Liking a guy way out of his league wasn’t really a choice.
Sero usually didn’t dwell on it, cuz what was there to dwell on anyway?! He had an awesome friend who liked the same manga as him and remembered all his favorite things in the order he mentioned them and who took him seriously in training, even if it was already proven that Sero didn’t stand a chance against him on live TV. And that was great, Roki was great, because Sero already had a bunch of friends that required metric tons of energy to keep up with, so it was nice to have someone that was content with just being together.
It didn’t matter how much Kaminari and the others badgered him about how he was down bad, it wasn’t like that— at least, not fully. He wasn’t some sad pining sap that was agonizing over his unrequited feelings. He was Roki’s friend, first and foremost. There was nothing sad about that, there could never be because he liked Roki for who he was, not for the potential of a relationship.
So friendship. Great gig once he started getting used to all the fluttery feelings in his chest everytime they were together. They were actually pretty nice if he was being honest. That was another thing about liking Roki, Sero liked that he liked him. Sure, it wasn’t fun to see other people throw themselves at the guy he liked on a biweekly basis — but hey, his stupid heart was the one that decided to like the most attractive guy to roam the planet, no one was to blame for that, and Roki rejected all of them anyway, so no harm done! As long as it stayed that way, everything would be fine. They’d stay friends, Roki would stay single, and no nice feelings would get in the way of any nice dynamics.
At least, that’s what Sero thought . His plans on living in perfect harmony with his feelings hinged on the idea that Roki didn’t have a relationship in the first place. That was the crux of it all!
SO THEN WHAT THE HELL WAS HE LOOKING AT RIGHT NOW?!
Roki’s phone kept pinging with messages, the screen lighting up with notifications from that same, cursed contact.
My Girl 💕💍
soooo whenz ur next day offfff 😝
My Girl 💕💍
new boba spot opened up in ur hood we shd totes check out 🤭🧋
My Girl 💕💍
one of my moots said the owner posted Endy hate like five yearz ago
My Girl 💕💍
sooo like weve gots to support 🫰
My Girl 💕💍
#endyhaterstogetherstrong🔥🚫
My Girl 💕💍
ew fire bad etc. etc….
Sero stared at the screen in horror. Roki had gone back to his room for a minute to grab the next volume of his manga, and in that short time span My Girl 💕💍had managed to completely blow up his phone and utterly traumatize Sero.
He tore his eyes away to stare at the ceiling instead, but morbid curiosity kept him flicking his gaze in the direction of the screen again and again. What the f*ck? What on EARTH? SINCE WHEN WAS ROKI DATING ANYONE?! He wracked his brain for the mention of any girlfriend — or any interest in girls in general — and came up completely blank. Had he somehow slipped into an alternate dimension? Did Roki just accidentally grab someone elses phone?! He felt like he was being pranked.
The phone pinged again.
My Girl 💕💍
icybabeeee stop ignoring meeeeee
Icybabe. Icybabe. Yup, this was hell. He fell asleep, died, and went to hell. There was no other explanation.
“I’m back,” Roki announced his entrance, and Sero nearly fell out of his hammock.
“WOAH— h-hey man! Welcome back!” He grinned, but even he knew that his expression was bordering on hysterical.
“...Are you okay?”
“Me? PFFT— When have I NOT been okay, AHAHA! I’m SO okay, are you okay?” He blinked innocently, resting his chin in the palm of his hand. His elbow was on the verge of sliding out of the hammock, and at this point he wasn’t sure what he should be praying for more.
“I’m okay.”
“GREAT! That makes two of us! Just two OKAY GUYS! Hangin out!”
Roki furrowed his brows, giving him a strange look that told him even the most socially challenged individual he knew wasn’t buying his facade of sanity. “...if you say so.” He shrugged, settling back onto the carpeted floor of Sero’s room.
Sero sighed in relief and swiveled his head back towards his book on autopilot. Well what NOW? He had to tell someone. He had to tell EVERYONE, actually. It was times like these that he wished he was more like Bakugo. Whenever that guy got agitated he just yelled a bunch and then threw Kirishima across the training room a couple of times and then immediately felt better. Maybe he should try it anyway? Couldn’t hurt— well, it might hurt Kirishima, but that wasn’t the point.
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Roki glancing down at the notifications on his phone. He held back a scream as the other boy’s hand reached for the phone, almost in slow motion. But then, instead of opening them and answering his apparent girlfriend’s spam, he slid the messages out of view and turned back to his manga like there was absolutely nothing pressing for him to get to.
“Uh… arentcha gonna answer those?” Sero chuckled nervously. He wasn’t sure what he wanted the response to be.
“Hm?”
Uh oh. Busted for nosiness. Maybe if he minded his own business more he wouldn’t be in this crisis in the first place. “Your phone was just chiming like crazy earlier!” He explained quickly, making random gestures in the air ahead of him. “I figured you, uh, probably got a lot of messages from… something, right?” Someone. Your GIRLFRIEND?!
Roki frowned, looking down at the phone screen. “Yes. Maybe later, I’m spending time with you now. I don’t need to be distracted.”
Sero’s hand dropped. Wow. So many emotions. He didn’t want to be distracted from hanging out?! That was too cute! Not only that, he was IGNORING HIS GIRLFRIEND FOR HIM! But also he had a girlfriend. Roki had a girlfriend. But he’d also just admitted that he likes hanging out with Sero out loud!
Was there a name for what he was going through right now?
“Oh, w-well, you know, it’s not rude if you just wanna check a message real quick, I don’t mind!” He said, and this time it was slightly less tinged with panic than before.
“Thank you, but I don’t want to. I can answer the message at any time, but you might be busy later. I don’t want to waste our time together.”
Dang it. Even with all the mixed emotions he was experiencing, Roki's earnestness was just too endearing! “Oh-aww, Rokiiii!” He gushed, nudging his head playfully with his elbow. “Careful with what you say around me, buddy, if you keep it up you’ll never be able to get rid of me!”
“I wouldn’t want to get rid of you, so that’s fine,” he said, leaning his head against the hammock, right where Sero’s shoulder was, effectively trapping him in place. There was no way on earth that Sero was going to disturb him now. The League of Villains themselves would have to come back to life and personally be at his door for him to even consider it.
He knocked their heads together and hummed contentedly, nearly forgetting why he’d been so distressed in the first place. Roki was right here, after all.
But then that awful device chimed again with new notifications.
My Girl 💕💍
ur cheating on me for reals i knew it
My Girl 💕💍
im preggo and ur the baby daddy
My Girl 💕💍
hello the owner of this phone was totes in a tragic car accident and now she’s dying plz respond
My Girl 💕💍
answer meeeeeee
Roki reached over and powered his phone off without a second glance. Sero would’ve almost felt bad for Miss Girlfriend if he wasn’t also violently jealous of her.
“Sorry.” Roki leaned back into him, slotting his head right where it was before without a second thought. “Very persistent.”
“ Aha! Y-yeah, sounds like it…”
He couldn’t help but feel that the contact between them wasn’t as warm as before.
◁◎✉◎▷
“Why the HELL am I here?!” Bakugo demanded, glaring at Kaminari and Kirishima like they’d taken him swimming in a sewer rather than to Ashido’s bedroom.
“Group meeting! Duh.” Ashido rolled her eyes, nudging Sero like ‘could you believe this guy?’. “Sero has important drama to share.”
“DRA—!” Bakugo’s eye twitched, turning to the other two with murder in his eyes. “You idiots told me we were going to WORK OUT.” He spat, grabbing Kaminari by the neck to throttle him.
“ ACK ! MERCY! HELP!”
“Chill out, man! We ARE gonna work out! Right after this!” Kirishima said, frantically pulling Bakugo’s fingers away from Kaminari’s throat.
“You think I wanna waste even a second of my time on this dumb sh*t?!” He let go of Kaminari and whirled around to pounce on Kirishima instead.
“YOW! HAIRHAIRHAIR!”
“Don't worry Kirishima! I got his legs!” Kaminari yelled, clamping onto Bakugo's ankles and yanking him back, which only resulted in Kirishima's hair being pulled harder.
“YAAAAAOW! STOP PULLING HIM!”
“Whoops.”
“OOH! ME NEXT! I'VE GOT AN ELBOW FOR YA!” Ashido declared, jumping onto her bed and smacking her palm against her elbow.
“Wait, NONONONO!” Kaminari yelled, before she leaped down and landed directly on his spine. “ ACK —!”
“Whoopsy, sorry, I was aiming for Bakugo!”
“BITCH—!”
Sero sighed and bent forward in his chair, leaning his arms on his knees and lacing his hands together. “Guys. This is really serious news.”
Nobody was listening. Ashido had gotten hold of what she thought was Bakugo's foot, but was actually Kirishima's. Kirishima was still grabbing his own scalp and begging for mercy, Kaminari was knocked out and sparking between them, and Bakugo was listing every swear word ever invented in alphabetical order.
“This is— guys—” His words fell on deaf ears and he groaned. With a hardened expression he leaped out of the chair. “TODOROKI HAS A GIRLFRIEND!”
