know that the police picked up the man who tried to mug you. There will be some legal trouble undoubtedly, you did break his nose and his jaw, but I wouldn’t worry about that. We have an excellent legal team, and it was self-defense.”

“Is he awake?” Mrs. Midoriya asks.

“No,” Recovery Girl says. “But you’re welcome to stay with him until he wakes up. I’ll be in and out periodically to check on him, but feel free to call for me at any time.”

The three of them say their “thank yous” and “goodbyes”, and the diminutive little doctor nods at them and leaves for her office.

“Thank you so much,” Mrs. Midoriya says, bowing deeply and rapidly to Iida and Uraraka both. “Thank you, thank you, thank you—“

“No, no,” Uraraka says. “That’s not necessary.”

“He’s our friend,” Iida says.

“He would’ve done the same for us,” Uraraka says.

“Has done the same for us,” Iida says.

It takes them a few minutes of this before they convince Mrs. Midoriya that, no, there is nothing owed between them, no, no, really, it’s fine, there’s really nothing to, no, please stop prostrating yourself, please. Please.

“I’m going to go in and see him, then,” she says, sniffling a little. She dabs at her eyes with a soaked-through handkerchief and scurries in.

“You’re not coming?” Iida says as he turns to follow Mrs. Midoriya in and sees Uraraka turn to walk the other direction.

“No,” she says. “It’d be too crowded in there, you know how tiny those rooms are.”

He raises an eyebrow at her. “You’re not hurt, are you?”

“No, no,” Uraraka says. “I wasn’t hurt, it was just Deku. I just need to think about some things.”

“If you’re sure,” Iida says. “I’ll text if he wakes up.”

“Thank you,” Uraraka says, and hurries out.

It’s only when she’s safely within the privacy of her own room that she lets herself break down and cry.

They’d been that close to just dying. Not in some big and meaningful fight, just a mugging gone bad, and it’d been that close. If she’d just been a second slower, had let the shock from Deku’s stabbing set in just that little fraction, then they both would’ve been goners. It had been that close, and then she would’ve died with so many things unsaid.

After a while, the tears slow, then stop. Uraraka curls up into a little ball and stares at the wall until sleep claims her.

The knock comes at Izuku’s window, in the dead of night.

He looks up, frowning, from his notes, and stares at his closed curtains.

A second later, the knock comes again, a frantic little rapping lasting maybe a second.

He waits and considers his options.

Well, the security around the school was good enough now that it probably wasn’t a villain trying to murder him. It was a possibility, sure, but not overly possible. And there’d probably be more screaming and explosions by now if it was.

“Deku, can you please open your window?”

Okay, so unless there’s a villain capable of perfectly mimicking or imitating Ochako’s voice—wait, wasn’t there that girl with the shapeshifting Quirk, Toga something or other?

Izuku shakes his head and stands, walking towards the window. Well, he could sit here and indulge his paranoia, or he could go and see what Ochako wanted at this time of night and why she was calling on him from outside instead of coming to his door.

Which, on second thought, doesn’t exactly do much for his paranoia.

He twitches aside the curtains and comes face-to-face with Ochako.

He blushes despite himself—she is really close, even if they’re separated by a window screen and a couple panes of insulated glass, and the sight of her expression, so focused and determined, sets his heart to skipping, and—oh for crying out loud, he shouldn’t be creeping on his friend like this. She wouldn’t want him to.

“We need to talk,” Ochako says. “Meet me on the training field in ten minutes?”

Izuku opens his mouth to say something, then thinks better of it and shuts it. He nods.

Ochako takes a deep breath and returns his nod. Then, she loosens her grip on the windowsill and drops gently away into the twilight.

Izuku quickly tugs on a sweatshirt and his shoes and slips out of his dorm. He closes the door carefully behind him so that the click of the lock doesn’t betray his exit, then makes his way down the corridors and stairways with his heart pounding in his ears and slips out of the dorms through a side door.

The campus grounds are quiet and cool past curfew, brightly lit by tall gold-shining lamps every few meters along its broad, winding paths. Izuku makes his way to the field by sticking to the edges of buildings and skirting the edges of shadows, alert for patrolling security and for other, more subtle sentries. After all, who knows what the inventors in the Department of Support might’ve dreamt up?

Still, he makes it to the field without incident and without any of the teachers popping up to reprimand him.

Ochako is waiting for him beside one of the long flights of stairs leading down to the field itself, at the edge of one of the pools of light cast by a lamp. Her eyes flicker up to meet his; her hands momentarily twist as they curl into fists around the hem of her shirt.

Izuku swallows, his mouth suddenly dry.

“Um,” he says after a minute or so of silence between them. “So, uh. Hi.”

Ochako meets his eyes again for a second, then looks down and away.

“So what did you want to talk about?” he says.

Silence. Her fists clench tighter.

“Are you okay?” he says.

Ochako finally replies, her voice quiet but firm and steady.

“I’m not,” she says.

Izuku takes a step closer to her, his hands half-raised to clasp her shoulders in a gesture of comfort. “What’s wrong, then?”

