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candleshopmenace · 2 years

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don't say a word.

SUMMARY

Present Mic frowns. “You cook dinner by yourself?”

“Yeah?” Katsuki tilts his head, confused. “Don’t you?”

“Of course I do,” Present Mic says, and he sets down his cup. “But I’m an adult. You’re eight.”

“I can cook!” Katsuki says. “And I bake really well, too!”

“Bakugou,” Present Mic says, and there’s something in his voice that makes Katsuki feel very small, “that’s not the point.”

—

Katsuki is pretty sure that there’s nothing wrong with his family. He doesn’t understand why nobody else seems to agree with him.

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[discord server]

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When Katsuki wakes up, the first thing he wants to do is go back to sleep. His entire body feels achy in a way that reminds him of what Auntie Inko called growing pains, and his head hurts, and when he opens his eyes he has to close them again because the lights are too bright. Plus, he’s tired. Which makes no sense at all, since he just woke up, but things rarely make sense, and so Katsuki is fucking exhausted.

From the doorway, someone says, “Bakugou? It's time to get ready to go, buddy.”

Katsuki cracks his eyes open and sits up, ignoring the way his stomach churns in favor of looking at Present Mic. “Where are we going?” he asks, blinking several times to make the room stop spinning. Everything looks weird, like it's smaller than it used to be, but he dismisses that as his mind playing tricks on him.

“Well, Eraserhead and I have to go to work,” Present Mic says. “We have to teach. I was thinking that you could sit in the teachers’ lounge until we’re finished.” Katsuki doesn’t know what expression he’s making, but he must look upset, because Present Mic quickly adds, “You wouldn’t be alone. All the teachers have different planning periods, so there’d always be someone to watch you.”

Katsuki frowns. He doesn’t need anybody to watch him. He can watch himself, and he’s even old enough to cook things on the stove at home! But he doesn’t say that, because he doesn’t want to seem rude or ungrateful that Present Mic is thinking about him, and it's not like he’d been asked a question or anything.

When an adult said something to you and it wasn’t a question, that meant that they were telling you what to do. And if an adult was telling you what to do, that meant you had to listen, because they would get mad at you if you didn’t. It's probably twice as true for heroes, since they were really strong and could hurt you really badly if they felt like it, and so everybody had to listen to them. Even other adults had to listen to them. Katsuki doesn’t want to make Present Mic feel like Katsuki isn’t listening to him, and so he says, “Okay.”

Present Mic’s shoulders relax, like he thought that Katsuki would throw a fit or argue with him about something he said. “Okay?” he says, copying after Katsuki, and then nods. “Okay! Well, get dressed, and then we’ll go downstairs and get some breakfast, alright?”

Katsuki sighs. His head hurts, and he’s pretty sure that eating will just make it hurt even worse. It feels like there’s someone inside his skull, whacking at the space between his eyes with a heavy metal hammer, and he really doesn’t want to get out of bed but he does anyways.

“Bakugou?” Present Mic asks, and, when Katsuki looks over at him, he sees that he’s frowning. “Are you feeling alright?”

Katsuki stares at him, wondering if it's a trick question, if he’ll get in trouble no matter what answer he gives. If it's a trick question, he needs to figure out which answer will get him into the least trouble, because his body hurts and his head hurts and his stomach hurts and he doesn’t know how many more things can hurt before he starts to cry, and wouldn’t that be embarrassing, crying as soon as he wakes up?

He must be quiet for too long, because Present Mic gives him that smile that people give when they don’t really want to smile but don’t know what else to do with their face. “Well, okay,” he says. “Sorry for waking you up so early, kiddo. I just didn’t think that you’d want to be left by yourself.” His eyebrows pinch together. “Do you want to be left by yourself?”

Without thinking, Katsuki says, “No!” He doesn’t know why he says it as quickly or loudly as he does, but then he imagines being left alone in this big building with all its hallways that he could get lost in, where anything could happen to him, and his heart feels like it's trying to beat out of his chest. Maybe he’ll get in trouble for being clingy, but he’d rather get punished for that than be stuck in an unfamiliar place, by himself, for an entire day. “Don’t leave me here. I’ll be quiet, I promise.”

Present Mic holds up his hands. “I’m not going to leave you by yourself if you don’t want me to,” he says. He sounds worried, which makes Katsuki feel guilty because he’s sure that Present Mic has bigger things to worry about than him. “I was just asking because you look tired. I could take the day off, if you want. You look like you could use some rest.”

… Is he trying to get rid of him? Is he that annoying?

Katsuki gnaws at the inside of his cheek, unsure of what to say. Should he agree to stay behind? Is that what Present Mic wants? Would it be selfish to say that that’s not what he wants? But why would Present Mic offer to take him along in the first place if he was just going to turn around and do the exact opposite?

Katsuki feels sick.

Present Mic clears his throat and Katsuki winces at the sound even as his head jerks towards it. He cringes further when he sees that Present Mic’s smile is even tighter than it was before. “I’m not trying to trick you, Bakugou,” he says, which is exactly what people say right before they try to trick you, but Katsuki doesn’t point that out because he’s seen what happens when he interrupts someone. “If you’re feeling unwell, I’d be willing to stay with you, since you don’t want to be left alone.”

Katsuki shakes his head. “It's fine,” he says. “I feel fine.” He hesitates, then braces himself and says, “I’d like to come with you.”

Present Mic is quiet for a moment, and fear floods Katsuki so fast that he feels like he’s fallen into a giant pile of snow. He did that once when he was six, and Auntie Inko had to rush him to the hospital because he got hypothermia. He remembers feeling so cold that he thought he was going to die, and that’s how he feels right now because he’d just failed a test he didn’t know he was taking. He gave the wrong answer.

Present Mic says, “Okay.”

Katsuki stares at him. He feels dizzy and cold and sick to his stomach, and his head hurts, and he almost wants to cry. He says, so quietly that he almost can’t even hear himself, “Okay?”

“Yeah,” Present Mic says, shrugging. “Okay.” And then he says basically the same thing he said earlier, says, “Get some clothes on, then let’s get something to eat.” As he closes the door, he says, “Make sure to wear something warm!”

Katsuki wraps his arms around himself and shivers.

There’s a plate in front of him. He’s in the kitchen and Present Mic is watching him and there’s a plate in front of him. Katsuki looks at Present Mic, who blinks back at him like he doesn’t know what the problem is. Like he doesn’t know that there even is a problem. He says, “You need to eat so that you have energy for the day,” and Katsuki can’t help but feel like this is a trap.

Katsuki shakes his head, digging his nails into his palms so that he can ignore the part of him that wants to reach forward and grab the plate that Present Mic is offering him, because that’s not healthy food. He’ll ruin himself if he eats that, and then he’ll never be a hero. Besides, heroes were supposed to have a lot of self-control. That’s what his mother always said, and it made sense, and so Katsuki has to control himself and not eat something that he knows will only hurt him in the end.