The declaration seemed to echo around the room. The entire group froze in an instant, staring at him wide-eyed and horrified.
Bakugo broke the silence first. “A f*cking what?”
“A Girlfriend.”
A collective sigh reverberated around the room. Slowly, Kaminari, Ashido, and Kirishima extricated themselves from the tangle and got down in a bowing position in front of Bakugo.
“We are so sorry for wasting your time.” They said as one.
“HAH?!” Sero’s eyes widened.
“When Sero said he had something important to say, I thought he was being serious. That's on me.” Ashido added, bowing doubly.
“WHAT?!” Sero spluttered.
“We could go work out now. Seriously, sorry about that, man.” Kirishima continued.
“You f— Guys I AM being serious! I saw her on his phone!”
“That was just a picture of his mom or sister or somethin.” Kaminari rolled his eyes, waving him off.
“Are you—” Sero gave him a sour expression. “I know what his mom and sister look like, asshole, it wasn’t a picture! It was a contact .”
“You saw a contact of a girl's name on his phone and assumed it was a girlfriend?” Kirishima gave him a pitying, judgemental look, grabbing Bakugo’s arm as he stood up. “That’s kind of a leap, man. We’re out.”
“IT WAS A CONTACT LABELED ‘MY GIRL’!” Sero yelled out, slamming himself against Ashido’s door to prevent any of them from escaping. “NO ONE is leaving! This is serious!”
“‘My girl’ ?” Bakugo gave him a withering expression, pronouncing each word like a slur. Kaminari and Ashido snickered behind his back, and Sero might’ve laughed right in his face at how profoundly wrong it sounded if he weren’t so distraught at the moment.
Sero nodded vigorously. “With that one two-hearts emoji—”
“The ones twirling in a circle or the big and small one?” Ashido cut in.
“Big and small. And a ring .” He said sharply, staring at every person in the room individually so they’d know how serious it was.
“A ring?” Kaminari echoed, acting like it was some kind of foreign word.
“Sero… that really doesn’t sound like Todoroki, bro.” Kirishima shook his head, still looking utterly unconvinced. “Since when does he even use emojis except thumbs up and thumbs down?”
“I’ve seen him use ones for random objects before…” Ashido said thoughtfully, humming to herself. “But you’re right. Hearts and rings are not his thing. Sero are you sure—”
“I SAW IT WITH MY EYES!”
“There’s no way.” Bakugo finally spat out, shaking his arm out of Kirishima’s grip to fold them across his chest. “A heart? A ring? ‘My girl’? That’s f*cking disgusting. You’ve lost it, Tape Face, go see a therapist for the war trauma like the rest of us—”
“I— are you guys kidding me?!” Sero spluttered. “I just found out the guy I like has a girlfriend, like, yesterday. It hasn’t even been 24 hours, stop accusing me of hallucinating and have a little sympathy! Do you even know how traumatizing it is to just sit there, in the same room as him while his phone BLOWS UP with messages from his girlfriend?! Everytime I close my eyes I see that STUPID ASS ‘My Girl💕💍’ contact. IT’S BURNED INTO MY RETINAS.”
“I’m gonna stop you right there.” Bakugo held his hand up in front of his face. “That wasn’t half n’ half’s phone. He grabbed someone else’s. End of story.”
“I swear to—” Sero slouched against the door. “How DUMB do you guys think I am, seriously?!”
“... Do you want us to answer that—?” Ashido began.
“I ALREADY THOUGHT OF ALL YOUR STUPID SCENARIOS!” He cut her off, glaring at her. “Alternate dimension, nightmare, hallucination, switched phones , accidental drug trip— everything. Everything. She called him ‘icybabe’ and mentioned going to check out a new boba spot because the owner was an ‘Endy hater’.”
“Oh.” Kirisima furrowed his eyebrows.
Kaminari grimaced. “Ooh, that’d do it…”
“Yup, definitely for Todoroki.” Ashido tsked, looking over at Bakugo. “Well, what do you have to say now?”
Bakugo, for his part, looked like he was on the verge of an aneurysm. “No.”
“No what?” Sero narrowed his eyes at him.
“No to ALL of that!” Bakugo shouted, his palms crackling. “That candy cane bastard does NOT have a f*ckING GIRLFRIEND! He’s— he f*cking—!”
“Gay?” Kirishima offered.
“I was gonna say gay too.” Kaminari nodded.
“I WOULD KNOW if he had one! That stupid asshole gives me life updates like I’m his damn diary—!”
“Hehe, Baku-diary,” Ashido whispered under her breath.
Kaminari cleared his throat. “Eh hem. Dear Bakugo, today I read a manga. It was good. I ate a noodle. It was good. I talked to my dad. It was bad. I hate my dad— ”
“WOULD YOU CUT THAT OUT?!” Bakugo slammed a crackling palm into his face.
“HELP!” Kaminari shrieked, sparks flying off his head, but there was nowhere to run.
In two seconds flat Kaminari was flung into Ashido’s bed, down for the count, and Sero sighed in relief. Unfortunately, the sigh was immediately sucked right back in as Bakugo whirled around to face him.
“Now shove over, Tapey! I’m heading out and asking that piece of sh*t what the hell is actually going on, cuz I KNOW he doesn’t have a f*cking girlfriend.” He spat, grabbing Sero by the shoulder.
“Wh— are you CRAZY?!” Sero elbowed him away, taping himself to the doorway in one swift movement. “You are not doing that, if this is some kind of recent development he’ll know I yapped about it to everyone!”
“So? Who the hell cares?” Bakugo sneered. “He doesn’t have a f*cking girlfriend, this could all get cleared up in a second if you MOVE—”
“Bakugo, dude, look at the situation for a second!” Kirishima protested, placing a careful hand on his arm. “I mean, why else would someone give their contact a name like that?”
Kaminari made a groan of stupidity from across the room, slowly sitting up on the bed. "what if thats, like, someones government name? I would give my kid an emoji name if I could... thats awesome."
Everyone blinked at him for a loaded second before deciding to collectively ignore it.
“I don’t know, sh*tty Hair, that’s why I’m going to ask him!”
“Well, okay, but Sero wasn’t supposed to tell us about it in the first place!” Kirishima said frantically. “If you told Todoroki about it that’d be super unmanly!”
Sero had never felt more grateful for that man in his entire life.
“Obviously, Sero himself needs to ask him about it!” He grinned, clapping Sero on the shoulder.
Sero had never felt more betrayed by that man in his entire life.
“Yeah, no, I’m not doing that,” he said flatly, shrugging Kirishima’s hand away. “I choose life.”
“I could ask him!” Ashido raised her hand voluntarily.
“I’d actually prefer Bakugo at that point.” Sero cut her off.
“GREAT! Hear that? That means I could go! Now everyone MOVE!” Bakugo shouted, lunging at the door with curled fingers.
“NO THAT’S NOT WHAT THAT MEANS!” Sero cried out, kicking him away with one foot while holding on to the door for dear life. “BACK! BACK AWAY! HELP!”
A light knock sounded on the door, and through it Sero could hear a muffled “Ashido? Is everything okay?”
All their noise had finally reached Ashido’s floormate, and Uraraka sounded appropriately concerned given that Sero was about to become a statistic on the other side of the door.
“We’re alright in here, Uraraka! Sorry about the— YEOWWW DID YOU JUST BITE ME?! You animal!” Sero kicked him harder, and Bakugou, fittingly, growled like some kind of rabies-infected creature and started shaking him by the shoulders.
“OUT OF MY WAY!”
Kirishima grunted in exertion. He and Ashido were both hanging onto Bakugos waist and trying to pull him off. “Dude, stop! That’s dangerous! You ever heard of shaken baby syndrome—?”
“THAT’S FOR INFANTS!” Bakugo and Sero shouted at the same time, though Bakugo added “DUMBASS!” to the end of it, which Sero thought was a little extra.
“Oh.”
“woah, group hug!” Kaminari declared happily, shuffling over to wrap his arms around Ashido. “yay!”
“Kaminari, NO!” Ashido gasped, her voice horrified.
But it was too late. With one nuzzle to her shoulder, Kaminari sparked right up and fried the entire group.
“AHHHHHHHHH!”
“awwww, love you guys too.”
“YOOUUUU IDIIIOOOOTTTT!” Bakugo hacked out through gritted teeth as him and everyone else slammed into Sero and snapped the door straight off its hinges, sending them sprawling onto the floor of the hallway outside.
“Woah! What just happened?!” Uraraka exclaimed, leaping back as the entire group laid groaning and slumped at her feet.
“What the f*ck do you think happened, Round Face?” Bakugo huffed out, but the shock had drained him of his bite so it came out sounding more sad than mean.
“Um… Sorry?” She frowned, looking down at him judgmentally. “Well, I hope the rest of you are okay.”
Sero snorted out a laugh. “Nothing we haven’t experienced before.” He held up a shaky thumbs up at her as everyone else muttered out similar affirmations.
Uraraka nodded, smiling at him. “So… what was that all about?”
Kaminari’s head perked up. “oh, todo— mph!”
Ashido’s hands slammed over his mouth, and the heart attack Sero was about to experience died before it could be born.