More silence. Izuku drops his hands back down to his sides even as Ochako’s loosen from their fists and drop down to hers.

“Uraraka?”

She finally looks up at him with tired but steady eyes, her expression resigned, her jaw set. The tension drops out of her shoulders completely, though she still looks hunched and small.

She just doesn’t look afraid anymore.

“You,” she says. “That’s what’s wrong.”

Izuku blinks.

“Or,” she amends hastily, “I should say that my feelings about you are what’s wrong.”

“Your feelings—“

“I love you,” Ochako says.

Izuku’s heart swells, so much so that he finds it hard to breathe or speak properly for a moment. His vision blurs. Oh, for crying out loud, he is not going to start crying now, he is not.

“I don’t know when I started seeing you as—as more than a friend,” Ochako continues. “All I know is that one day I woke up and—well, things were different.”

Her hands close into fists on the hem of her shirt again; she looks down and with a small effort forces her fingers to uncurl, one by one.

“You were just—“ she looks up at him, then back down to her hands again “—a light in my life, all of a sudden. And I wanted to be close to that light. So close.”

She looks up at him again, and holds his gaze. Izuku thinks his heart might explode from his chest when a smile, small and flickering, finds its way to her face again.

“I thought that would just go away,” she continues, standing a little straighter now. “And I tried to ignore it when it didn’t and I tried to just move on with things like everything was normal.”

She gives a little shrug. “And it didn’t work. Loving you is a hard habit to break.”

“Um, Ochako—“

She holds up a hand and Izuku stops. “Please, let me finish,” she says. “I didn’t want to tell you this because I didn’t want to make things weird between us and I didn’t want to, well, make you feel like you had to respond or anything.”

“So what changed?” Izuku asks.

“I realized that I’d regret it more if, y’know, something bad happened to one of us and I never let you know,” Ochako says. “And a part of it, well, was just me needing to be honest with myself, just me needing to stop denying that I want to be with you. As more than a friend, I mean.”

She inhales deeply and then blows the breath out through her mouth, squaring her shoulders.

“So there,” she says. “I just needed to let you know. I mean, I don’t want to make you feel like you need to return my feelings or anything—”

“I love you too,” Izuku says.

Ochako freezes with her mouth open in a wide O, the words that had been about to escape coming out as a mere squeak instead.

“I didn’t know when I started to see you as more than a friend either,” he continues, as a blush scorches its way across her cheeks and lights the tips of her ears aflame. “I mean, I’ve admired you since the day we first met—your drive and determination, your kindness and selflessness—“

He stops, feeling his own blush creep up over his cheeks. “I’m sorry,” he says, dropping his gaze. “I’m probably not saying this very—I’m probably not being very clear. I don’t really have a lot of experience—I’m not really used to this kind of thing.”

“Neither am I,” Ochako says, with a quiet smile that Izuku just sees in his peripheral vision. He blushes harder. “I mean, I’ve had crushes before, but I’ve never really felt anything this strongly before.”

“Honestly,” Izuku says, “I never thought that I’d ever be on the receiving end of something like this.”

They stand there for a minute more in silence, both of them almost glowing brighter than the lamp they’re under.

“So,” Uraraka says. “What do we do now?”

“I, uh,” Izuku says. “I don’t know. I never thought that I’d ever get this far with, uh, anyone.”

“This hasn’t ever been something that I’ve really thought was important,” Uraraka admits. “Until now, I mean.”

“So how do you want to go ahead with this?” Izuku asks.

Uraraka chews at her lower lip, and Izuku finds himself reflecting on just how ridiculously adorable the expression on her face is in an attempt to distract himself from his suddenly racing heart.

“Maybe just,” she says, “take it slow?”

“Take it a day at a time sort of thing?” he says.

“Do what comes natural?” she says.

“But keep it light and casual?” he says.

“Yeah,” she says, nodding perhaps a little too vigorously. “Yeah, that sounds good. I mean, we both still need to concentrate on school and stuff, and uh, stuff. We shouldn’t let, y’know, us get in the way of that.”

“Light and casual,” he repeats, nodding in sympathy with Uraraka. “Uh, Ochako?”

“You can call me by my first name,” Ochako says. “I mean, we’re, uh, together now, right?”

“Um,” Midoriya says. “Um, right. Well, you can call me Izuku, then.”

Again, there is a silence. The two of them try to fight down the tides of embarrassment and general, overwhelming emotion pouring over them and after a minute or two, mostly succeed.

“We are very, very new to this, aren’t we?” Ochako says.

“You’re honestly the first girl that I’ve been able to talk to for more than ten seconds without freezing up,” Izuku admits. “And maybe we don’t know each other as well as we’d—“

He searches for the word.

“Like?” Ochako suggests.

“—as well as we’d like,” Izuku says.

“Well, that’s what dating is supposed to be about, isn’t it?” Ochako says, giving him a small smile. “Getting to know each other?”

“Yeah,” Izuku says. He returns her smile, a little hesitantly. “So, uh. Do you want to get to know each other a little better, uh, next Saturday?”