“Bakugou,” Present Mic says, and Katsuki takes a step back, shaking his head again. “Look, you need to eat. I’m being serious.” He looks between the plate and Katsuki, then sighs. “This is exactly what I made you for breakfast yesterday. What’s different about today?”

“I don’t -” The words feel like they’re stuck in his throat. “I don’t - I can’t eat eggs. Not the yellow part. They’re bad for you.”

“Well, I’m not letting you only eat toast again.” Present Mic straightens, setting the plate down on the stove. “You know, that’s probably why you’re so cold.”

“I’m not cold,” Katsuki says, even though he is. He’d put on long-sleeved shirt and then a sweater and then a jacket, but he still feels like there’s ice under his skin, spreading and growing like a sickness, like a disease. He says, “And I like toast.”

Present Mic sighs and turns in a circle, looking around the kitchen. “What else do you like?” he asks, walking over to a cabinet and opening it. “Cereal?”

“I want an apple,” Katsuki says.

Present Mic sounds very tired when he says, “That’s not enough, Bakugou.”

Katsuki frowns, thinking of all the times he asked for a snack and then watched his mother take an apple out of the fridge. She’d cut it in half, then weigh each piece on the little scale on the kitchen counter. She never said that apples weren’t enough. She never said that any kind of food wasn’t enough. Glancing around, Katsuki sees that there’s no scale in this kitchen, and he wonders how all the people who live here know how much they’re supposed to eat if they don’t have a way to measure it. “You guys should get a scale,” he says.

Present Mic closes his eyes for a moment, then opens them and says, slowly, “We don’t need a scale, Bakugou.”

Katsuki starts to argue, then bites down on his tongue. Present Mic has a ring on his finger, and it always hurts more to be slapped by a hand that has a ring on it. Present Mic’s ring doesn’t look like it has a gemstone on it or anything, but Katsuki still doesn’t want to risk it. “Okay,” he says. “Sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing?” Present Mic asks, and it sounds like one of those questions that adults asked but never actually wanted an answer to, and so Katsuki stays quiet. “You don’t -” Present Mic sighs and glares up at the ceiling for a moment, then looks at Katsuki like he’s trying to see inside his head. “Bakugou, if I get you an apple, you need to actually eat it. Okay?”

Katsuki blinks at him. “Why would I ask for food if I wasn’t going to eat it?” He watches as Present Mic crosses the kitchen, pulling open the refrigerator door. He waits until Present Mic is far enough away, then points out, “You should totally get a scale.” Present Mic straightens up so fast that he hits his head on the top part of the fridge. “Ow, fuck,” he mutters, then looks at Katsuki. “We don’t need a scale. You don’t need a scale. You’re eight.”

“My mom has a scale,” Katsuki counters. “She uses it for food so that we can stay healthy, because she’s a model and I’m going to be a hero.”

“That’s not what being a hero is about,” Present Mic says. “Being a hero is about saving people, not eating, like, one thing a day.”

“I eat more than that!” Katsuki says, and it feels weird to be saying that, but Present Mic is wrong. “I would die if I only ate one thing a day.”

“Oh my God,” Present Mic says. He closes the refrigerator, shaking his head. “I can’t believe that I’m having this conversation.” He looks at the apple in his hand, then at Katsuki, then sighs. “Do you want me to cut this up?”

“No, it's fine,” Katsuki says. “You’re probably already late for work.” He takes the apple when Present Mic offers it to him, then stares down at it. Now that he’s actually holding it, he kind of wants to ask if Present Mic can cut it in half, but he guesses that it’s fine. Apples are healthy, anyways, which is why they always had them in the fridge at home.

Present Mic puts a hand on his shoulder. “Are you sure that you feel well enough to come along?” he asks, sounding concerned. “I wouldn’t mind -” Katsuki says, “I’m fine.”

Present Mic looks like he wants to say something else, but then he just sighs again. “Alright, then,” he says. “Let’s go.”

Like the rest of Yuuei, the teachers’ lounge is huge. There’s a teachers’ lounge at Katsuki’s primary school - he knows because he’s caught glimpses it while walking by when the door was open - but he’s pretty sure that it's not as big as this.

When Katsuki says that, Present Mic laughs a little and says, “Well, Yuuei has a lot of teachers. Plus, they have to convince people to work here somehow, right?”

“I guess so,” Katsuki says. He pulls his legs up into his chair and crosses them, leaning his elbows on the table as he watches Present Mic bustle around the kitchenette in the corner, and then he asks, “Where’s Eraserhead?” Because now that he thinks about it - and he is thinking about it, a lot - he hasn’t seen Eraserhead since yesterday. “He wasn’t here this morning.”

“He was taking Eri to school,” Present Mic says, taking down two mugs from the cabinet above the sink. They’re gray, with the symbol of Yuuei printed on the sides, and he pours hot water into both of them as he says, “He’s teaching right now. He’s Class 1-A’s homeroom teacher.”

“That’s the hero class, right?” Katsuki asks, sitting up in his chair. He remembers seeing a special documentary about Yuuei, and he remembers thinking that Class 1-A was the class he wanted to be in when he got older because that was where the best heroes came from. “Y’know, where the top-ranking students are?”

“Yep! You’ve met a few of them, actually.” Present Mic glances over his shoulder. “Let’s see… you’ve met Ashido, Todoroki, Kirishima…”

“And that girl with the ponytail,” Katsuki adds. “She made me some clothes because you guys weren’t expecting to have to take care of me.”

Present Mic hums in agreement as he turns around with a cup in each hand. He carries them over and sets them on the table, then sits down across from Katsuki. “Her name is Yaoyorozu,” he says, then nods at the mug he’s placed in front of Katsuki. “Let that cool down a bit, and then you drink it. It’ll warm you up.”

“I’m not cold,” Katsuki protests. He pulls the sleeves of his sweater over his hands and drags the cup closer to him, feeling the steam on his face as he peers at its contents. “Is this tea?”

Present Mic nods. “Peppermint.”

“I like tea,” Katsuki says, and he finds himself rubbing at the mark on the side of his palm. It's barely even noticable, just a few shades darker than the rest of his skin, but it feels rough beneath his fingers. “I tried to make some a couple days ago, but Todoroki wouldn’t let me because he’s an asshole.” He hears a snort and looks up to see that Present Mic is doing a terrible job of covering up a smile. “I’m being serious! I was trying to make some tea and then he came running in and started yelling at me!”

Present Mic’s smile turns into a frown. “Todoroki did that?” he asks, like he thinks that Katsuki is lying. “That doesn’t really sound like something he’d do.”