“AHAHA! When are we not getting up to some trouble, Uraraka?” Ashido laughed loudly, sticking her tongue out between her teeth.
“Yup! You know us! General shenaniganerie!” Sero nodded vigorously, giving a ‘thank you’ clap to what he thought was Ashido’s leg, but with the whole mess on top of him, it could’ve really been anyone.
Uraraka pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes at them, and Sero felt the hairs on his arms stand up on ends. Geez. Uraraka’s gotten much scarier these days.
“If you say so!” She shrugged. “I’m on my way out, so I’ll see you guys later—!”
“without me?” Kaminari pouted, and Ashido smacked him upside the head. “Ow! What was that for?!”
“Oh, uh…” Uraraka gave him a funny look, nervously running her hand over the straps of her bag. Now that Sero wasn’t in the process of having his brain scrambled, he could see that she was dressed up for some kind of outing. “Apparently there’s a new boba place that opened up closer to the town, more room for stuff like that now that repairs are finally getting done… I kind of wanted to go check it out, see if they were… um… handing out free samples or something.” She muttered the last part under her breath, her heel digging into the ground anxiously.
Something clicked inside Sero’s brain. New boba place? IN THEIR ‘HOOD’?
“I’M COMING WITH YOU!” He declared, shooting up to his feet and pushing away everyone else on top of him.
“Owwww, what gives—?” Ashido whined, before something clicked in her head too and her eyes widened.
She blinked at him firmly.
He gave her a single nod.
“I’M COMING TOO!” Ashido declared, kicking up from the boys and making them groan again.
“Would you QUIT THAT?!” Bakugo grumbled.
“Oh, um, okay!” Uraraka blinked in surprise. “You don't… wanna get your door fixed before that?” She pointed to the door and the floor, and then the empty frame exposing her room to the hallway.
“Psh, nah. These three will take care of it for me?”
Bakugo spluttered out an enraged cough. “WHAT?!”
“We are?” Kaminari scratched his head.
“Sure thing, Ashido!” Kirishima threw her a thumbs up, which earned him a whallop on the head from Bakugo. “C'mon, dudes, it's a good work out! Plus Bakugo's awesome at putting things together. You should see him pitch a tent—!”
“A DOOR AND A TENT ARE NOT THE SAME THING!”
“Oh… so you can't do it, then?” Kirishima frowned, tilting his head at him.
Bakugo sucked in a breath, holding his gaze for a moment before turning away angrily. “Get. Me. A. Screwdriver.”
“Okay!” Kirishima grinned, throwing Ashido two thumbs up this time.
“See? No problem! Let's go!” Ashido smiled widely, linking arms with both Sero and Uraraka and marching them out of the dorms. Straight towards the accursed boba spot that started all of his problems.
◁◎✉◎▷
“Wahhh, this place is so nice!” Uraraka gasped in awe.
The three of them stood outside the establishment, their faces plastered against the shining glass windows. A good amount of construction workers and students taking time off were milling around inside, pointing to this and that on the menu or stooping down to pet one of the shop cats— because as if the place wasn't already cute enough, it had to have some fuzzy little guys to make it even cuter.
Sero tried to stamp down his bitterness. It really was a nice place. Dang it, Miss Girlfriend had good taste! It was big, but there were tons of booths that provided a bit of privacy, which is exactly what Roki liked. It was brightly colored, but not in a gaudy way, sticking to themes of cool blues and greens. But at least…!
Nope, he had nothing. The place was great.
“Man…” Sero's head hung low, and Ashido patted him on the back sympathetically.
“Well… may as well go in, that's what we came here for anyway, right?” She said delicately, pushing him towards the door.
Sero gave her a flat look, but let himself get shoved along anyway. Traitor. And here he thought he was going to have her unwavering support in all of this. She just wanted to squeeze some free boba out of him! Well, if nothing else, he could at least grab some tea and try not to imagine how great of a date spot it would be for Roki and his established, existent girlfriend.
“Um… if you guys don’t wanna go, it’s really okay. I can go by myself!” Uraraka said supportively, patting Sero’s arm.
Aw man, he had to get it together! It was one thing for him to feel bad, but bringing down other people’s moods along with him was just uncool.
“No way! We forced ourselves onto your outing for a reason, Uraraka!” He declared, pumping himself up and reaching for the front door on his own. “Tell you what, this outing’s all on me today! So you can try out whatever—! Woah, whoops.”
Just as his hand latched around the door handle, another hand came to rest at the exact same spot.
The other hand was quickly snatched back. “Oh, sorry. Didn’t see you guys.”
“Ah, it’s Shinso!” Ashido exclaimed, pushing past Sero to throw an arm around his shoulder. “We didn’t see you when we left the dorms, if we knew you were heading out we’d’ve all gone together!”
“That’s because I’ve been out here for… a while.” He admitted, looking semi-embarrassed at his own confession.
“Seriously? What, scoping out people who deserve an interrogation?” Sero snorted, and was instantly whacked on the head by both Uraraka and Ashido. “OW! I meant in a hero way!”
“Ha… yeah, kinda.” He shrugged, staring through the clear glass of the cafe’s door. “It, uh, part of the draw to this place is that it provides shelter for all the stray cats that ended up without a home cuz of the war.”
And there was a good cause behind having all the cats around. Honestly, who thought of this place?! Shouldn't there be some sort of limit to all the upsides it could have?!
“It gives owners looking for their lost pets a good place to start, so…” Shinso trailed off, gesturing towards the shop.
Ashido gasped, grasping him by the shoulders. “You have a pet cat?! Since WHEN?! Why didn’t we know about this?!” She shook him, and Sero was half worried he’d get knocked out by the force of it.
“Ashido, the guy isn’t used to getting thrown around like the rest of us…” Sero laughed lightly, tapping her on the shoulder.
“I-its fine— Uh, no, not really, I just feed the strays around the school sometimes,” Shinso stammered, taking the throttling remarkably well for an untrained man. “I haven’t seen my regulars in a while, thought they might’ve ended up here, just wanted to make sure they were being taken care of okay before, y'know… saying goodbye.”
“Awww!” Ashido squealed, and Sero had to resist the urge to do the same. Who knew the Mr. Aizawa clone had a charity streak?
Uraraka clasped her hands against her cheeks. “Wow, that’s actually really cute! Kinda unexpected of you, Shinso!”
Shinso winced. “Uh, is it—? I don't really think about it that much—”
“Obviously he's not going to share all his deep dark secrets with us if that’s how we’re reacting?” Sero cut him off, poking Uraraka’s arm.
“Heyyy, you were just as bad before!” Ashido glared at him.
“Oh, no! I didn’t mean it badly!” Uraraka gasped, clapping her hands over her mouth. “I just mean, like, your vibe is all dark and gloomy, so taking care of strays is totally against your image, but you do it anyway! It shows that your heart can’t resist helping things that need to be helped. That just makes you even more heroic, right?” She flexed her arm in demonstration, looking at Shinso hopefully.
He blinked in surprise, adjusting his capture-scarf idly. “Ah, yeah… thanks.” He gave her a small smile, and Uraraka sighed in relief.
Their conversation was interrupted by a group of students pushing out of the doors of the establishment, snickering and jeering amiably at them when they all jumped out of their way.
“Hey, lookie! It’s the ‘out in the early rounds’ squad!” One of them called out. “Looking better these days, guys!”
“Thanks.” Sero called back flatly. He had been holding the door open for them, but now he suddenly had the urge to slam it right in their faces.
He hadn’t even realized it until they mentioned it, but it really was unfortunate for the four of them to be gathered up here. Ashido was the only one who hadn’t gotten struck right out during the first round of the Sports Festival last year. But seriously? That’s what they were going to be remembered for? They all fought in a war, for f*cks sake! Uraraka actually beat up an A-tier villain, Ashido and Shinso had grappled with Gigantomachia, and Sero had his tape around All for One himself for a good three seconds! Where was the respect?!
“Were they talking about the sports festival?” Ashido wondered aloud.
“I’ve never had someone use that as an insult against me before.” Shinso muttered. “Everyone in 1-C thought it was cool.”
“Well, they are kinda right, y’know! We’re looking way better now than back then!” Uraraka said encouragingly. “A-anyway, we probably shouldn’t be standing right near the entrance if we don’t want people making commentaries on us…”
“True enough…” Sero muttered, jerking his head towards the still-open doorway. “Ladies first… and you.” He glanced at Shinso.
“Thanks.” He smirked, wiggling his way out of Ashido’s hold to head inside. “Geez, I haven’t thought about the Sports Festival in so long…”
“I have!” Ashido interjected, skipping in behind him. “Everytime I see the stuff Tokoyami can pull now I just think ‘phew! imagine if he’d figured that out back then!’”
Shinso shivered, probably imagining what Midoriya was able to do at his prime and how many pieces he’d be in if he had to face that head on.
The four of them settled into the last place on line, and Uraraka stood on her tiptoes, trying to read the menu. “I dunno… I haven’t really thought about it much either, but I’d like to have a rematch with Bakugo someday. I think I can really make the fight count now!”
“I’d kinda wanna see that too, actually.” Sero nodded along, following her vision.