Ochako’s smile widens into something brilliant and golden, and Izuku finds himself answering it with one of his own.

“I’d love to,” Ochako says.

“Oh my god,” Mina groans, flopping face-first into Momo’s bedspread.

“What is it now?” Momo says, not looking up from the article she’s idly scrolling through.

“Okay so Midoriya getting stabbed and all was horrible and awful and I really hope that it never happens again,” Mina says. “But come on, him being in mortal peril? Ura staying by his bed for a week all teary-eyed while Recovery Girl healed him back up and made sure that he wasn’t going to have an infection? The situation was perfect.”

“So?”

“So why aren’t they smooshing booties yet?”

Mina lets her head flop back down and screams into Momo’s bed.

“You’d better not be getting any spit on my sheets,” Momo says calmly.

“Okay, you know what we need to do?” Mina says after a minute, popping back up. She drops her fist into her open palm.

“Step up our—“

“Step up our game!” Mina declares. “We need to get these two adorable losers together at any cost.”

“Oh,” Momo says, without much enthusiasm. “Wonderful.”

Unbeknownst to them, in a clearing in the forest just outside of the main campus, Ochako and Izuku are laughing with each other, sitting side by side, their eyes bright and their smiles wide. Ochako’s hand sits atop Izuku’s, their fingers interlaced as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

The world is not well, they know. Outside of their little sanctuary the world seethes with hate and rage and cruelty.

But for now, in their own little world, all is well.

#uraraka ochako #midoriya izuku #bnha #uravity bang #long post

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emilyelizabethfowl · 6 years

Text

A Cup Of Coffee And Birthday Wishes

This is my response to @paigyloli beautiful challenger piece!

Both pieces were made for the @uravitybang organized by the incredible @clairelutra!

Available on AO3

Length: 5519 words; Pairing: none; Other characters: the entire 1AUA class, only there’s Shinsou instead of Mineta;

Disclaimer: I have never in my life drunk coffee. I have no idea how to make coffee. I have researched featured drinks extensively, but please do not try to make them at home unless you have experience in coffee-making.

“Welcome! How can I help you today?” Ochaco perked up at the sound of the door bell as her voice ringed through the empty café.

“Sorry, Occhan,” Midoriya said, crossing the threshold. “It’s just me and Tsu-chan, here.”

Ochaco’s smile slipped a bit. She was happy, of course, to see her friends and co-workers, but it just wasn’t the same as having customers.

She plopped down on the counter, staring at the perfectly arranged pastries, that had taken her half of the shift to get sorted.

“Not many customers then, I take it? Ribbit.” Tsu-chan said as she walked up to her, patting Uraraka’s cap gently, as the girl dropped her head, her arm being the only thing preventing her forehead from thumping on the cold surface. Midoriya took the time to get their coats sorted out in the backroom.

“Not one,” Ochaco mumbled out into the crook of her arm. “Not one through the entire week!”

All Atsui could offer was a soft hum of patient understanding.

“It’s only wednesday, though!” Midoriya pointed out, entering the main room again, his apron firmly in place. “I’m sure someone will turn up soon!”

“But what if they don’t?” Uraraka looked wistfully at the cakes again. “These will all go to waste!”

The other two looked at the pieces as well; the moist layers of sponge, connected by the generous portions of creme, covered with glaze on the outside, and sugar flowers on the top.

They were simply mouth-watering, alluring everyone who entered the café with their ephemeral beauty and promise of heavenly taste.

Midoriya shook his head slightly.

“Yeah, Kacchan really did his best with those, didn’t he?” He managed, his strong will being the only thing that prevented him from gluing his face to the glass case like a child. “I still can’t believe these pieces landed here and not in a art gallery!”

Atsui could only manage a slight nod.

“And now they will all turn into garbage!” Ochaco wailed miserably. “I don’t understand! Last week there was someone here all the time!”

Her co-workers exchanged a worried glance.

That café was her oldest dream, her most pampered child; To have it not filled with life, chatter and the smell of coffee must’ve been hard for her.

With a heavy sigh Ochaco pushed herself off the counter.

“Guess I’ll go sort through the materials, again.” She declared, straightening her cap and re-knotting her apron. “For the third time today.”

She headed towards the backroom, her shoulders slumped as if the world’s entire stock of coffee beans rested on it, her feet dragging as if she was wading through the thickest cream and toffee muddled together.

The second she disappeared behind the door frame, Tsui and Midoriya huddled together.

“Do you think it was a good idea? Ribbit.” Tsu-chan asked, wringing her hands nervously.

“I didn’t expect everyone would just, stop coming.” Izuku wasn’t much better, fiddling with the edge of his apron as if it held the answers to all of the world’s problems. “I thought she would just have a bit of a break, you’ve seen the bags under her eyes.”

“I’m not sure if worrying over no customers helped with that particular problem, ribbit.” As usual, Tsu-chan’s bluntness hit where it was most relevant.

Midoriya bit his lower lip, twisting his fingers so hard Atsui was sure people could hear him from the other side of the street.