Katsuki tenses. He should’ve just kept his stupid mouth shut, because Present Mic has obviously known Todoroki for longer than he’s known Katsuki, and that meant that he’d be on Todoroki’s side. Like how Katsuki’s father always agreed with his mother, or how Kariage always backed him up in a fight. He doesn’t know what good it’ll do, but he finds himself saying, “I’m telling the truth.”

Present Mic’s eyebrows shoot up. “I never said you weren’t,” he points out. “I just meant that Todoroki usually doesn’t act like that.” He takes a sip of his tea, then muses, “Maybe it's because he was sick.”

And that’s something that Katsuki didn’t know about. “He was sick?” he asks, remembering how angry Todoroki had looked when he ran into the kitchen, the way he grabbed Katsuki’s arm and shook him and asked if he wanted the burn to scar. “So he’s usually not that mad?”

“Well, he’s mad, but not loudly. If that makes any sense.” Present Mic looks at Katsuki over the rim of his cup. “Does that make any sense?”

Katsuki thinks about how his father sometimes got really quiet, and that usually meant that he was pissed about something or the other. And then something would set him off, and he would explode, going on a rampage like some kind of monster. He’s never been well and truly angry at Katsuki, but he’s seen it happen. It never ended well. Katsuki presses his hands to the sides of his cup in an attempt to make them warmer, then says, “Yeah, that makes sense.” But now he can’t help but wonder what it was about him that seemed to make Todoroki so upset. Did he do the wrong thing? Did he say something he wasn’t supposed to? Maybe Present Mic is right, and maybe Todoroki was acting weirdly because he was sick, but Katsuki has the feeling that it's somehow all his fault.

He takes a sip of tea and winces when it scalds his tongue. Present Mic catches the motion, because of course he does, and asks, “Is it still too hot for you?”

Katsuki shakes his head. “Nope,” he says. He hates it when people worry about him because that means that he’s distracting them, and people always got mad if you distracted them for too long. “It didn’t even hurt! One time, I accidently put my hand on a burner while I was making dinner, and I couldn’t move my fingers for, like, a month. That hurt way more than this.”

He’d said that in an attempt to reassure Present Mic that he was fine, but his words seem to have the opposite effect - Present Mic frowns, and his eyebrows furrow again, and he looks even more worried than before. “You cook dinner by yourself?”

“Yeah?” Katsuki asks, feeling confused. “Don’t you?”

“Of course I do,” Present Mic says, and he sets down his cup. “But I’m an adult. You’re eight.”

“I can cook!” Katsuki says. “And I cook really well, too! Everybody says so.”

“Bakugou,” Present Mic says, and he sounds weird. He’s speaking quietly, but there’s something in his voice that makes Katsuki feel very small. “That’s not the point.”

Katsuki presses himself back in his chair, unsure of why Present Mic suddenly seems angry. He’s not sure if he’s angry at him or if he’s angry at something else, but there never seemed to be a difference in how Katsuki got hit, and so he can only assume that he’s done something wrong. “Sorry?” he tries, because maybe if he apologizes, shows that he really does feel bad about whatever it is that he’s done, he can get away with only a single blow.

Present Mic’s eyes go a little wide. “I’m not angry,” he says, and he says it quickly, like he thinks that Katsuki might try to interrupt him. “I was just… thinking.” He pauses, then says, “How many times have you cooked dinner by yourself?”

Katsuki lets himself breathe. But he doesn’t relax, not completely, because if he does something wrong this time, he’s sure that Present Mic will change his mind about not being angry. “A lot,” he says, because maybe that’s the right answer. Maybe Present Mic wants to know if he can take care of himself - which he can, by the way. He’s not a fucking baby. “I have to stand on a stool to reach the spice cabinet, but I’m good at cooking. And baking! I know how to make cookies and stuff, but I only ever make them for my friends. And for Deku, because he’s not going to be a hero, so he doesn’t have to worry about not eating healthy things.”

He waits to see if Present Mic is going to respond, but he doesn’t, and so Katsuki continues, “He likes those ones that have chocolate chips in them. I want to eat them, sometimes, because they smell really good, but…” He trails off, thinking about how good the cookies smelled. And they looked good, too, and he knew they tasted good by how much his friends seemed to like them, but all the ingredients that went into them were bad, so they had to be bad, too. “They’re bad for you. They have a bunch of sugar in them, and butter, and then there’s all that chocolate, so there’s no way that they’re healthy. They’re even worse than peanut butter, I bet.”

When he finishes, Present Mic still doesn’t speak. He just looks at Katsuki like he’s watching a sad movie, and he’s frowning again, and he hasn’t taken a sip of tea in the past five minutes, and Katsuki tries to think of what it is that he’s done wrong. He got asked a question, and so he answered it. Was he not supposed to answer it? Was his answer not the one he was supposed to give? Was his answer too long? The third option seems like the most likely, and it makes the most sense, so Katsuki says, “I didn’t mean to talk that much.”

“No, it's…” Present Mic pinches the bridge of his nose like he has a headache. Like he has a headache because of Katsuki. “It's fine. You haven’t done anything wrong. I was just wondering about something.” His glasses are fogged with the steam from the tea, and so he takes them off and cleans them with the edge of his shirt, then asks, “Do your parents leave you at home by yourself?”

“Well, yeah,” Katsuki says, feeling relieved, because at least that’s a question he knows the answer to. He’s been asked it a bunch of times, and he never got in trouble for his response. People always just smiled at him and told him how responsible and mature he was, which was a good thing because it meant that he was better than other kids his age. “A lot! It's because they know that I can take care of myself, and I know the way to school, and I look both ways before crossing the street. One time they left me by myself for, like, a bunch of months, and I had to go to the store by myself and everything.” That last part is important because he had to carry the groceries home by himself afterwards, so he couldn’t get too much. He was responsible and mature for his age, but he was also small for his age, too, so it's not like he could carry a lot of stuff at one time. “But my dad left me a bunch of money, so it wasn’t that bad. I read a lot of books and stuff, since house was really quiet.”

He stops talking and watches Present Mic, hoping for the praise he always got when he told that to other adults. He was responsible and mature, and that meant that he was going to be a good hero. The best hero, actually, because Katsuki was great at being the best! When he got the highest grades on his tests and stuff, his father would smile at him, and even his mother would tell him, good job, and then she would brag about him to all her friends, which was a good thing because it meant that he’d actually done something right for once.

But Present Mic doesn’t smile at him, and he doesn’t say, good job. He just says, in that weird voice that makes Katsuki feel tiny, “Right.” He puts his hands around his cup of tea but doesn’t drink it, just holds it. “How old were you when they left you alone for all those months?”

