sketchbook

A very, very long night

Denki was sitting on his bed when he heard a knock on his door. He jolted upwards, sketchbook in hand, and went to answer the door.

"Hey.. I figured it would just be easier if I handed the book to you," Denki said in a low voice, trying to fight back the tears beginning to form in his eyes.

"Thank you, I'll be going now," Shota answered in an exasperated voice. He didn't want to stick around any longer than he had to, considering there was a student in his class at risk of suicide, and Shota would never forgive himself if he let Izuku die.

"Wait!" Denki shouted. "Please tell Midoriya I'm really sorry for looking at his things, I know it wasn't right but I was really curious and.." Denki trailed off as his bottom lip began to quiver. This wasn't about him, and he didn't need to cry right now.

"I'll make sure to." Shota responded. "In the meantime, you should get some rest. I'll handle the rest of this situation, so don't get all worked up over it." Shota commented, trying to reassure the blonde boy.

"Okay.. Thank you.." Denki averted his teacher's gaze as he slowly inched back into his room. All Shota did was nod, as he took off running to a certain green haired boy's room.

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Midoriya awoke to the sound of someone at his door. Confused, he rubbed his eyes and cracked open the door.

"Hello?" A groggy voice questioned. Izuku hadn't gone to bed the night before, due to wanting to study more and just not really being able to sleep that night in general, so he had been pretty tired the entire day.

"Thank god.." Shota whispered under his breath. He didn't think Midoryia was going to off himself that very night, but it didn't make him any less worried about the boy, considering the greenette's track history of not telling anyone when he's upset/going to do something.

"Sensei? What are you doing here?" Midoryia asked. He wasn't sure why his home room teacher had showed up to his dorm room, looking like he had just ran a lap around campus. That was until Izuku noticed the grey book Shota was holding.

"Wait.. I can explain that, just let me-" the freckled boy was interrupted by his teacher.

"Explain how you wrote suicide notes in this book?" Shota questioned. Izuku was a terrible liar, and Shota could see tears swelling it the greenette's eyes.

"W-Well.. they weren't.. I wasn't g-going to.." Izuku managed to choke out before he decided it was best for him to just be quiet.

"Problem child, tell me what's going on. You're obviously struggling right now, and bottling everything up isn't going to make you feel any better."

"But.." Izuku said, "How did you get the book? You left the classroom early and I remember having the notebook after you left so how did you get it?" Izuku was full on sobbing now, and Shota placed a hand on the greenette's shoulder.

"One of your classmates was still in the classroom after you left and saw you drop the sketchbook. They tried to give it back, but they weren't able to find you in the hallways." Shota sighed. "Then.. they read some of it and found the letters. After that they called me, and now we're here." Shota answered truthfully. There was no point in lying anyways.

"Who was it? Why would they read it?" Izuku
asked, trembling.

"I'll tell you who it was later. While they had no right to read it and I will be giving them consequences for invading your privacy later, they had asked me to tell you that they're genuinely sorry and that they were curious to see what the book contained." Shota explained.

He didn't condone students, or anyone really, invading other people's privacy, but he was secretly a bit glad that Kaminari was nosy enough to look at the book and smart enough to call him because otherwise, well, Shota didn't really want to think about the otherwise.

Izuku's shoulders slumped, and he tried to hold back some of the tears threading to spill out of his eyes. "Those letters.. th-they don't mean anything. I wasn't in my right mind when I wrote them, and I was overreacting to having a bad day. I'm fine, seriously!" Izuku smiled weakly.

Shota sighed. He had expected the child to deny anything was wrong, something Midoryia did often, usually because the greenette didn't want anyone to worry about him, Shota assumed.

"Listen, problem child. I hate to break it to you, but writing literal suicide letters to over 30 people isn't just 'an overreaction to a bad day.' Doing something like this isn't something to be taken lightly, and lying that you're 'fine' and that you 'weren't in your right mind' is only going to make matters worse.

Izuku looked down. "I-I know that! I'm alright, I promise! There's nothing wrong with me, so if th-that's all then—"

"Midoryia." Izuku looked up to find his teacher glaring at him. "I'm not buying your story. Like I said before, nobody writes suicide notes as an overreaction to one bad day. Tell me what's going on. Nothing's going to get better if you don't let anyone help you." Shota stated.

Izuku gripped the doorframe. This wasn't supposed to happen. He was supposed to be a hero, someone people could look up to and feel safe around. Not the type of person to cry when they were upset, or to harm themselves when they didn't know how else to cope. Izuku's smile he had been trying to keep up faltered, and tears streamed down his face, despite Izuku desperately trying to hold them back.

"I-I'm sorry, okay? I know this is probably such an inconvenience for you, since you're a hero and heroes are usually busy and—"

"Nonsense, problem child. My student's mental health and well-being isn't an inconvenience in any way. Now, would you like to tell me the truth about why you decided that you needed to write suicide letters?"