“I’m sure it’ll work out just fine, ribbit.” She decided to have some mercy for the boy, getting distressed over him being distressed. “This evening everything will go back to normal, and she’ll be happy again in no time, ribbit.”

“Let’s hope,” Midoriya agreed, on the verge of biting his nails. “Let us hope it will work.”

In the meantime, Ochaco was busy in the back room, looking at the bean bags with a calculating expression on her face.

“Am I desperate enough?” she mused quietly, her hand sieving the beans softly.

She was on the verge of deciding that yes, she was desperate enough despite the bag not having the bean-count, when her phone ringed.

Her phone almost landed on the floor when she very enthusiastically tried to remove it from her apron pocket as soon as humanly possible.

“Hero Café, Uraraka Ochaco at the phone, how can I help you today?” She chirped happily, forgoing reading the contact name.

“...” The other person didn’t say anything for a moment, “Do you always answer your personal phone like this?”

Uraraka blushed, silently grateful it wasn’t a video call. Although, if it was, she wouldn’t have greeted him like that in the first place...

“Kacchan! You’d know if you called more often,” she retorted, going on offensive. “I don’t think I’ve heard from you outside of business matter in at least half a month! I bet this time isn’t any different?”

A loud sigh sounded from the other side. She could picture him rubbing his forehead with the back of his hand, constantly aware of the flour or dough that was probably staining his fingers. If Bakugou was doing one thing at a time, it would be lying down when he’s dead, nothing else, no sooner than that.

“You know Koji and I are really busy around Christmas,” Bakugou said, regret ringing faintly in his voice. “But, actually, we’re going to drop by this afternoon. See around, check what new kinds of coffee you’ve got brewing, this kinda thing.”

The overjoyed squeal Uraraka made most likely reached the frequencies usually used by dolphins and bats, and it had the side effect of momentarily deafening Bakugou.

“Yeah, go on, destroy my eardrums, it’s not as if I need them!” He complained, louder than strictly necessary.

“Sorry, Kacchan,” Uraraka giggled apologetically, one hand moving to play with the beans again. Her shoulders slowly became less tense and the soothing motion took the forefront of her mind, pushing the lack of customers to some old, dusty coroner.

“Anyway,” Bakugou’s voice was back to its normal volume. “Do you need me to bring anything? I know the monday’s delivery was supposed to last til friday, but if you run out of something-”

“Sorry,” She interrupted him, “I’ve got full stuck.”

Fidgeting with the hem of her apron, she waited for Bakugou to answer.

“Damn,” he finally said. “Gotta kick it up a notch or two, if no one wants to buy our cakes.”

“Oh, I’m sure if people actually came in and saw them, they wouldn’t be able to resist their overwhelming cuteness and charm!” Uraraka replied, refusing to make Bakugou feel bad for longer than what it takes to rely the message. “It’s just… There’s not many people around, lately.”

They both stayed silent for a second.

Then, Uraraka could swear Bakugou grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like “Fucking Deku”, but before she could question him about it, he was talking again.

“You gotta tell us all about it when we come over,” he said in his I run out of time voice. “I gotta run now, y’know how it is. See ya.”

“See you, Kacchan!” Uraraka rushed out, managing to fit the entire bit before the tell-tale sound of disconnecting.

She put her phone back in the pocket, suppressing the heavy sigh that threatened to escape. It wouldn’t do to despair over the customers, or rather the lack thereof.

Bracing herself, determined to do her best no matter what. She left the backroom only to have her eyes assaulted by the most sparkling stack of glittery something that ever existed.

But Deku and Tsu-chan seemed as if they were talking to that highly reflective surface…

“Aoyama-kun?” She hazarded a guess, knowing he was the only person who would willingly wear such amount of sequins and rhinestones.

She knew she got it in one as the stack turned around, revealing the unmistakable, absolutely dazzling smile of one Aoyama Yuga.

“Oui, it is indeed I!” He exclaimed, waving around with the armfulls of glitter-filled balloons he had with himself. “And I have brought decorations!”

Uraraka tilted her head.

“It’s really nice of you… But is there any occassion? I thought today’s just a random day like all the others…”

With her attention pinned to the effervescent figure in the middle of the room, Uraraka missed the quick glance exchanged between Midoriya and Asui.

“Ah, but every day is worth celebrating, mon amie!” Aoyama declared with flourish, the balloons leaving generous amounts of glitter in their wake.

Uraraka eyed the colorful trail. On one hand, it was creating a big mess in the middle of her café. On the other, that was precisely what she needed - something new to make her hands busy.

Aoyama must’ve wrongly interpreted her sudden silence.

“N’est-ce pas?” He turned towards the other pair, asking for support.

The two green-heads nodded eagerly, succeeding in distracting Ochaco from the idea of checking the calendar.

She faked a sigh, making it seem as if they had to convince her to let the balloons stay. Who wouldn’t want to have such colorful spheres in their café?

“If you would be so nice and put them up on that wall, it would be fantastic.” She directed, smiling softly.

Aoyama’s smile reached its full blinding potential.