Unease flares through Katsuki’s stomach. Does Present Mic think that he’s lying about being able to stay home by himself? But that can’t be right, because Present Mic said just a couple of days ago that he thought that Katsuki was going to be a great hero. Those had been his exact words, You’re going to be a great hero. Did he change his mind? Did Katsuki make him change his mind?

Hesitantly, Katsuki says, “Seven?” and then winces when the word comes out sounding like a question. He tries again, saying, “I was seven,” and then he adds, “It was last year,” because he wants to show how long ago that was, and he’s gotten older than that, so that means he’s even more responsible and mature than he was back then.

Present Mic’s frown deepens. “You’re really young, Bakugou.”

Katsuki scowls. “No,” he says, feeling hurt, “I’m not.” Why can’t Present Mic just act like all the other adults that Katsuki has met? Why does he have to react so differently to everything?

“You’re eight,” Present Mic says, like that changes everything. Like that changes anything. “You’re too young to be left alone for a day, much less an entire month.”

“It was a bunch of months,” Katsuki corrects.

“That’s even worse,” Present Mic says. “How many people have you told about this?” The way he says it makes it sound like he thinks that Katsuki was trying to keep it a secret. “How many adults know about this, Bakugou?”

Katsuki tries to remember all the adults he’s gotten compliments from, but quickly loses count. He shrugs. “A lot, I guess.”

“And none of them have done anything about it? None of them have tried to help you?”

Katsuki tenses, feeling hurt that Present Mic thinks that he needs help. He just told him that he was able to take care of himself! He doesn’t need anybody to help him with something that he already knows how to do! “I don’t need help!” he says, and his voice sounds louder than it should, but he thought that Present Mic said that Katsuki was going to be a great hero, and great heroes didn’t need help. All Might never needed help, which was what made him the best hero. “I’m responsible and mature!” and he’s never actually said that out loud before, so he stumbles a little over the words. He sputters, then continues, “I know how to take care of myself!”

“That’s not what I meant, Bakugou,” Present Mic says. “I know that you can take care of yourself. But you shouldn’t have to. You’re too young to worry about things like that. You should be having fun, not… not worrying about making yourself dinner. That’s what a parent is supposed to do.”

Katsuki shakes his head. “That’s what parents are supposed to do for kids that don’t know how to do things for themselves. I know how to do everything by myself. I don’t need anyone’s help, so my parents don’t have to do that.” He tries to keep himself calm as he explains it, but Present Mic is looking at him like he’s something to be sad about, and the anger grabs hold of him again and refuses to let go. He doesn’t want to be here. He should’ve just stayed back at the dorms. Sure, he’d be lonely, but at least he wouldn’t have to deal with one of his favorite heroes telling him that he’s practically useless on his own. He feels sparks crack across his palms and quickly smothers them on his pants, knowing what happened when he couldn’t control his Quirk, but he’s so, so angry and he hears himself say, “Don’t you have a class to teach?”

“Not for another thirty minutes,” Present Mic says, then pauses like he wants to say something else. He closes his mouth. Opens it, then says, “Bakugou, you deserve more than this.”

Katsuki doesn’t answer, and they spend the rest of the time in silence.

After Present Mic leaves, time passes in a blur. Katsuki is bored but doesn’t want to say it, knowing that complaining would just make him sound ungrateful, and he distracts himself by watching the hands of the clock tick away the seconds and minutes and hours. True to Present Mic’s word, all the teachers have different planning periods, so there’s always someone in the lounge with him. Some of them talk to him, and he tries to respond politely, but most of them just stare at him while trying to pretend that they’re not staring.

Katsuki sighs.

He must fall asleep for a little bit, because he wakes up when the chair across from him scrapes against the floor as someone pulls it back and sits down in it. “Oh, sorry,” they say. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Katsuki straightens, rubbing at his eyes. “It's okay,” he says, because that’s what you’re supposed to say when someone apologizes, even if it's actually not really that okay. “I -” He looks at the person who just sat down and freezes, staring. He says, after a long moment of silence, “You’re Midnight.”

The woman raises an eyebrow, looking amused. “Yes, I suppose I am,” she says. “And what’s your name?”

Katsuki stares at her. It takes several moments for her question to register in his head, and, when it does, his answer sounds nervous even to his own ears, “Bakugou.” He clears his throat and tries again, steady and confident like his mother always told him to be when introducing himself to strangers. “I’m Bakugou Katsuki.”

“I should’ve guessed,” Midnight says, and he has the feeling that she’s teasing him. Before he can say anything about it, she smiles and asks, “What are you doing here?”

Katsuki pauses, thinking about how he should respond. Does she want to know why he’s in the teachers’ lounge, or does she want to know why he’s at Yuuei in the first place? The second choice seems the most likely, since it would give her more information, and so he says, “Eraserhead is taking care of me,” which is a concept that still feels weird to think about. He didn’t even know that his parents were friends with any heroes. But his father once shook hands with some super important person in America, so he supposes that it's not actually that strange. “And Present Mic.”

“Really? That sounds fun.” Midnight’s smile widens. She seems delighted by the sight of him, and he can’t figure out why. “How old are you, Bakugou?”

“I’m eight,” he says, watching her warily. She looks really happy to see him. He doesn’t remember the last time anyone ever looked happy to see him. Actually, Deku looked at him like that, and so did Kariage and Yasu, but they didn’t count because Katsuki has known them since forever. “I’ll be nine in April.” He counts on his fingers, then adds, “That’s in three months.”

Midnight nods as if she’d been expecting that answer. “That’s really close,” she points out.

“Yeah, it is.”

Midnight puts her elbow on the table and leans her cheek against her palm, watching him. “What are you hoping to get for your birthday?”

Katsuki blinks at her. He hasn’t gotten birthday presents since he was, like, four. Well, he got them Deku and Kariage and Yasu, but, again, they didn’t count. “I’m too old for presents.”

“Nobody is too old for birthday presents,” Midnight says, that teasing tone back in her voice. When Katsuki shrugs, she asks, “Well, what kind of cake do you plan on getting?”

She’s asking all the wrong questions, Katsuki thinks, then says, “I don’t like cake.” When her eyebrows shoot up, he hurries to explain, “I tried it once at a party, and it tasted good, but my mom found out and got really mad at me.” He shudders at the memory of how mad she got at him.

“... Why would she get mad at you about something like that?” Midnight asks, sitting up. She’s frowning. “What’s so bad about cake?”

“It's unhealthy,” Katsuki says, and it's true, so he doesn’t really know why Midnight’s frown deepens when he tells her that. “Like, it has all that sugar and stuff in it. It's really bad for you.” The silence stretches a bit too far, and Katsuki shifts in his seat, suddenly nervous. When his mother got quiet, it usually meant that she was really, really angry at him. And when she got angry, people got hurt. He got hurt. He doesn’t know if Midnight is the same way, but she’s watching him with wide eyes and she’s staying so still that she looks like a statue and Katsuki doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do, and so he says, trying to relieve the tension, “I have to eat properly if I’m going to be a hero.”