Uraraka’s features brightened. “Hey, we should ALL do rematches—!”
“PASS.” Everyone else declared at once.
“I’m way stronger now, but Dark Shadow could seriously eat me for breakfast!” Ashido shook her head.
“I am not stepping a single foot in a ring with Midoriya. I don’t care if he’s quirkless now.” Shinso said darkly, grasping his chest like just the thought of it was enough to send him to the infirmary.
“And I…” Sero trailed off, thinking about how ‘don’t mind!’ had been a permanent part of his life’s soundtrack for months following the Sports Festival. But then he thought about how Roki had his hand on his chest for about thirty minutes afterwards in order to melt him, so who really won that round? “Heh… yeah… ”
“That wasn’t a sentence.” Ashido poked him in the arm, snickering.
“Okay, okay!” He poked her back. “I don’t think doctors have figured out what happens when someone gets frostbite and third degree burns at the same time, and I don't wanna help them find out! There, that’s my final answer.”
He avoided eye contact with the rest of the group, letting his gaze trail around the rest of the cafe while their squad steadily approached the front of the line. Another point for the boba spot. Their service was crazy fast. Dang it.
“Honestly, I think from the start you handled that fight the best way you could.” Uraraka remarked. “We both started off at square one, but I think I was only that confident against Bakugo because, well… I wasn’t just gonna let myself get thrown around by some bully! Todoroki was something else from the start, though, I think I would’ve been too scared to even move, but you went ahead and made the first attack!”
Sero smiled bashfully, waving her off. “D’awww , yeah, I guess I did do pretty good against—” His voice caught in his throat and stayed there so all that came out of him was a faint, choking sound. “A- shi- do!” He gasped, clawing his hand blindly in her direction.
“Huh? You never fought me? Owwww!” She frowned, hitting him back when he finally caught hold of her.
She met his stunned expression for a moment before turning to look at where he was gesturing.
There. In the far corner of the cafe, was the unmistakable two-toned hair of the source of all his angst. He wasn’t facing them, but it didn’t matter. As if Sero would mistake someone else for Shoto Todoroki.
And he wasn’t alone.
“You guys okay?” Shinso was giving them a funny look.
“Next in line!” The cashier called out, and Sero quickly fumbled for his wallet and threw it in Uraraka’s face.
“Woah!”
“AWESOME! Just order us whatever you’re ordering yourself, ‘Raka! We’re gonna grab a table!” He stammered, stumbling out of line and nearly tripping over a stray cat as Ashido dragged him towards an open booth near The Corner.
Sero couldn’t have picked a better stalking spot if he’d designed the place himself. The booth was positioned just right so he could see the side of Roki’s face and the person sitting across from him too, but if either of them turned in their direction it was an easy dip to the side to totally hide himself.
Which meant that now he got to focus on the actual problem.
The girlfriend.
“W-woahhhh. Woah. Woah.” Ashido gasped, clamping her hands over her mouth. “She’s— I mean, pfft, she’s OKAY I guess…”
“That’d be a lot more believable if there weren’t literally blooming flowers and sparkles in the air around her!” Sero hissed at her, burying his face in his hands.
Seriously?! What kind of cruel existence was this?! It’s like the girl was so perfect that flaws were going out of their way to avoid her. Sero was pretty sure everyone else in the facility had just gotten uglier by being in close proximity to her! Except Roki, of course. But that only made sense, right? Who ELSE would someone like him go out with?! It obviously wouldn’t be some average girl that was easy to tear into, it had to be some top-model gorgeous chick that stopped traffic everytime she went outside! He was doomed. He was so, so doomed.
The girl laughed, and the shojo-style sparkles in the air around her faded for a second, making it slightly easier to look at her without feeling like he was committing some horrible offense to beauty-kind.
Did she… look familiar for some reason?
He groaned.
Yeah, he’d probably seen her on a billboard or magazine or in theaters before! How appropriate would it be for an up and coming hero to throw a tantrum in a cafe right now? As long as he presented his case to the public, he was sure nobody would be able to hold it against him.
“Um, here you guys go… I wasn't sure what was okay to get so I just ordered the cheapest thing on the menu.” Uraraka entered the space, placing the drinks on the table between them with a concerned look on her face.
“Thanks…” Sero mumbled, staring blankly at the table as he reached for the cup. Life was just too unfair. Was it not insulting enough to know Roki was way out of his league? Did he also need proof of it? Honestly…
“Okay, who are we stalking?” Shinso sighed, gesturing for Sero to make room for him on the good side of the table.
“Huh? Sta— pfft, who's stalking?! No one's stalking, what a— that'd be way too unheroic of us. We don't stalk, right Sero?” Ashido stammered, elbowing him aggressively.
Sero sniffled, jerking his chin towards the couple's table. “Roki… and his girlfriend.”
Ashido facepalmed, and Uraraka nearly choked on her drink.
“Girlfriend?!” Her eyes widened and she clamped a fistful of napkins over her face. “A- are you sure?”
“Positive. I didn't know they were going out today .” He groaned, slumping down in his chair and finally scooching over to let Shinso sit. He’d seen enough of Miss Girlfriend to last a lifetime, if Shinso wanted a view he could have it.
Shinso sat down and stared hard at the couple for a moment, before—
“I, like, totes have to take a pic of that. You're literally adorbs.”
Ashido and Uraraka stared at Shinso in shock, their mouths agape.
“Um. What the f*ck was that?!” Ashido demanded, pointing at his mouth like something particularly foul had crawled out of there.
Something clicked in Sero's brain.
“Lip reading. You can lip read! I remember that!” He said excitedly. “You can tell us what they're saying! Wait— no don't do that! I don't wanna know…”
“I do!” Ashido exclaimed.
“Okay I lied, I do too. But no, that's totally out of line!” He shook his head. “We— I mean, we aren't even supposed to be watching them in the first place. I just wanted to scope the place out and make fun of it a little, maybe make myself feel better—!”
“I'm starting to get the sense that you guys didn't actually come here cuz you wanted boba or cuz you wanted to hang out with me.” Uraraka said pointedly, swirling her drink around with her straw.
Sero winced. “I'm- I'm sorry. It's just…” he trailed off.
Oh, what the hell, he was in too deep now! Losing Roki was about the most decent and understandable excuse he could possibly give for the social blunder. Everyone would be forced to feel bad for him and forgive him immediately, it was an objectively sad story!
He slammed his hands on the table. “Arghh, okay, fine! It's like this—!” he gave them the entire abridged summary. His feelings, hanging out with Roki, finding the contact, reading the messages, all up until hearing about the spot from Uraraka. He tried not to think too hard about the fact that he didn't know Shinso that well to be telling him his business, but Mr. Aizawa said they should put in the extra effort to include him, so this was him being all-inclusive! Should've gone to 2-B if he wanted less drama.
“Wow…” Uraraka remarked as he wrapped it up, giving him a light pat on the arm. “That's… really sad.”
“I know !” He groaned.
“It's just… I still can't believe he has a girlfriend!” She shook her head. “I mean, we have the same friend group. I know I don't hang out with him as much as you do, Sero, but between Deku and Ida, I kinda thought we counted as close…” She huffed, quirking her mouth into a lopsided frown of disappointment. It seemed that everyone was losing relationship points with Roki, these days. Except Miss Girlfriend. “I guess there really is no other explanation for that contact name, though.”
“Ugh, don't remind me…” he whined.
Uraraka glanced over her shoulder, trying to subtly get a look at Miss Girlfriend.
“Geez, I can't see her that well, but… doesn't she sort of look familiar?”
“That's what I thought…” Sero muttered. “Probably because she's a supermodel or A-list actress or something.”
“Huh? She doesn't look familiar to me.” Ashido frowned, furrowing her eyebrows.
“And she's not any of those things. She's from Shiketsu. They don't allow their students to do those sorts of things.” Shinso remarked.
“Hah?” Sero lifted his head up, glancing at the girl again. “How could you tell?!”
He pointed at the air above his own head. “The hat. I did a lot of research on hero schools before applying to U.A.. Shiketsu was a little too strict with their rules for my taste.”
So she was a hero student too, and from Shiketsu of all places! That stupid stuffy school from the west had all the prestige of U.A. plus the added bonus of looking twenty times more private school-y. Of course a girlfriend of Roki’s was gonna be a hero from some high-end school. They'd probably make tons of headlines as a couple once they debuted… stupid Shiketsu. When did Roki even have time to run into anyone from there anyway—?
His salty ramblings paused as his memories finally caught up with him, and he nearly choked on air as he gasped loudly. His head shot up to look at Uraraka, who was already wearing a matching expression of horror on her face.
“It’s her! ” They shouted incredulously.
“Huh? Who? What? What's the realization?!” Ashido exclaimed, shaking Sero’s arm frantically.
“That's the chick that was getting freaky with Midoriya during the license exam!” Sero cried out, grasping the sides of his head in despair. “When will enough be enough for that woman?!”
“We have to get rid of her.” Uraraka said darkly, crushing the cup in her hand. “Now.”