“I will do so tout de suite!” He beamed, skipping to the wall she pointed out.

Another sparkling path followed him, making Uraraka wonder how much glitter exactly did he stuff on the inside and outside of balloons he was carrying around, and what prompted him to waste a good few hours on decorating the few dozens of them.

“What’s the deal with all this glitter?” She decided to ask, with a wide hand gesture necessary to encompass the entirety of the balloons.

“Ah!” Aoyama exclaimed, as if he was waiting for this question to be asked (he most likely did). He did a pirouette where he was standing and faced Uraraka once more. “I have decided to buy a couple of des ballons today! But all of the ones en la boutique were comme ci, comme ça - terriblement moche, the lot of them! So as you can see, I had no choice but to sparkle them up myself! Much more éclatant now, n’est-ce pas?”

She nodded seriously, pretending the possible existence of ugly balloons was the worst thing in the entire universe.

“How much time did you spend on them?” Midoriya asked curiously.

“And how much money did you spent on glitter? Ribbit.” Asui added.

Aoyama flipped his hair out of his face.

“Je ne regrette rien!” He said proudly, and moved towards the wall again.

The trio shook their heads in unison, well aware of Aoyama’s antics. Nothing was sparkly enough for him - even store-bought glitter was not glittery enough. No one had any idea what his secret ingredient was, but the glitter he produced was at least three times as dazzling, making the common one look pale and plain in comparison.

Uraraka made a move to go and grab the broom, but changed her mind before she could even take a single step.

“Would you like something to drink, Aoyama-kun?” She asked, moving to the counter instead.

“Sûrement!” The man replied, almost completely focused on getting the balloons just right.

“The usual?” She clarified.

“Mais oui! Merci beaucoup!” Aoyama looked over his shoulder to express his gratitude and blowing her a long-distance thank-you kiss, before once again immensely focusing on his precious floating glitter bombs.

“I assure you, the pleasure is all mine.” Uraraka grabbed at the ingredients necessary to prepare the “Can’t Stop Twinkling Coffee”.

Maybe it wasn’t the most original name, but the coffee itself was most certainly one-of-a-kind.

It was a cappuccino, and its every sip was absolutely dazzling. The foam on the top glistened like a layer of fresh snow on top of the velvety expansion of caffeinated pleasure. On top of that was a star made with the most shining edible glitter Aoyama was able to produce.

The drink was bright enough to blind you and delicious enough to make your taste buds find everything else bland for the rest of your life.

It’s also very quick to make. Even when she was trying to slow down the process, it didn’t take her longer than a mere five minutes.

After bringing the cup over to Aoyama - she served it in a see-through glass cup and saucer, to make sure it’s beauty and sparkliness could be properly appreciated - Tsu-chan handed her a broom.

“Thank you,” Uraraka took it, grateful to have such understanding co-workers. If they were to clean it and she was to just sit around and do nothing, she would surely go crazy with restlessness.

She only swooped the broom only a couple of times, before the most beautiful sound in the entire universe sounded through the café - the bell above the entrance!

“Welcome!” She called out happily, stilling the motions of the broom. Midoriya and Asui looked up from where they were sitting at the table as well, only Aoyama being completely unperturbed. “How can I help you today?”

She looked over at the front, looking for the customer she was welcoming, but there was no one there. The door stood wide open, but no one entered the café. Uraraka stared at the tracks in the snow, confused.

“Hello?” Midoriya called out, half-way out of the chair, the green lightning bolts of One-For-All buzzing on the surface of his skin.

“Oh, sorry!” A breathless voice sounded from the threshold, enabling them all to identify the newcomer as Hagakure. “I’m- on the job- with Sato!”

All she was able to say after that were pants - it was clear she must’ve ran all the way to the café - but then again, nothing else had to be said.

Uraraka knew what they needed. She was back at the counter before someone could say “Sugar Rush Coffee”! It was another one of her special coffee series.

This one was a simple caramel macchiato, but the sugar contained in such a small glass was a dose that would seriously mess up an usual human!

In Sato’s case however, it was the perfect energy shot for when he’s out of his own packets.

First into the cup went a shot of espresso, with seven sugars. Then a bit of highly-concentrated vanilla syrup. Next goes frothed milk, extra sweetened by the addition of vanilla. On top went a generous dose of caramel sauce, and after sprinkling it with brown sugar, the drink was ready!

Ochaco served it in a solid but light metal cups with lids, so that they were easy to discard and almost impossible to get destroyed upon impact - it might not exactly matter when she fixes a cup for a normal customer, but in the case of Sato it was very important.

“Thank you!” Hagakure chirped, paying with an application on her phone. She grabbed the cup and run out of the shop, rushing towards the place she left Sugar Rush at.

Hagakure had her own “Invisible Girl Coffee”, but she rarely ordered it - she rarely ordered any coffee, really.

Fortunately, she had many fans who loved it. And Uraraka loved making it, so really, it was a win-win situation for everyone.

That coffee was one of her greatest creations - a blend of highest quality, imported straight from the plantation Ethiopian Arabica coffee beans, carefully processed to result in a completely clear coffee.

