My Pawfect Rebirth

55: Afraid

Katsuki walked through the streets and though it was the middle of the day, it was pretty chilly for the weather. 

'Shit, shit, fucking shit, did I really just fucking kiss Deku!?!? What the fuck made me wanna do that?!?!' 

"You like Izumi, don't you?" 

'No no no! I can't fucking like Deku, I can't like her! Why is this happening, why does my chest feel all funny? What's going on?!?' he thought as his face remained red and steam was coming out of his dog ears.

"Well I know you're struggling with your emotions." 

Katsuki froze and looked up to see Iris, with her fox ears and tail appearing, as she sat on top of a light post. 

"What the- what the hell 're you doing sitting on that?!?!" 

"I get a good view up here, and from what it looks like, something interesting happened with Izumi?" Iris said with a smirk. Katsuki jerked and more steam came out of his ears as he clutched his chest. 

"No! N-Nothing happened, it wasn't interesting either!" he yelled.

Iris jumped down from the light post and walked up to blond. 

"Are you sure nothing interesting happened? Because from what it looks like-" Iris paused and pointed right at Katsuki's lips. 

"Seems your lips are swollen." 

Katsuki placed a hand over his lips and could tell right away that this fox was right, his lips were swollen. 

"Either you went off having a make-out session with her, or you're bad at lying that your lips are swollen because of all your lies. So which is it?" Iris asked. 

"You- Deku started it, and I couldn't push away."

"Oh~ so you acknowledged it happening and went along with it. And it seems you caved in and couldn't possibly say no to a kiss. So what're you doing out here?"

"Deku's sick, and I was just getting some fresh air." 

"Hm, seems like you ran away instead of just accepting it. When will you realize that things will never change and you'll only continue hurting her?" Iris said. 

"Huh? What're you talking about?" 

"Each time you push Izumi away, it will cause a problem in the future. Your Fate was sealed a long time ago, but after each push, the Fate of you two getting together gets more twisted. So why can't you just accept that Izumi is a girl now and get on with it?" Iris suggested, Katsuki froze.

"What?" 

"I heard everything about you distancing yourself from Izumi back when she was a boy. You distanced yourself from him because you were scared to like him, and now that she's a girl, that shouldn't be a problem. But here you go again, pushing her away, why? Because you're afraid that things will happen again like they did in the past. Why can't you just... Hah- look past the gender of Izumi, and what do you see? You see a person, a human who wants your love and attention. So stop twisting Fate and stop taking so long, be a man and have the balls to like her happily and openly." Iris said and walked off.

Katsuki had heard this before, back when Aster asked him if he liked Izumi and Aster got mad because he couldn't give a clear response. 

"You're only saying Izumi's different from back then because she looks different, is that it?" "Just because Izumi's appearance has changed, doesn't mean she's any different from what she was in the past. Appearance doesn't matter if they're your best friend." "I can tell... you liked Izumi when she was a guy, didn't you?" "The point is; it shouldn't matter if you liked Izumi when she was a guy, or if you like her now since she's a girl. You recognized her by her personality, didn't you? Which means it shouldn't matter about what they look like and look past that." "Don't compare her to what she looked like in the past and just remember her for who she really is as a person, got it?"