“Bakugou,” Midnight says, and she doesn’t sound as happy as she did before. “That’s not… sweetie, you should be allowed to eat cake.”

Katsuki leans back in his chair, putting himself out of her reach. “Sorry,” he says, because he’s obviously made her upset. He thought he’d been doing the right thing by saying that, by proving how much he wants to be a hero, but he guesses that he was wrong. He feels like he’s been wrong about a lot of things, lately.

“You don’t have to apologize for anything,” Midnight says, and her voice is just barely above a whisper, and Katsuki doesn’t like the way she’s looking at him. She’s looking at him like she’s never seen him before.

Katsuki shrinks under her gaze, holding onto the sides of his seat to keep himself from running.

… He doesn’t know where he’d go, anyways, if he did run. Somebody would find him, because somebody always does, and then everything hurts more than it would if he had just stayed where he was. He knows this because he still remembers the one time when his mother was yelling at him and so he ran into his bedroom and shut his door in her face, and she responded by locking it and not letting him out until he apologized. But he didn’t want to apologize, not to her, and so he missed dinner for two entire nights. And then when he did get to eat, he threw it back up because he ate too fast, so he didn’t get dinner that night, either.

Katsuki winces at the memory. The only good thing that came out of that experience was that he learned his lesson: running away didn’t help anything. It just made things worse.

Midnight closes her eyes for a moment, then opens them and asks, “Are you bored?”

“No,” Katsuki says, because that’s probably the answer that she wants.

Midnight’s eyebrows pinch together. “Are you sure?” she asks. “It doesn’t look like you have anything to keep you busy, and I’d be pretty bored, too, if I were stuck in here for hours.” When it becomes clear that Katsuki isn’t going to respond, she scrapes her chair back from the table and stands, holding out a hand towards him. “C’mon,” she says. “You can help me in my classroom, alright?”

Katsuki starts to reach out, then draws back. “Present Mic told me to wait here,” he says, suspicious.

“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.”

“He told me to wait here.”

“Look,” Midnight says, taking out her phone.

Katsuki can’t help the way he goes so tense that his entire body aches. His teachers used to get him to behave by threatening to call his parents, and he knows that Midnight isn’t going to do that, that she doesn’t even know his parents, but some voice in his head whispers, But what if she does? They’d be so mad if they had to come home early just to pick Katsuki up. His mother might even be mad enough to -

Don’t, he tells himself. Don’t think about that.

But Midnight doesn’t call his parents. She just says, “We can ask him, okay?” and then dials somebody’s number before Katsuki can respond.

Midnight puts the call on speaker, so Katsuki can hear it when the phone rings once, twice, three times, and then Present Mic’s voice asks, “Do you need something, Nemuri?”

“Yes, actually,” Midnight says. “So, I’m in the teachers’ lounge, and -”

Present Mic interrupts her, asking, “Is Bakugou okay?”

“Bakugou is just fine,” Midnight says. She puts a hand on Katsuki’s head and he flinches, thinking that he’s done something wrong, but then all she does is ruffle his hair. “I just wanted to know if you’d mind me bringing him to my classroom.” She pauses, then asks, “What were you thinking, anyways, leaving a kid in here with nothing to do?”

Present Mic is quiet for a long moment, and then he sighs. “Yeah,” he admits, “that was a pretty bad idea.”

Midnight shakes her head, but she’s smiling. “You’re not very good at this whole babysitting thing,” she says, then, speaking over Present Mic’s protests, “Anyways, you’re fine with me taking him for a little bit? He can hang out in my classroom. The kids will love him.”

“Are you sure it’ll be okay?” Present Mic asks, sounding worried. “Have you told them about -”

“Yes,” Midnight says, cutting him off. “Everybody already knows. They’ll all be perfectly behaved.”

“... Well, alright,” Present Mic says, still sounding unconvinced. “Don’t let anything happen to him.”

“Oh, please,” Midnight says. “Who do you think I am?” Then, without waiting for Present Mic to answer, she ends the call and grins down at Katsuki. “See? I told you he’d be fine with it!” She puts her phone away and holds out her hand.

Katsuki takes it.

Midnight’s classroom is empty. When Katsuki looks around, wordlessly questioning, she explains, “I’m still technically on break. They’ll be here in -” she looks at the clock over the door “- about ten minutes.”

Katsuki says, “Okay,” and then falls silent, unsure of what it is that he’s supposed to be doing. She must want him to do something, but he can’t figure it out. But he doesn’t want to ask, because then he’ll feel stupid if the answer is something obvious.

Midnight smiles at him. “What kinds of things do you like to do?” she asks, walking over to her podium. “I’m sure I can find something to keep you entertained.”

Katsuki follows her after instinct, trailing behind as he considers her question. He likes to read, but it looks like the only books in here are textbooks about history and stuff, and he likes to draw, but all of the supplies that Eraserhead got for him is still back at the dorms. “I don’t know,” he answers. “I just -”

Somebody says, “Kayama-sensei, I’d like to speak to you about something.”

“Hold that thought,” Midnight says to Katsuki, then looks towards the voice. Katsuki follows her gaze to a tired-looking boy in the doorway. “Yes? What do you need?”

The boy walks forward. He starts, “I was wondering -” and then stops short when he sees Katsuki. Aside from his raised eyebrows, Katsuki can’t read his expression. “Is that -”

“His name is Bakugou,” Midnight says, and there’s something in her voice that Katsuki can’t quite decipher. It almost sounds like a warning. “I’m looking after him for a little bit.” She clears her throat, and her voice is back to normal when she asks, “Now, what is it that you needed help with?”

With what seems to be great difficulty, the boy looks away from Katsuki. “I had a question about the study guide you gave us.” He puts his backpack on the closest desk, unzipping it, then rummages through it until he pulls out a packet of stapled paper. He flips to a page, then points at a line of text on it, showing it to Midnight. “It says the the Quirk Discrimination Act of 2173 was meant to protect people with mutant Quirks, but it was actually made to protect people with mentalist Quirks, because there was an incident a year before where a nine-year-old girl had her vocal cords -” He falters, glancing over at Katsuki, then looks back at Midnight. “The Act of 2149 was the one that protected people with mutant Quirks, not the Act of 2173.”