Shinso gave them both a funny look. “Wow. Nice heroic attitudes, guys. Good to know that they put you guys in the course before me. Very fair— ”
“Shhhh, you were literally helping us spy on them, this isn't your moment.” Ashido silenced him, squishing a finger against his lips.
Shinso made a grunt that sounded like something along the lines of ‘fair enough’.
“Well we have to know what they're saying now!” Uraraka declared, a determined fire in her eyes. “With a past like that, maybe she's got other targets!”
Shinso snickered, pushing Ashido's finger away from him. “What, you think she's running down the list of eligible bachelors in your— our class like a to-do list?”
“Okay, don't call it that .” Sero huffed, becoming increasingly exasperated with the situation.
But Uraraka was completely caught up in her fantasy where Shiketsu’s next top model was actually Satan incarnate. “YEAH! She's probably some— some kind of villain! And her quirk makes her victims blind to people who are totally in love with them and are much better options even though they're right THERE, DAMMIT!”
Well, now that she'd explained it all out loud…
“Uraraka’s absolutely right!” Sero declared, jolting out of his seat. “It all makes sense now! That's the only possible explanation as to why Roki would go out with someone like her!”
Ashido and Shinso exchanged unimpressed glances before turning back to the other two.
“Um.”
“Yeahhhh,” Shinso clicked his teeth. “I think there might be at least one or two reasons as to why someone might wanna go out with her unrelated to any quirk. No offense—”
“Just read their lips, General Studies Boy.” Uraraka cut him off with a glare.
“Reading lips…” He nodded dutifully, his mouth pursed tightly.
Villain girl laughed loudly— dammit, even her laugh sounded villainous — and twirled a lock of her hair with her finger in an evil way.
“You’re, like, soooo funny sometimes—”
“Roki’s funny all the time .” Sero grumbled bitterly, and Ashido instantly shushed him.
“I missed you, icybabe! It’s been, like, legit forevs since we last hung out, lowkey thought you were avoiding me! — It’s because we were in a war.” Shinso pitched his voice down to read Roki, fully into his role. Sero got the sense that he was enjoying this a little too much. “Ohhh em geeee always the war thinggg, that’s, like, so old! If you loved me for reals you’d find a way. Y’know there was this refugee guy at Shiketsu whose girl was in Ketsubetsu - cute af couple be tee dubs- and he literally sent her carrier pigeons. Every day. — That’s amazing. Where did he find them? — Ummmm, like, aroundddddd, there’s tons of birds outside, Sho, you could just pick one u— okay, that’s not how carrier pigeons work—”
“NO ONE CARES!” Uraraka hissed, shaking Shinso’s arm as his thoughts cut into the commentary.
“Did she just call him ‘Sho’?!” Sero grimaced. If looks could kill, this villain girl would’ve been dead ten times over. Sero was pretty sure he’d looked at All for One with less contempt.
“That’s usually what happens when people date—” Shinso said pointedly.
“Okay are we spying or not?!” Ashido cut him off, narrowing her eyes at the couple. “Uh, uh, she’s saying… a bitch found the ham? ”
“No, a pic for the gram.”
Todoroki shook his head on the other side of the table, and Sero sighed in relief. Shinso didn’t need to read the subsequent whine of ‘Shotoooo pleeeaseeeee’ that came out of the evil woman, it was loud enough that it rang in his ear like some kind of disaster siren.
“There’s a cat on him so he’s not moving.” Shinso explained, smiling at Roki approvingly. “Good guy, Sero.”
“I know, it’s terrible! It’s probably why this villain is sinking her claws into him in the first place!”
“You guys are seriously overdoing it.” Ashido sighed, giving the two of them flat looks. “Back me up, Shinso.”
Shinso glared at Miss Villain. “She’s still talking… she says she doesn’t care about the cat and wants him to move closer anyway! You guys— I didn’t think you were being serious, but you were right, she has to be a villain.”
“...I give up.”
“See, told you! We’ve had tons of experience with villains, we would know!” Uraraka said firmly. “We’ve gotta find a way to knock her out and turn her in before she could infect anyone else! It’s too late for my— ACK— uh, it’s too late for Deku, but maybe we can still save Todoroki!”
Sero nodded, balling his hands into fists with determination. They could probably get it done in seconds with Shinso’s help, but they couldn’t underestimate Miss Villain. She talked all ditzy, but clearly she was pure evil, so it was probably just a front! If worse came to pass Uraraka and Ashido would be their powerhouses, and—
With a noncommittal shrug, the villain pursed her lips and breathed out a cloud of sparkly mist. In a single instant, ten Roki’s spawned in various poses all around her, filling up the pair’s tiny booth to the brim.
“WHA—” Uraraka choked out, duckign close to the table with her head in her hands and her eyes wide with horror. “PLEASE TELL ME I’M HALLUCINATING?”
“Cloning. She clones.” Sero stared off into space blankly. So much for that! What the hell were they supposed to do against her now?! Uraraka nearly DIED fighting a villain like that! “W- well, if she’s not a villain, then where was she during the war, hah, Ashido?! Explain that! If she really was some good guy hero, then she should’ve been the one to deal with the girl that was duplicating herself!”
Ashido’s jaw flapped open and shut, clearly struggling to formulate a sentence. “I- I— HOW THE HECK WERE YOU GUYS ACTUALLY ON TO SOMETHING HERE?!” She spluttered, nearly tearing her hair out.
As the four of them watched, the clono-Roki’s draped themselves over Villain Lady like they were on the cover of some kind of dating sim, looking deeply un-Roki-like the whole way through— which was just more proof that this woman didn’t even like Roki like that at all and just had some evil agenda to fulfill with him! Anyone who really loved him would know that that’s the last way he’d behave, and wouldn’t even want him to behave like that in the first place!
“Eugh…” Shinso grimaced, cringing away. “I don’t think I wanna read this anymore, move over.” He nudged Sero aside, wincing as their elbows clacked together. “Ow, do you have tape or steel in there?”
“What? What were they saying?” Ashido pressed.
Shinso glanced at Sero, then at the other two. “I don’t…”
“The lives of people could be hanging in the balance! Are you a hero or not?!” Uraraka urged.
Shinso sighed, tugging at his capture scarf. “Okay, Todoroki— the real one . He said… ‘I still don’t see why Bakugo liked that so much’.”
Uraraka slapped a hand over her own mouth in shock and Ashido gave him a mortified look. Sero was wondering if it was possible to get a heart attack at age 16, because he was pretty sure that’s what he was experiencing at that moment.
“What on earth?!”
“So… So she got Bakugo too?!” Uraraka exclaimed, glancing between Ashido and Sero with deep concern. “Or… Liked what, exactly?! What did he like?!”
“Todoroki looking hot… er than usual?” Shinso offered in answer, shrugging. “I think the less we know the better, honestly.”
“Bakugo said he didn’t know anything about a girlfriend!” Ashido grumbled. “None of this makes any sense!”
Sero slammed his forehead against the table as hard as possible, and then groaned in pain as his brain jostled in his skull.
“Oww… okay, so I’m not having a nightmare. That’s fine. I think I get Shigaraki now, he was right, we should’ve just let the world get destroyed and that’s it.”
“Normal reaction.” Shinso deadpanned, glancing back towards the other table before freezing in place all at once. “Um. So, hypothetically. On a scale of one to ten, how bad would you guys say it would be if Todoroki and Maybe-Girlfriend-Maybe-Villain saw us right now.”
Sero huffed, lifting his face off of the table for a second. “Like a million.”
“Cool. I lied, it wasn’t hypothetical, it just happened.” He forced on a smile and waved at the pair across the cafe. “I think they only saw me, actually.” He added through his teeth.
“WHAT?!” Sero hissed, his entire body tensing as he kept his head ducked low.
“This— this is really really bad.” Uraraka whispered.
“Todoroki is waving me over.” Shinso laughed uncomfortably.
“Well you can’t just go over there and face a villain by yourself!” Uraraka said urgently, shooting up to her feet. “I’ll come with you! Wait— no I won’t!” She quickly sat back down. “I forgot I can activate my quirk from a distance now. Ashido, you go!”
“They already saw you!” Ashido snapped, standing up from the booth defiantly. “And now they saw me too! I’ve had enough of this! Bakugo was right, Sero, none of our explanations are cutting it, someone’s just gotta ask Todoroki about it face to face, and if you won’t do it, then I’m gonna do it!”
“You wouldn’t.” He gave her a hard stare.
“I wouldn’t?! I was the second person to volunteer for it!” She exclaimed.
“Guys they’re really staring at us now, I think they’re gonna come over.” Shinso coughed.
Sero ignored him, staring at Ashido with pleading eyes, trying to communicate without saying a word. Please don’t make me, this is so embarrassing I’m going to die.
Ashido just glared back, conveying her own clear-cut message. ‘Die then!’.
Everything about this situation sucked from start to finish. Why couldn’t he just keep imagining that this girl was an A-tier villain and move on with his life? Why must he get answers that he probably won’t even like?! Why was he born so nosy that he couldn’t just look away from Roki’s phone when it got a notification? Why did the trend of heroes having tragic backstories have to catch up with him— and it wasn’t even a good one?!