A single serving contained as much caffeine as a cappuccino, but its sweet, aromatic and just a little sharp taste resembled more a latte. It was also less bitter than regular coffee - therefore there was no need for milk or sugar.

Of course, there was always someone who wanted to add some, but it was between them and their cup of coffee-

“That would be two customers, by now,” Deku pointed out cheerfully, again seated comfortably.

Uraraka eyed them carefully.

“Let’s make it four, shall we? Ribbit.” Tsu-chan proposed with one of her rare smiles.

Ochaco grinned widely.

If she could spend her life by only making coffee, she would die happy.

Asui’s coffee, the “Froppy Coffee”, was a more of a tea than a coffee, but she left the name so that it’d fit the collection.

A spoon of matcha green tea and twice as much sugar went to the cup and got mixed with water until it was dark and smooth. Then in went milk, usually with a hint of vanilla, to reach a light green coloration. On top went a tiny bit of frothed milk and a simple symbol of a frog, made from the matcha powder and green glitter.

Served, of course, in a forest green cup with cute froggy accents.

Deku’s “Deku Coffee” was more of a concentrated shot of pure caffeine with a microscopical tang of sweetness with a complimentary tartness. It was made by compiling three shots of blackest espresso with the thinnest possible layer of frothed milk, painted dark green by tasteless food coloring. And the grand finale - grated lime zest and, of course, some golden glitter.

Soon enough the drinks were done and Uraraka went back to sweeping the floor.

She hasn’t done so for long - the sparkling trail had barely a third of itself cleaned up when the bell rung again.

“Welcome!” she greeted the newcomer. “How can I help you today?”

On the doorstep stood Tokoyami, Dark Shadow hidden under his jacket. It was holding a thick, black notebook - all three were a regular view at her café. Tokoyami always insisted it was the place where he wrote the best pieces of poetry.

With a quiet word of greeting directed at each of the four people currently in the café, he moved directly to his usual table in the coroner.

Uraraka set the broom down and happily skipped to the counter.

“Tsukuyomi Coffee” was one of the darkest coffees she ever made or drunk, both in color and taste. Tokoyami insisted the sharp bite was doing wonders for his creativity.

It was basically a large slow-drip coffee from a roast that was light enough to guarantee a strong taste and dark enough to make sure the cup stays as close to an imitation of a black hole as possible.

It had a rough finish and was almost too strong to drink - that’s why Uraraka tended to add a small layer of frothed milk and use the created surface to add a likeness of Dark Shadow made with dark cocoa.

That particular coffee was very popular with coffee addicts who were no longer able to reach the desired effects of coffee consumption via regular brews.

“Thank you,” Tokoyami said as she placed the insanely black cup in front of him. The tiny white dots here and there only emphasized on the infinite expanse of darkness presented on the ceramic.

With the customer taken care of and as happy as he wanted to show, Uraraka grabbed the broom and all too soon all the misplaced glitter was gathered on a single stack near the wall.

Speaking of which, the wall decorations Aoyama was putting up already covered almost half of the available surface. And of course another sparkling trail gathered at the junction where the wall and the floor met.

Another quick job for when Ochaco got too restless with the lack of customers.

Fortunately for everyone, two people just decided to drop by.

“Hiiii!” Sounded through the café simultaneously with the bell.

Uraraka’s head whipped around. Only half-caring whether or not the broom will find support on the nearest table she let it go, crossing the room in a few quick strides and hugging the hell out of the pink newcomer.

“Welcome!” She added, moving to hug Yaoyorozu. Facing both of them, she asked, “How can I help you today?”

“We heard Aoyama-kun was set on decorating your café,” Yaomomo explained. “We came to help him.”

“And to get those sweet, sweet drinks you created with our names!” Ashido added, bouncing on her feet. “I still can’t believe you’ve got our entire class done! And every one of them is absolutely delicious!”

Ochaco blushed slightly, moving to fidget with a loose strand of her hand.

“I just thought it would be a great way to bust the recognition, especially since we barely graduated,” she explained, a soft smile constantly present on her face.

“And it was a genius idea!” Midoriya called over.

“Agreed. Ribbit.” Tsu-chan added.

Neither of them got up to greet the newest additions, but they did exchange waves.

Uraraka blushed harder, moving towards the counter to get started on the coffees, while the girls made their way to the sparkling highlight of the café.

Her goal when creating “Alien Queen Coffee” was to make the pinkest coffee imaginable. It did take her multiple tries to get the recipe just right, but the resulting sweet paradise was absolutely worth it.

She started by mixing a shot of espresso with an equal portion of honey. Then in went three times as much milk mixed with raspberry, thoroughly frothed. On that she placed a layer of whipped cream, also colored pink, and after grating a portion of pink chocolate, the drink was ready.

It was of course served in a cup covered with a layer of pinkest pink paint that ever existed.

After this one was ready, she started on Yaomomo’s drink.

“Creati Coffee” was kind of a mix of frappuccino and mocha cappuccino.