Midnight frowns down at the paper, then sighs. “You’re right,” she says, somehow managing to sound apologetic without even saying the words. “I don’t know how I made a mistake like that. The years aren’t even similar. Sorry about that, Shinsou.” The boy - Shinsou, Midnight had called him - rubs at the back of his neck, looking like he regrets bringing up the mistake at all. “It's not a big deal,” he says. “I just remember it because it's the year I manifested my Quirk.” He shrugs, then lets Midnight take the study guide. As she walks away, he turns to Katsuki and says, “Wow, you’re tiny.” As if to prove it, he crouches down so that he can look Katsuki in the eyes. “I bet you can’t ride any rides at the fair.”

Katsuki scowls at him, crossing his arms. “You’re a jackass.”

“Yeah, well,” Shinsou says, shrugging again. “Doesn’t change the fact that you’re tiny.”

“Don’t antagonize him, Shinsou,” Midnight says, but she sounds like she’s smiling. “Aizawa-sensei is in charge of him. You don’t want him getting mad at you, do you?”

Shinsou tilts his head. “I guess not,” he says, straightening up. “He’d probably have me run laps until I dropped.” He pulls his backpack off the desk and puts it down by his feet, sitting in the chair. He props his chin in his palm and studies Katsuki, then says, “I bet you plan on coming to Yuuei when you’re older.”

Katsuki’s scowl deepens. He has the feeling that he’s being made fun of. “Yeah,” he shoots back, glaring. “What about it?”

Shinsou holds his hands up in mock-defense, his sharp grin giving him away. “Calm down,” he says. “I was just making an observation.”

Katsuki narrows his eyes, unwilling to let his guard down. There’s something about the way the boy speaks, like he’s purposefully keeping his voice flat, that makes him uneasy. “I can beat your ass, you know,” Katsuki says. “I could blow up this whole entire room.” He wouldn’t actually do that, of course, because he’d get in trouble and then his arms would get hurt again, but he wants Shinsou to know that he could.

Shinsou raises an eyebrow. “Christ,” he mutters. “You’re as touchy as always.”

Katsuki bristles. He doesn’t know exactly what Shinsou means by that, but he can tell it's a bad thing by the way the jerk said it like he didn’t want Katsuki to hear. “Shut up,” he snaps. “Leave me alone.”

And now Shinsou raises both eyebrows. “Hold on,” he says. “Calm down. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Bullshit.”

“No, seriously. I’m being serious. Dead serious.” He grins again as he says, “There's no point in picking a fight with someone I’ve just met, especially a six-year-old.” “I’m eight!”

“Well, an eight-year-old, then,” Shinsou amends. “I don’t make it a habit to fight eight-year-olds. Even if they do threaten to blow me up.”

“I wasn’t threatening you,” Katsuki says, even though, yes, that was exactly what he’s been doing. “I was just telling you that I could beat your ass if I wanted to.” He feels his hands start to get hot and curses, waving them through the air to cool them down before he actually does blow something up. “You’re fucking lucky that I don’t want to get in trouble, bastard.”

“I’m so relieved.”

Katsuki glares at him. This was how all fights started, usually. He didn’t try to get into fights, but people liked to taunt him until he got angry enough not to care anymore about getting in trouble, and then everyone said that it was his fault even though it wasn’t. And then his mother would yell at him the entire car ride home, and then, if the damage had been really bad, she’d shove his arms into those stupid restraints until he either learned how to control himself or threw a big enough fit that his father unlocked him just so that he’d stop screaming. The last option usually came first.

“Fuck you,” Katsuki says, rubbing at the thin scar wrapped around his arm, just beneath his elbow, as a reminder of what would happen if he let himself get too upset. He drops his hand, though, when he sees Shinsou’s eyes follow the motion. “The Hell are you staring at?”

“Nothing,” Shinsou says, which is total bullshit. “I was just wondering what your parents are like.”

“What kind of question is that?”

“It wasn’t a question.”

“Well, that’s still a weird thing to think about. I don’t wonder about what your parents are like.” Katsuki frowns, sitting in the seat across from Shinsou, turning to face him. “You’re fucking weird.”

Shinsou shrugs, not looking offended at all, which is fine. Katsuki hadn’t really been insulting him. He’d just been making an observation. “Yeah,” Shinsou says. “I guess I am.”

Katsuki goes silent, not sure about how he’s supposed to respond to that, then says, “You look tired.”

“Oh, really.”

Katsuki nods. “You’ve got bags,” he says, tracing his fingers under his own eyes to demonstrate. “You must stay up past midnight a lot. I tried to do that once and then I got in trouble because I fell asleep in class the next day.”

Shinsou huffs a laugh. “Sounds like your parents need to set a bedtime,” he says.

“I only tried to do it once!” Katsuki protests, rushing to defend himself. He pauses, considering, then points out, “Plus, it's not like my parents would know if I stayed up too late. Time doesn’t work the same in other places. One time my dad called me, and it was, like, five in the morning! He woke me up! When I asked him why he called me so early, he said that he got confused because it wasn’t that early in America.” He looks at Shinsou. “Isn’t that weird?”

Agreeably, Shinsou says, “Yeah, that’s pretty weird.” He pauses, then says, “I’ve never been to America before.” “I’ve been there,” Katsuki says, happy to share the knowledge he gathered from his one trip to the United States. “Everybody smiled a lot, and it was really loud. I got to see the Statue of Liberty and everything! I wanted to see more, but then I had to go to the hospital.” When Shinsou stares at him, Katsuki explains, “My dad hit me in the head with a vase.” Then, when Shinsou’s eyes go wide, “It was an accident! He was trying to hit somebody else, but I got in the way, so it was my fault.” He pushes his hair out of his face and points to the scar along the top edge of his forehead. He knows it by sight as much as he knows it by feel, the crooked line of it usually hidden by the fall of his hair. “The doctors had to stitch it up and everything, and my head was hurting really badly, so I didn’t even get to see the rest of New York. I’m still mad about that, actually.”

“Oh,” Shinsou says. “That’s… interesting.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki says. “It doesn’t hurt anymore, though. And my dad got me ice cream, which I don’t really like, but I ate it so that he wouldn’t feel bad.” He grins, remembering. “I had to eat it really fast so that my mom didn’t see, and I ended up getting a brain freeze.”

And that makes Shinsou laugh, even though it sounds more surprised than anything, like it's been shocked out of him. Maybe that’s just what his normal laugh sounds like. “Fuck,” he says, shaking his head. “That’s… not what I expected to hear.”

Katsuki’s smile falls. “What did you expect to hear, then?” he asks, not really knowing if he wants to know the answer. “I don’t know,” Shinsou says. “Something happy, I guess. Not a story about your dad throwing a vase at your head.”

“He didn’t throw it at my head,” Katsuki points out, irritated. “I literally just said that it was an accident.” He pauses, processing the rest of Shinsou’s words, and then scowls. “And it was a happy story!” “Your dad hit you in the head with a vase and put you in the hospital. That’s what I’ve gathered from this. It doesn’t sound very happy.”