What was he gonna say in interviews in the future? “Hm? The moment that changed my life? Well, my crush got a hot girlfriend and I’m a 6 on a good day so there’s really no bouncing back after that, egotistically speaking. It made me a much humbler man.” That was the worst way to get character development!
But, well… if it was going to happen anyway, how would sulking around help? Shinso was right. They were being profoundly unheroic right now, and Mr. Aizawa would put them in detention for a trillion years for acting like this in front of the new student. And Ashido was kinda right too. He DID have to go talk to them, and he should show Miss Villain Girlfriend some grace while he was at it because if she was going to stay in Roki’s life then he was determined to not make his bitterness ruin things, dammit!
Sero sucked in a deep breath and nodded at Ashido, and Ashido nodded back, looking half proud and half fed-up with him.
“Sero?” Uraraka asked fretfully as he rose from his seat like he was on his way to the electric chair.
“I'm gonna go talk to him,” he said, his voice strained. “But if I do anything stupid just levitate the building and drop it on my head please.”
“Stop being dramatic, you talk to this guy every day!” Ashido demanded, punching his arm from across the table to force him to get a move on.
“Okay, ow ow…” he grumbled, squeezing his way past Shinso and dragging his feet over to Roki’s table. He didn't dare glance back at the other three, he was pretty sure that Uraraka’s look of pure fear on his behalf would make him run away screaming if he saw it.
“Oh em gee, there were FOUR of you!” Miss Girlfriend gasped before he could even get a word in, pressing a hand to her mouth. “That's, like, soooo sick! I was starting to think everyone in your school was sexy for reals, like, what kinda dreamy-steroids are they putting you on?! But I guess even U.A. has to have a few normal guys!”
What the…? Sero blinked at her, completely perplexed by the assessment. He was pretty sure she'd just insulted him, but she was smiling at him good-naturedly in a way that made him think he might've just hallucinated everything that came out of her mouth.
“...Um. Hi, nice to meet you?” He stammered.
“Heeeyyyy,” she drew out the word, leaning her head against her hand and staring him up and down in a way that made him feel naked. “Actually, you're not that bad, just gotta get a little used to you! You're like medium ugly. But, like, in a way that if you were an actor you'd get type casted to always have a super hot love interest, so I'd say that's totes a W!”
He opened his mouth, and then snapped it shut again. “... right.”
“Sozzzz was that rude?” She pouted, tilting her head to the side. “IDK— oh, y’know what it is?! It’s probs the fugly shirt you've got on, no offense, but, like, you're legit DROWNING in it! Here, put your digits in my cell, I'll text you some recs, you’ve got CRAZY potential!”
As the girl scrambled to open her contacts app, Sero slowly turned to look at Roki with a baffled expression on his face. Even Sero, who pretty much maxed out his communication skills, had a hard time keeping up with her. So then how did Roki manage to get through a single conversation with her?! Let alone start dating her!
“Hi, Sero.” Roki gave him a small smile, like he didn't even notice the girl's weird speech patterns. There was a black and white cat curled up on his lap, Just like Shinso had said. It was staring at Sero judgementally, which he didn’t appreciate, but he couldn’t say he didn’t understand it. “I didn't know you were here.”
Sero immediately dropped his dumbfounded look to smile back. Roki-smiles were too contagious to act otherwise. “Heya, Ro—! OW!”
The sudden flash and rapid clicking of a camera shutter startled the cat, making it yowl and launch off of Roki to streak straight past Sero.
“Oh…” Roki watched it go, sounding completely devastated. Sero had the sudden urge to yank the phone out of the girl’s hand and hurl it across the room.
The two of them turned back to Miss Girlfriend, who was staring at her screen with a wide smile, not even noticing the looks of annoyance being shot her way.
“Oh Em Glowingbaby! IRL pics of Shoto smiling at something?! These are going to sell for, like, a bajillion bands in a few years, you just paid my tuition, Fugly-Shirt! TY!” She winked at him, humming to herself as she continued to scroll through the photos. “Ugh, IDK why my flash was on, though, totes ruined the pics. Hey, make him do it again, Elbows!”
Sero’s eye twitched. “Um.”
Miss Girlfriend was weird , he decided. What was her deal? Just who the heck acts like their boyfriend smiling was some rare event? And why was she so… like that?! Was it on purpose, or did she just genuinely not notice how people reacted to her? Maybe she just didn’t care! Or maybe—
“Camie, this is Sero Hanta.” Roki’s remark shook him out of his stupor. “You should probably call him by his name, Bakugo is going to get mad that you’re coming up with better nicknames than him.” He added, and the girl burst out laughing.
The corner of Sero’s mouth twitched, but he schooled his expression and kept it together. He refused to laugh with Miss Girlfriend after all the antagonizing she just did. She could laugh by herself!
“Literally STAWP! Oh em gee, so you’re thee Hanta Sero?” She exclaimed, looking at him with fresh eyes, less judgemental and more searching. “You’re, like, literally famous in our friend group! I’m Camie Utsushimi, but don’t call me Utsushimi, kay? It’s, like, so awk. Only Camie, please! Can I call you Han? Actually it kinda sounds like hon, lol. I’m gonna call you hon!”
Famous? He was famous?! In a friend group that involved Roki, a literal beauty queen, and possibly Bakugo? Was he supposed to be excited or scared?
“S- sure? Last time I was famous was cuz this guy kicked my ass in a tournament, so I dunno if I like that.” He laughed awkwardly, jabbing a finger in Roki’s direction. If Miss Girlfriend, Camie , wasn’t letting any part of this conversation disturb her flow, then Sero was determined to match her. No way was this chick gonna have him beat in every department, that would just be too unfair!
She grinned widely at him. “LMAO, you’re such dudes. Do you beat up all your guy friends before making them, Sho?”
Sero’s skin crawled everytime she said his name like that, but Roki didn’t seem to mind at all, which just made Sero want to throw himself out of the giant cafe windows and run back to the dorms. Stupid girlfriend privileges.
“Huh… I guess I did,” he said, furrowing his brows in thought before turning to Sero with an apologetic look. “Sorry.”
“Psh, nah, don’t worry about it!” He clapped him on the shoulder reassuringly. “If that’s what it takes to be your friend, then it was worth it!”
Roki smiled at him gratefully, meeting his gaze head on and making Sero feel warm all over.
“Awwww!” Camie gushed, cutting straight into their moment. Not a moment, that’s his girlfriend. “Me and who?! Sorry, hon, I totally get the hype about you now! Sucks that Sho and Baku-bae never tell you about us, though. Actually offensive, plus you’re cancelled, and I’m blocking you both.”
Roki shrugged. “Sorry.” It didn’t sound half as earnest as before. “I think Bakugo might’ve already blocked you, though.”
“Yeaahhhhh , ugh, he does it every other day. Block, unblock, block, unblock, like oh em geee you’re literally obsessed with me, we get it! If he wasn’t such an attention whor* he would’ve gotten invited here but I’m on a blocked day today soooo...” She sighed, twirling a lock of her hair around her finger, and Sero curled his hands into fists, willing every fiber of his being to not laugh at Bakugo’s expense. Stop being funny, I can laugh later, stop being funny, I can laugh later! “Anywhoooo, hon, you probs wanna know about the fame thing, right?”
“Uh, yeah, kinda!” He stammered, masking the small snicker that escaped him with a cough. Dang it. Bakugo getting dragged was just too funny. “I gotta know what my friends are saying about me behind my back, right?”
“At least your friend are talking about you!” She rolled her eyes, glaring at Roki. “Anywho, y’know how, like, Sho and Baku-bae totes failed to get their licenses cuz of their massive egos? Well we all became literal besties—”
Roki leaned into Sero’s space, muttering under his breath. “We didn’t, actually.”
“—while doing the make-up lessons. At one point I was like, wow, you guys both SUCK at being normal people! Do you even have friends outside of us? —That’s me and Inasa, fyi, he’s, like, supes strong. — And Bakubae was like ‘grrr f u I totes have friend’ and Icybabe was like ‘yeah same lol’ and I was like ‘nuh uh’ and they were like ‘yeah huh’ and I was like ‘nuh uh’ and they were like ‘k bet’ and then they started listing off their friends to, like, prove it, and you’re the guy who made it into both lists—!”
“Bakugo mentioned me by name?” Sero cut her off before he could stop himself, turning to Roki for confirmation.
He was caught between feeling all warm and fuzzy that both of them listed him as a friend when prompted and feeling extremely concerned for Bakugo’s health and longevity. There wasn’t enough Edgeshot left to bring him back if he was about to die again!
Roki shook his head. “No, he called you Tape Face and I translated. He only mentioned Kirishima by name.”
Yeah, that made more sense.
“Riiiight, the spiky red one, I loooveeee him, he’s so fun!”
Sero felt his brain record-scratch to a halt. So Camie, the supposed girlfriend no one’s ever heard of, had met both Bakugo and Kirishima? He wouldn’t put it past Bakugo to straight up forget a fact like that out of sheer contempt for having knowledge of someone’s relationship status, but Kirishima was a totally different story! Hadn’t he come here to question them anyway? Why wasn’t he doing that right now?!
