Lightning Serenade

Chapter 6: Christmas in April

It had been just an average day for Hitoshi.

It wasn't for Neito, because none of his days have seemed to be average in quite a while. He had just gotten settled back into his class schedule after being in his favorite mental hospital for a week and a half. That was a lot of school to miss, but Neito was smart and caught up quickly. He knew the school sends the hospital his work to do, but Neito never once actually tried doing it in the mental hospital. He always had too much fun with the other patients to worry about schoolwork. It was supposed to be a vacation to restore his sanity, after all.

Speaking of patients, he was surprised that he never ran into Hitoshi in any of his inpatient adventures. The other boy across the classroom was sitting alone, like always, dead eyes staring at the wall and waiting for the teacher to call his name for attendance tracking. That kid was due for a breakdown or two if their peers had anything to say about it.

Hitoshi had always been a sort of mystery to Neito. Neito easily got under everyone else's skin, but Hitoshi usually remained stone-faced and refused to even glance at Neito most of the time, let alone use that amazing quirk of his on him. The only time Hitoshi really gave Neito a reaction was when he dodged his touch. Neito was used to it from his other classmates always keeping their distance, terrified that he would be able to use their quirk better than they ever could on his first try and outshine them like the damn star that he was. It was a little different for Hitoshi, though. When Neito reached out to him, he saw panic in his eyes. He knew for sure what it was after being holed up in multiple psychiatric wards with other patients who had anxiety and panic attacks.

Annoyingly, it always stopped Neito in his tracks. He liked when people were annoyed with him, but he didn't like that fearful panic that Hitoshi always portrayed with his eyes when Neito got too close to making physical contact. Neito figured that Hitoshi would eventually chill out after he saw that all Neito wanted to do was showboat after copying a few of his classmates' quirks while they were unsuspecting, but Hitoshi continued to have that damn look on his face every time Neito tried to target him.

Was Shinsou Hitoshi's quirk really something to fear that he had to make sure that someone as crazy as Monoma Neito never got his hands on it? Everyone else was scared of Hitoshi to the point of not speaking to him, but they never jumped in to try to stop Neito from copying the quirk. Still, Hitoshi guarded his quirk from the copycat with increasing dodging expertise.

Hitoshi had started wearing long sleeved shirts with tall necks to cover his skin, reducing his risk of Neito copying his quirk, pulling his sleeves over his hands whenever he didn't need them to write. He grew his hair out longer to cover the back of his neck and his ears, and always wore pants and sneakers, never shorts and sandals, no matter how hot it got. Neito almost felt a little bad when it was late spring and the air conditioning broke. The school even relaxed the dress code to allow students to pull some layers off. The girls were lounging around in tank tops and short shorts for the whole week that the air conditioning was being fixed, and dear god, no one failed because they were distracted with the girls showing their shoulders and kneecaps. Imagine that! It was a damn miracle. Even the teachers were allowed relaxed dress codes, wearing colorful, breezy Hawaiian shirts and Bermuda shorts as they stood at the chalkboard to teach. The show must go on, or whatever.

But Hitoshi came to school wearing what he always did, not even switching out the turtleneck style shirt for a crewneck. Neito felt like he was in an oven just by looking at him, and he felt bad because he knew it was his fault. He tried to tell Hitoshi that he would get a pass this week; Neito would not try to copy his quirk and he could relax and not sweat to death in the seat next to him. Hitoshi glanced at him, and he knew he heard him because he offered a small smile and nod before turning back toward the teacher at the front of the room, but the very next day, he was still wearing his usual outfit. Yes, Neito knew he was a little manic, but he never felt as though he was untrustworthy. Until he met Hitoshi.