“That’s because you’re trying to make it sound unhappy,” Katsuki says. “It's like you weren’t even listening. He got me ice cream!”

“You just said that you don’t like ice cream.”

“I don’t,” Katsuki huffs, crossing his arms. “But he got it for me, and he apologized.”

Shinsou blinks at him, eyebrows furrowing. “You never said that he apologized.”

“He got me ice cream,” Katsuki says.

“But he didn’t apologize.”

“He got me ice cream,” Katsuki repeats. What about this doesn’t Shinsou understand? Was he even listening?

“Yeah, but he never said that he was sorry.”

“He didn’t have to,” Katsuki explains. “I knew that he was sorry. He wouldn’t have gotten me anything if he wasn’t sorry. He never gets me anything unless he’s sorry.” Katsuki tilts his head back, trying to think of an example. He comes up with the most memorable incident, which also happened to be the one that he wasn’t allowed to talk about. His father made him pinky-promise to not tell anybody about it, but it’d probably be fine if he kept the details out of it. “There was this one time when I hurt my arm, and my dad took me to the zoo after I got my cast off. I got to see all the animals, but we didn’t go into the bug exhibit because he doesn’t like bugs. We took a bunch of pictures.”

“... I don’t see why he’d have to apologize for you getting your arm hurt,” Shinsou says. “Not unless you’re leaving something out of the story.”

Katsuki freezes. He hadn’t mentioned how much it hurt to have a bone broken, or how his father had gotten the doctor to make his cast bright orange to cheer him up even though it didn’t really work, or how Katsuki had to tell everybody that he fell down the stairs, or how all these years later all his mother had to do was grab his arm to make him behave, but he feels like Shinsou knows it all anyways, like he can see everything that Katsuki kept hidden, and he wonders if maybe it was a mistake to start talking about his family in the first place. His arm aches when it rains.

Shinsou says, “But I could be wrong.”

“You are,” Katsuki says. He thinks that he says it too fast, but he can’t stop himself. “You’re wrong. He apologized. He got me ice cream, and he took me to the zoo, so you’re wrong.” And Shinsou is looking at him in the same way that Present Mic had been looking at him, the same way that Midnight had been looking at him, like they thought that there was something wrong. Like they thought that there something wrong with him. “Stop looking at me like that!”

“I’m don’t know what you’re talking about,” Shinsou says. “I’m just -” “Shut up!” Katsuki snaps. His head is hurting again, and so is his stomach, and he feels like he’s about to cry. But he can’t cry, he can’t, he doesn’t even have a reason to cry. It's not like anybody is yelling at him. He’s the only one who’s yelling. “Leave me alone. I don’t want to talk to you.”

Shinsou frowns. “Hey, it's alright,” he says, and then he reaches forward.

Katsuki flinches, jerking back so hard that he almost falls out of the chair and has to grab onto the desk to keep from crashing to the floor. He watches as Shinsou quickly pulls his hand back, but Katsuki’s heart doesn’t slow down, just keeps beating so fast that he feels like he might throw up.

“Sorry,” Shinsou says. “That wasn’t - I didn’t mean -” He looks around the classroom like he’s searching for help, then says, “Kayama-sensei, can you…” And then he trails off, like he’s unsure of what he’d been about to ask.

Midnight asks, “Is something wrong?” There’s the sound of footsteps. “I finished editing the -” She stops. Katsuki can feel her eyes on him, burning into him. “Bakugou, are you okay?”

In response, Katsuki bursts into tears.

—

“He’s tired.”

Katsuki swipes his arm across his eyes and tries to focus on taking deep breaths, which is what Recovery Girl told him to do. He doesn’t look at where Present Mic and Eraserhead are standing in the corner, speaking quietly, like he can’t hear them. Like he doesn’t know that they’re talking about him.

“No,” Present Mic says. “He’s hungry.”

“Well, yeah, but he’s more tired than hungry.” Eraserhead waves a hand in Katsuki’s direction, and Katsuki closes his eyes. “Look at him, he’s exhausted. He should sleep.”

“He’s exhausted because he’s hungry. He needs to eat, and then he should sleep, not the other way around.” Present Mic sighs. “Christ, his head must hurt like Hell.”

And he’s right. Katsuki’s head does hurt like Hell. It's been hurting since he woke up and now it's even worse. It hurts so much that he feels dizzy when he pries his eyes open and says, “No, it doesn’t.” He doesn’t know why he’s saying it. He doesn’t know why he’s not telling the truth. He’s a liar and a baby and a weakling and he doesn’t deserve to have people be worried about him. He doesn’t deserve anything.

He feels his eyes start to burn and quickly closes them again.

“I think the hardest part would be finding food that he’ll actually eat,” Present Mic says. “He doesn’t like peanut butter, or caramel, or eggs, or cookies…” He trails off, then sighs again. “The only things that I’ve actually seen him eat are apples, toast, and, like, a few bites of dinner each night. I don’t know how he’s still awake. I don’t even know how he’s still alive.��

Katsuki brings his knees up to his chest and buries his face in his arms, trying to block out their voices. He’s doing the right thing. He is. Even when his parents weren’t home, he made sure that he ate properly. He checked the nutrition facts and everything because that’s what his mother taught him to do and he’s doing the right thing and he can feel his heartbeat against his ribs and he’s so fucking hungry.

“I mean,” Eraserhead says. “Why don’t you just ask him?”

“Don’t you think I’ve tried that? I’ve asked him what he wants to eat. I’ve asked him to eat. I’ve told him to eat.” There’s the sound of footsteps going back-and-forth and Katsuki can only assume that Present Mic is pacing. “Nothing works. If you put food in front of him and tell him to eat, he’ll just argue with you until you give him something he actually wants, which ends up being, like, a single piece of fruit.”

There’s a long pause, and then Eraserhead says, “He’s eight.”

“I know!” Present Mic says, and Katsuki flinches at the way his voice rises. “He’s eight! He’s a little kid! This shouldn’t be happening!”

Katsuki feels horrible. It's bad enough that Midnight had to carry him to Present Mic’s class, and now Present Mic and Eraserhead are arguing over him, and Katsuki wants to be with his parents again because at least then he knew what people wanted from him. At least he knew what it was that he had to apologize for.

His head hurts so much.

The voices drone on and on, and Katsuki’s thoughts are so loud that he can’t even understand them. His arm hurts and it feels like nails are digging into his skin and he wants to cry. He wants to fall asleep until everything makes sense. He wants to eat and eat and eat but he knows that he’ll just throw it back up, because that’s what happened last time, and he’s learned his lesson. Plus, wouldn’t that just be proving that he doesn’t have any self-control? If he loses control, he’ll ruin his future. Remember. He has to remember that.