“Anywayssss,” Camie continued, “after that me and Inasa were like ‘oh em gee, this guy is, like, a literal legend in the world of the socially constipated!’ So now everytime one of us totally f’s up an interaction we’re all like ‘well, we can’t all be Sero Hanta’ and that’s basically the whole story! You’re, like, literally my idol, I’ve GOT to get pics, Inasa’s gonna be so jelly.”
All plans of interrogation quickly dispersed from his mind and Sero grinned in spite of himself, feeling his ego swell at the hands of none other than the woman who crushed it in the first place. Deep deep down, he was really just a shallow guy, huh? With the thinnest of complementary anecdotes, Camie had completely redeemed herself in his eyes. He could actually learn to get used to her!
“Well, I can definitely live with that!” He turned to beam at Roki. “Thanks for getting me my first fans, Roki, I owe you one!”
“You’re easy to like, so it didn’t take much effort.” He replied, but was quickly cut off by Camie’s arm coming between them.
“Woah woah woah, wait a sec!” She waved it around, calling the attention back to her. “‘ Roki ’?! You, like, totes tried to bite me when I called you that the one time!” She looked over at Sero, nodding her head at his shocked expression. “Swear on my life, he was growling like I just told him he looks like his dad or something! I mean, obvs it’s no biggie cuz I’ve got more nicknames for you, but what gives?!”
Sero looked over at Roki— Todoroki? — in alarm. “Woah, seriously? Do you, uh, if you don’t like it I won’t call you that anymore, man! You could’ve told me—”
“No, it’s okay.” Roki held a hand up, looking slightly panicked himself. Or, well, as close as he got to looking panicked. “I don’t like it when other people say it because it’s what you call me. It’s… special, I want it to stay that way.”
“...Oh. Em. Gee.” Camie uttered, holding a her hands over her mouth, and Sero couldn’t have agreed more.
“A- awww, Roki!” Who needed stupid first name privileges anyway? He had an exclusive nickname, that should be enough to keep him on cloud nine for the rest of the year!
What more could he ask for?
“Stawp, you’re actually making me jealous!” Camie exclaimed, reaching over the table to shake Roki’s arm.
His heart sank. That, maybe?
“Ughhh, I want a bf sooo bad! Or gf or tf or whatever, I’ll take anything, I totes need someone to say cute stuff like that to me, it’d, like, fix all my problems for reals.” She groaned, draping herself over the table.
What.
“What?” Sero croaked out, but he was pretty sure it was only audible to him.
“Like you said, Bakugo is obsessed with you, right?” Roki said, slipping his arm out of her grasp. “You should annoy him more, maybe he’ll get so mad his brain will explode and then he’ll date you.” He glanced up at Sero, waiting for him to laugh, but was instead met with a profoundly stressed out look instead. “…Because he won’t have a brain.” He reiterated the joke.
“A-HA!” He laughed, almost maniacly, and Roki was pacified. “I- I’m sorry, um, Camie… you’re… not dating anyone?”
“Ermmm soz but you’re not my type…” She wrinkled her nose at him, crossing her fingers together in the shape of an X.
“And she doesn’t like manga anyway.” Roki added, frowning to himself. “So you wouldn’t have anything to talk about.”
Sero felt his brain cells drop like flies.
“Ooh, you know who might be my type though, the pinky friend you had sitting back there was kinda cuuuuuteeeee!” She glanced back over at the other table, waving over to the trio who was lurking behind.
From a distance, Sero could see Shinso refusing to lip read what Camie had just said.
“Or the one that looks lowkey homeless but, like, in a sexy way. Are they just gonna watch us like a bunch of stalkers or, like, can they come over cuz I need a full view—”
Sero held his hands up, pausing the conversation by force. “Wait. Wait, hold on, that’s not why I was asking!” He spat, and tried desperately to not lose his mind when he noticed Roki sighing in relief out of the corner of his eye. “I—”
Camie blinked at him curiously, folding her hands under her chin. This is hell.
“Roki, are you supposed to meet anyone else here ever?” He sputtered out, turning to the other boy instead.
“...No.” His eyebrows furrowed slightly. “Is everything okay?”
“Awesome. Can I— what’s your— geez. ”
Clearly Camie wasn’t the girlfriend, if the girlfriend even existed at this point, but My Girl💕💍 had texted exactly the same way she talked— unless they were lying to him, but Bakugo and Kirishima wouldn’t join in on the lie too. Unless they didn’t know either—
“...I’m confused.” Roki declared.
“Samesies. Whats the sitch?”
“Who— ugh, what— who’s My Girl?!” He finally managed to get out, his eyes wide and wild.
Camie and Roki stared at him with dumfounded expressions, and he felt a harsh wave of self consciousness hit him. Oh god, what if I actually did hallucinate it—
“You have one?” Roki finally replied, his shoulders sagging.
“And why TF don’t you know who she is?” Camie added. “Did you get catfished?”
“NO, man, your phone!” Sero exclaimed, gesturing at Roki’s phone on the table between them. “You’ve got a contact in there that talks just like her—” he thrust his finger in Camie’s direction, “but it’s labeled ‘My Girl’ and it has those stupid two-hearts and the stupid—!”
“Oh. Em. Gee.” Camie slapped her hands over her mouth, cutting off his disturbed tirade. “Yup, that was me! LMFAO, icybabe did you seriously never change my contact?!”
“I didn’t realize that’s what it was,” Roki pursed his lips irritably, snatching up his phone to scroll through his contacts.
“Okay, hon, here’s the tea.” Camie waved him closer to her, like the whole thing was just some funny little secret joke and not the reason Sero nearly lost his f*cking mind over the past 24 hours. “Basicallyyyyy when I asked Sho if I could give him my number— cuz, like, we became besties and whatnot— he just handed me his phone. Obvs I was like ‘omg, wouldn’t it be, like, so hilarious if I put my number in like I was his gf?’. I mean, who wouldn’t try it? He’s literally thee dream man. I thought he’d just change it on his own once he saw it but I guess that was toooo much effort for him, huh?”
Roki was still frantically pushing buttons on his phone with a deepset frown. “I just didn’t notice the name. I know it’s you texting because of the way you talk.”
“Wowww, you really know how to make a girl blush,” she said flatly, poking the back of his phone. “Anywho, soz it’s not more juicy, I’d, like, love for this to be a huge relationship reveal but he’s, like, LGBT or whatever. Which is slay for him, y’know, hashtag pride, but totes not slay for me.”
Sero felt like a weight of seven trillion tons had just lifted off his spirit. He could’ve jumped up, clicked his heels, and cheered if Camie hadn’t suddenly decided to keep talking.
“So, like, were you jelly or whatevs? Is that why you were so stressed out? LOL.” She asked, twirling her hair.
“He’s not jelly, he’s a person.” Roki huffed in annoyance, glaring at the contact that he’d finally managed to pull up on his screen.
“I mean jelly like jealous , icybabe.” She rolled her eyes, looking at Sero like he was on her side or something. “So were you?”
Sero felt a part of his soul wither away at the question, and he was just about to laugh it off and deny the accusation like his life depended on it when Roki turned his eyes up at him curiously, and Sero found himself unable to say anything against it.
“WOW, sorry, I just realized we are being REALLY RUDE to our friends back there, HAHA!” Sero said way too loudly. “I’M GONNA GO GET THEM!”
Smooth . He thought to himself as he speed walked his way back to the other table.
Just before he was out of earshot, he managed to hear Camie click her teeth and sigh. “He tooootes was.”
◁◎✉◎▷
“So, then, if you’re not dating why were you calling him ‘Sho’?” Shinso quirked an eyebrow at Camie.
After a brief and highly frazzled explanation — that wasn’t actually necessary thanks to Shinso’s lip reading — the rest of the group was rounded up and tugged towards Camie and Roki’s table to conduct their own interrogations. Personally, Sero would've rather died than tell the other two all of their Camie-theories formulated through fraying threads of hope and hardly-intact sanity. As far as he was concerned, Roki not having a girlfriend was the only thing that mattered, case closed! But, as per usual, no one cared about his opinion. So now each of Camie's made-up offenses were being laid out one at a time to truly prove her innocence.
“Uh, cuz that’s his hero name , duhhhh.” She rolled her eyes.
“BUT— BUT WHAT ABOUT YOUR QUIRK?!” Ashido exclaimed, pointing a finger straight in her face. “You totally cloned Todoroki!”
“LMFAO you guys are sooo funny, it wasn’t a clone!” She pursed her lips together and blew out a cloud of sparkles that quickly took the form of Ashido, Shinso, and Uraraka — all with dreamy expressions on their faces.
“You’re making me turn pink all over~” The Ashido-clone simpered.
“Let me see that beautiful smile of yours~” The Uraraka one leaned against her, holding a hand over her heart.
“With you, I’d spend countless sleepless nights~” The Shinso one uttered.
“Alright, ew .” The real Shinso grimaced, waving his hand through the clones.
In an instant, the figures dispersed, turning back into a cloud of sparkles before fading into nothingness.