Into a mixer went a cup of ice, half a cup of milk and three shots of espresso, complemented by 3 pumps each of vanilla and dark chocolate syrup and a few tablespoons of chocolate chips.

On top went a generous dollop of chocolate whipped cream, drizzled with caramel syrup and sprinkled with oreo cookie crumbs.

Its sweetness rivailed that of Sato’s drink, but it was a side-feature of the drink. The main goal of Uraraka’s while making it, was to make the fat content as high as she possibly could.

And since most of the fattest coffee additions are sweet… Well, no one was complaining.

With both coffees done, she brought them over to the girls, who were quietly conversing with Aoyama.

“Do you want another cup, Aoyama?” She asked, handing out the drinks. “That glitter on your lips must be driving you crazy!”

“Oh, non, non!” Aoyama explained, his focus shifting to cover solely her. “C’est mon newest lipstick line!”

He rummaged through his purse, pulling out a handful of tubes.

“Ça, alors!” He said, showing off the four tubes - yellow, two pinks and a red one, all of them looking as if they were made of compressed glitter and glitter only.

Plucking the yellow one out of his own hand, he decaped it and fixed his look.

He motioned the rest towards the girls.

“Je made those with you in mind!” Aoyama prompted, causing the girls to help themselves to the sticks.

Ashido immediately opened hers and after quick eradication of her previous lipstick, she applied the new one.

“Oooh!” She squealed happily, “It doesn’t feel like glitter at all! I feel no grating!”

With such an encouragement, the other two applied their own as well.

“It’s truly most delightful!” Confirmed Yaoyorozu. Uraraka nodded in agreement.

“What is it?” Deku came closer, Asui looking over his shoulder.

“Ah!” Aoyama plucked his hand into his purse again. “I have some rouge à lèvres for you two aussi!”

He extended his hand with a flourish, presenting the two of them with two sparkling green lipsticks. With a quick look around, they applied it as well.

The five of them gushed over the delightful make-up when the bell sounded again.

“Welcome!” Uraraka turned around promptly. “How can I help you?”

This time at the entrance stood three people.

“We have come for your delicious coffee!” Iida explained with his usual grand gestures.

“Yeah, what he said,” Shinsou and Todoroki chorused, flanking both of his sides.

Uraraka lighted up almost brighter than it was possible. Another three coffees from her beloved collection? That day was shaping up better and better with every passing moment!

“Ingenium Coffee” was a unique kind of coffee that only the biggest connoisseurs ever dared to try - a full serving of sparkling coffee.

It was a very popular drink, as people found it unusual; It was also the second drink most often dared to drink, right after “Tsukuyomi Coffee”, even though it was right on the other end of spectrum.

It was quite easy to make, too. A cocktail shaker was to be filled with ice, vanilla syrup and espresso shot. After a vigorous shaking, the resulting mixture got strained over glass filled with ice. Then the entire thing was topped with sparkling water and decorated with some mint leaves.

Of course, the cup resembled one of Iida’s engines.

Shinsou’s coffee had an extremely unfortunate name. The reason was simple - Hitoshi was a not-so-little shit and took his sweet time with his hero license, choosing his hero name after Uraraka already began her coffee line.

With the naming convention known, Shinsou choose the name “Order”.

If Ochaco got a coffee bean each time someone went up to the counter with a “Order Coffee, please” or many of its variations on their lips, she would never have to order any ever again.

“Order Coffee” was a simple cappuccino: a shot of espresso, steamed milk, and a layer of foam. On that went some simple swirls made with purple violet syrup. With a bit of grated chocolate on the top, the cappuccino was ready.

“Shouto Coffee” was a variation of affogato. While normally the ice-cream went as the base and the cup got filled with espresso, she preferred to make it half-and-half with a vertical division.

She had Hatsune Mei make a scoop that shaped the ice cream to fit perfectly the arctic blue cup she liked to use for that specific drink. The actual coffee bit was made with lighter beans to reach the reddish-brown coloration, making it a quite strong concoction.

After the boys’ coffees were done, she brought them over to the table they were sitting at, close to Aoyama. She gathered the empty cups on her way and set to wash them, happy to have something to do.

The universe had other plans - barely did she put the cups in the sink when the bell rung and another group of people entered.

“Hi, Uraraka! Hey, everyone!” Sero called out, stepping over threshold first. Directly behind him was Jirou, greeting everyone with a solemn nod. Last entered Shouji and Ojiro, following through with their own words of greetings.

“Welcome!” Uraraka responded cheerfully. “The usuals?”

A handful of confirmations later, Ochaco once again started in a flurry of movements, getting ready for another four cups of coffee.

Jirou’s, Shouji’s and Ojirou’s coffees weren’t exactly original; Rather, they were personalized.

“Earphone Jack Coffee” was a simple latte - a shot of espresso, a portion of milk. On top of that went a stave, a key and a few notes drawn usually with hazelnut syrup.

“Tentacole Coffee” was an Americano - that is, a shot of espresso diluted with water - with a bit of blue-colored foam covering half of the cup, resembling his trademark mask.