There’s the sound of the door closing and Katsuki’s head snaps up. He blinks until his vision is clear and sees that Present Mic is staring at him, and when he sees Katsuki looking, he says, “He’s just getting Recovery Girl.” And he sounds almost scared when he reaches out a hand and asks, “Can I see your arm, Bakugou?”

Katsuki scrambles away until his back is against the wall. He shakes his head.

“I’m not mad at you, Bakugou,” Present Mic says, sounding pleading. “I just want to see your arm.”

Katsuki’s breaths are so short and shallow that he thinks he might fall over. He clutches his arm to his chest, wincing at the pain that flares through it, and somehow manages to say, “You said you weren’t mad at me.” And he should be grateful that nobody is calling his parents, but he can picture Present Mic’s fingers wrapping around his wrist and bending it until it breaks, and the mental image makes him feel so sick that he thinks he might throw up. “You said you weren’t mad. You said…”

Present Mic’s eyebrows furrow. “I’m not mad, Bakugou,” he says, still holding out his hand. “I just want to see your arm, alright?”

And he sounds so insistent about it that Katsuki knows that he doesn’t even have a choice. Maybe he had a choice before, but he must’ve done something to ruin it. He doesn’t deserve to have a choice. The only thing he can do is listen, and he can’t even do that properly. He inches forward and holds out his arm, eyes going wide at the red lines raked into his skin. He watches at Present Mic gently takes his wrist, inspecting the damage that Katsuki has done to himself.

Present Mic’s grip is so loose that Katsuki could yank out of it if he wanted to, but he knows that that’s what Present Mic wants him to think. It's a trap, and if Katsuki tries to escape his punishment, everything will hurt even more when Present Mic catches up to him.

After a few seconds, Present Mic frowns and says, “Bakugou, you’re shaking.”

Every moment feels like the moment before the pain comes, and the worst part, he thinks, is the waiting. He knows that he’s about to get hurt. He just doesn’t know when. Katsuki tries to answer, tries to apologize, but all that comes out of his mouth is a strangled sob.

Present Mic’s eyebrows shoot up. “Are you hurt somewhere else?” he asks, sounding frantic and worried. “Bakugou?”

His grip tightens, just a little, and Katsuki’s mind goes blank. The fear that rushes through him knocks the world off-kilter. He hears himself scream out, “SORRY!” and only knows that he’d been yelling by the way his throat feels like it's been ripped to shreds. He bursts into tears again and doesn’t even realize it until he feels them dripping down his cheeks, and he wants to run away, wants to hide, but that’ll just make everything so much worse. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m really sorry, please don’t -” He takes a gasping, heaving breath. When he speaks, his voice comes out thin and weak, “My arm -”

Present Mic lets go of him so fast that Katsuki flinches, scrambling away and shoving his back against the wall. Which is fucking stupid, because he’s just cornered himself. He digs his nails into his palms and tries to calm down, but he can’t, and he’s crying so hard that he feels like his chest might crack open.

Present Mic says, “Oh.” He looks down at his hands and then looks at Katsuki. “Bakugou, did you think that I was going to…” Behind his glasses, his eyes go wide. “Holy shit, did you think I was going to break your arm?” His voice gets louder as he says, “Did you think I asked you for your arm so that I could break it?”

“I’m sorry,” Katsuki says. He’s so fucking stupid. He always ruins things for himself. He thought that Present Mic wanted to break his arm and now he’s mad at him for thinking that and Katsuki doesn’t know what to do. He has so many things to apologize for that he doesn’t know which one to pick. He clutches his arm to his chest and feels his own blood on his fingers and that just makes him cry even harder. “I didn’t - I thought -”

“You thought that I was going to…” Present Mic’s voice trails off. He sounds sick. “You thought that I was going to break your arm. You thought that I was going to break your fucking arm -”

Katsuki opens his mouth to apologize again, but no words come out. His vision blurs and blurs until Present Mic is nothing but a smear of color. He can feel his mother’s fingers around his wrist and she’d been shaking him and she hadn’t meant to go that far, that’s what his father said, but she never said that she was sorry. She left that to him. She leaves all the bad stuff for Katsuki to deal with and takes all the good things for herself and she shows him off to her friends because he has good grades and a great Quirk and he’s going to be a hero when he grows up, aren’t you, Katsuki?, and that’s why she does this, to make him better, to make him stronger, and he knows that, he knows, but everything hurts so much.

Katsuki feels trembling fingers pry his hand open. He blinks away enough tears that he can see Present Mic trying to get him to stop digging his nails into his skin. He hadn’t even realized that he’d been clawing at himself again. “It's okay,” he hears Present Mic say. “It's okay, just - just let go, Katsuki, please -”

Katsuki manages to ask, “Are you mad at me?”

“No, no, no,” Present Mic says, shaking his head. “Nobody is mad at you. I’m not going to hurt you, please, Katsuki, you’re bleeding -” He finally loosens Katsuki’s grip and lets out a ragged breath, saying, “There we go.”

“Sorry,” Katsuki chokes out. The smell of blood makes his stomach lurch, and he doesn’t want to look down in fear that he’ll actually throw up. He guesses that it's a good thing that he’s in the nurses’ office and not in a classroom or something, but it feels like his arm has been ripped open and it hurts so much and he did it to himself so maybe he deserves it. “I don’t know why - I don’t - I -” The door opens and both of them flinch. Eraserhead starts, “Hizashi -” and then stops, staring. He’s silent for a moment, then shakes his head and goes to the cabinet above the sink, pulling down a box of badages. He takes out a roll of gauze and walks to the cot that Katsuki is on, saying, “I’m just going to stop the bleeding,” before taking Katsuki’s arm and pressing a wad of gauze to what looks like the deepest cut, a bloody trench ripped down from his elbow to his wrist.

Katsuki flinches in pain, screwing his eyes shut as he tries to take steady breaths. He feels someone rubbing his back and finds that he wants to both lean into and away from the touch. He tries to ignore the murmured conversation he can hear taking place over his head, tries to focus on the pain pulsing through his arm and his head and his chest, but his ears catch on the word stitches and he almost wants to cry again. Which is stupid. He’s stupid. He’s being stupid, crying so much over something like this. It doesn’t even hurt that much, and, even if it did, it’d still be his fault.

“You’re alright,” somebody says. “You’re going to be alright, I promise. Just hold on, and it’ll be over before you know it.”

It's never over, Katsuki wants to say, but he doesn’t have the strength to speak. It keeps going and going and it doesn’t stop. He doesn’t say that. He doesn’t say any of that. He just keeps his eyes closed, focuses on the pain of his arm, and lets the entire world slip away.