“It’s Glamour!” Camie grinned, winking at them. “I make illusions, not clones. P cool, huh?”
“Did they have to look like that?” Shinso frowned.
“Ughhh, fun sucker. Baku-bae finds them hilarious.”
So that answered that question.
“ I have a question for you.” Uraraka gritted her teeth, a dark look coming over her face.
“Yikes. Scary!” Camie leaned away from her as Uraraka stepped closer.
“If you aren’t just collecting guys from our class, then what were you doing with Deku, huh?!”
Camie blinked. “...Dek- who?”
“THAT’S IT—!”
“WOAH WOAH, wait a sec!” Ashido cried, catching Uraraka in mid air as she lunged at Camie’s throat. “Deku’s the guy that, like, saved the world! Don't you remember?! The one who beat up the big bad during the war, with the green hair— you two were, uh, hanging out during the license exam—”
“NAKED!” Uraraka added, steam practically shooting out of her ears.
“Oh that guyyy. Yikes, LMAO, are you his girl? My badddd, but that was, like, totes not me.” Camie shook her head. “Apparently I was, like, kidnapped or something by those villains around that time, it’s kinda why I failed the test. They totes harvested my blood and stuff, I had a migraine for dayzzz! Pretty cray, right?!”
Uraraka instantly stopped squirming in Ashido’s arms, dropping to the floor with a perplexed expression.
“So… it was actually Himiko that time?”
“Yeah, that was her name!” Camie nodded fervently. “Didn’t know she was showing off my goods to other peeps, though! That’s, like, sooo not right. I could deff let greenie know the sitch if you want, wouldn’t want him to get the wrong idea if he didn’t know it wasn’t me.”
Uraraka stared hard at the floor for a second before toppling down into a bowing position and sputtering out her apology. “I- I'M SO SORRY FOR ASSUMING THE WORST OF YOU!”
“Nah, you're totes in the right!” Camie waved her off casually. “If I saw me with my man I'd start tweaking out too— especially if he got a faceful of my everything LOL!”
“S-still, I'm supposed to be a hero, I shouldn't be thinking badly of other people!” Uraraka replied frantically. “And you were actually being held prisoner the whole time, you had no one to save you back then and I'm blaming you instead! I’m the worst!”
“Woah, girlie, it's chill, I don't even remember it that much, they kinda knocked me out a whoooole buncha times LOL I had so much head trauma I didn't even remember anything once they found me!”
Uraraka's jaw dropped and her eye gave a small twitch.
“WHAT?!” Ashido gasped.
“That's… terrible.” Shinso muttered.
“...O- oh em geeee, yeah, it was supes traumatizing etc etc you should totes feel bad for me and comfort me or whatevs.”
Roki tugged at his arm, and Sero quickly tuned out of the conversation while it petered away into nonsense.
Their eyes met, and a lump of regret instantly formed in the pit of his stomach.
Having to face Roki like this really made him realize just how awkward he made things with the weird stalking and the roundabout questions. Worst of all, it meant that Bakugo was actually right, and that alone was a loss worth mourning.
It was stupid of Sero to think that those fluttery feelings wouldn’t turn against him one day. Hadn’t he vowed to not let them be an obstacle? What kinda hero couldn’t stand a simple task like that?! How was he planning ons staying friends with Roki if just the possibility of him dating someone was enough to send Sero into an episode — what was he supposed to do when it actually happened? Having an unrequited crush sucked, but having an unrequited crush and no more Roki in his life would be a truly worst case scenario.
Starting now, if Roki turned up with a boyfriend on his arm, Sero would become that guy’s number one fan. He had to, because this time things ended up semi-okay, but next time it might not, and he’d rather launch himself into oncoming traffic before making things hard or weird for Roki!
“W- what's up?” He leaned towards him with a shaky smile, an apology on the tip of his tongue.
Roki scooched to the side, looking up at him expectantly. “Sit with me.”
“Oh, sure! Don't hafta tell me twice.” He slid in, and their knees clacked together. The lump grew. Just apologize, man! “Ugh…” He turned to Roki, a determined look in his eye. “Roki, man, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay, it didn’t hurt—” He shrugged, looking down at their knees.
“No, not that! I mean, about all… this!” Sero gestured at the rest of the group, who were in various states of disbelief and regret over their actions as Camie went on about her villain experience. “And that I looked at your notifications in the first place, it was none of my business. I didn't mean for it to be a whole thing, I should’ve just been straight up. I was just…”
There were too many emotions that could be listed there. Confused? Horrified? In agony?
“...Being weird. It wasn’t cool of me, so… sorry. You can put hearts on whatever contact you want, buddy.”
“I didn’t want to put hearts on Camie’s contact in the first place. She did it on her own.” Roki said pointedly, his fingers tracing his phone cautiously. “But I’ll make sure to remember that.”
Sero sighed in relief, slumping low into the booth seat and resting his head on the table. “Good… We’re cool?” He asked hesitantly.
“Of course. I’m always cool, It’s part of my quirk.” He bumped him with a frosty arm, as if to demonstrate, but his small smile told Sero that all jokes aside there was nothing to worry about.
“HA! Oh yeeeeah, how could I forget?”
And really, how could he forget? The friendship thing was a two way street, and there was a reason he liked Roki so much in the first place. He wasn’t the kinda guy to hold a moment (several moments) of idiocy against a friend. Once he held someone close to his heart, it was tough to lose that privilege.
“Ugh, I need more munchies after all that. You want anything, icybabe? My treeeeeeat.” Camie cut into the conversation, poking Roki’s empty cup with her finger.
“Not sure, I’ll check the menu again.”
“My tea… exploded so I need a new one too.” Uraraka muttered sheepishly.
“I gotchu, girlllll, whatever you want!”
“R- really?!” And just like that, Camie became a personal saint.
“Duhhhh.”
“I’ll come to, I’ve got to ask what brand of cat food they use for the strays here…” Shinso remarked.
“GROUP TRIP! Sero, save the table for us!” Ashido declared, hooking her arms through Uraraka and Shinso’s and bouncing off towards the back of the line.
“Good call. That fugly shirt’s the only thing needed to keep everyone, like, a trillion feet away from our table.” Camie said.
“It’s really not bad.” Roki frowned, placing a hand on Sero’s shoulder to clamber over him on his way out of the booth.
“Ruh roh. Did fighting against all that fire in the war kill your eyesight, king?”
“No… but my sister needs glasses. You think I should get checked?”
“Deffo.”
Sero watched their receding backs, snickering to himself when Camie blew a puff of sparkles into Rokis face to create an illusion of thick, circular glasses. He didn’t even mind that the conversation was being held at his expense if this was the result.
Roki turned around to glance at him over his shoulder, the frames making his eyes look wide and buggy. Sero laughed and shot him a thumbs up, and Roki smiled back, turning away with a light flush on his face.
Yeah, we’ll be alright.
◁◎✉◎▷
Sero was hanging upside down off his bed, trying to make sense of the poem in his hand. He had nothing against classical literature, but Cementoss had the weirdest picks sometimes for his assignments.
“Nope, doesn’t make any more sense upside down than right side up,” he declared, flipping himself back up.
“I could give you my answers if you want,” Roki offered, not for the first time since Sero had gotten started on the assignment.
The other boy was cooped up in the hammock, his phone and a stack of reread mangas resting a few inches away on the floor. They were so close that Sero could almost reach out and grab a book and forget about the assignment completely. That’s why they were really here in the first place, but then Roki reminded him that they had homework due the next day, and Sero had to force himself to be a responsible student for once.
“Thanks Roki, but I gotta do it myself. I think I relied on you and Yaomomo a little too much last year, I’m hoping just your presence is gonna be enough to make me smarter this time.”
“Technically you’ll still be relying on me, then.”
“Dang it. Guess you’re stuck with me for life!” He grinned impishly, leaning his head against his hands as he dove back into the poem for the trillionth time that day.
A new track came up on his playlist of background music, and he began humming it quietly under his breath before he realized that he’d just reread the same line of Kanji ten times in a row and scowled.
“That’s a good song,” Roki remarked, “could you send it to me?”
Sero snickered. “You’re the one who introduced me to it, pal.”
“I think you should send it to me anyway.”
Sero glanced up from his paper, looking over at Roki inquisitively, but the other boy wasn’t facing him, and his face was buried too deeply into the hammock to tell what expression he was wearing.
“...If you say so!” He finally shrugged, throwing aside the poem to quickly link him the song. Sometimes Roki just had weird habits, it was part of his charm! He wasn’t about to ruin the mystique by grilling him on it.
The message was sent, and Sero turned back to Roki as his phone pinged with the notification.
“Happy?”
“Yeah.”
Sero huffed out a laugh, turning back to his work with a perplexed expression. “Well, that’s all that matters to me, man—”
His words quickly cut off as the brightened screen of Roki’s phone caught his attention from the corner of his vision. His eyes widened, and his head snapped towards the notification, the one that came from Sero’s own phone.
And there it was, plain as day until the screen dimmed again and cut it off from view for good.
Sero 💕🙂
Check this out! Some super cool guy with good taste had me listen to this song once, wish I remembered his name…