“Tailman Coffee” was a mocha - espresso with chocolate powder, mixed with frothed milk and with an added tiny, yellow-colored puff of whipped cream on top, resembling the tuft on the end of his tail.

And then there was the Sero’s one.

“Cellophane Coffee” did not, as many young people apparently believed, contain any cellophane. Although it was just as thick and hard to swallow.

A ristretto, which is basically an espresso shot with half the water, gets mixed with condensed milk. That ensures the coffee is thick and velvety. Then on the top Uraraka draws swirls with extra thick vanilla syrup. No water, no standard milk, only the thickest ingredients for the highest quality tape-like coffee.

This time she didn’t even get to properly stand behind the counter before the doors opened again.

“Welcome!” She turned with a wide smile. “How can I help you today?”

The café entered Kaminari and Kirishima, equally wide smiles visible on their faces. Behind them stood Bakugou, with a slightly smaller frown than his usual one, which equalled a smile in his book. He grunted in greeting.

“Hi Uraraka!” Kirishima called out, with followed by Kaminari,“Hi everyone!”

The two of them made a beeline towards her, while Bakugou preferred to focus on his cakes first.

“Do you know where’s Koda?” Ochaco asked. “Kacchan said they would both come this afternoon.”

The boys exchanged a glance.

“I don’t know,” Kaminari said. “We only met him right in front of your café.

“You’d need to ask Kacchan himself,” Kirishima added, pointing at Bakugou engrossed with the cakes.

“I’ll sure do!” Uraraka assured.

With a bit more of small-talk, the both of them ordered their usual drinks, after which they went to greet the rest of the group already present in the room.

“Red Riot Coffee” was an advanced macchiato - double shot of espresso as a base, with red-colored frothed milk arranged into spikes just like his hair.

A strong but sweet coffee - just like him.

“Chargebolt Coffee” was a large espresso with a thin layer of foam, on which she drew a lightning bolt in yellow edible glitter.

Absolutely electrifying drink, ideal for recharging when your energy’s low.

She finished both of them quickly, only then realizing that at some point, Kacchan shifted his attention from the fruity freshness of cakes to her swift movements.

Blushing slightly, she took the cups to her customers, feeling his eyes following her.

“So, where’s Koda?” Ochaco asked when she got back behind the counter, setting down the empty cups she gathered.

“He’s coming in a bit, he wanted to get some touch-ups done on his latest creation.”

Uraraka hummed quietly, focusing on making his coffee. It was one of her more creative creations.

“Ground Zero Coffee” was almost as explosive as Kacchan himself. Made in tall glass, it contained a shot of espresso, then got filled with a thick layer of whipped cream. On that she sprinkled some pop rocks, another layer of cream, pop rocks, cream, and pop rocks again as the grand finish.

The drink popped in one’s mouth with tiny sparks just like those Bakugou produced when his temper spiked suddenly.

“Should I make his order now, or wait a bit?” She asked, putting the glass in front of Bakugou.

“Now, I suppose,” he said, taking a sip and grinning madly. “God, I love this coffee.”

Uraraka blushed bright red, preparing Koda’s drink.

“Anima Coffee” was just a shot of espresso with hazelnut syrup and a tall layer of milk foam and a cute paw mark made from cocoa powder at the top. Precisely as cute and sweet as Koda himself!

She set the cup aside, pondering the question of what to do next. She could ask if anyone wanted a refill-

“Why don’t you make yours, too?” Kacchan interrupted her musings. “I know you don’t make it often.”

Uraraka thought about it for a moment.

“Well… I mean, Aoyama said that every day is worth celebrating, so I don’t see why not!” She decided in the end.

“Uravity Coffee” was the second least coffeey drink on her “1AUA Hero Coffee Collection”list, right after Asui’s one.

To reach the perfect creamy texture and the ethereal weightlessness, she had to forgo the standard methods. Instead, she mixed a shot of espresso with light milk and frothed the mixture to reach the perfect foamy concoction, that seemed to defy the laws of physics and attempt to escape the cup.

She moved to take the first sip, when the doorbell rang. A bit reluctantly, she set the cup down, but before she could say anything, the others spoke instead.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” Sounded through the café, with a few party cannons going off.

Startled, Uraraka looked around.

At the entrance stood Koda, holding the biggest, yet lightest looking cake she had ever seen.

Behind him were Sero and Hagakure, out of their hero suits and holding a tray of floaty-looking cupcakes.

Everyone who already was inside the café stood in a group in front of the decorations, grinning at her, a pile of colorful boxes at their feet.

When she actually focused on the ornaments, she noticed the balloons spelled “HAPPY BIRTHDAY OCHACO!” which made her feel a little silly for not seeing it sooner, but other than that, it warmed her heart to see her friends care about her so much.

She could feel her eyes welling up with tears, but she ignored it in favor of hugging every single one of her friends.

“This is the best birthday ever!”

And with that declaration, the party started.

#BNHA #Boku no Hero Academia #Uraraka Ochaco #Uraraka Ochako #Uravity Bang #My Writing

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