Resurrection | Shota Aizawa

Chapter 24

happy pride month yes it is one am no i have not slept yes i have to be up in the morning

This is not edited. Also if there's plot holes I'm sorry I literally forgot every single thing that happened and I'm not rereading 23 chapters of trash to figure out what's going on. On god y'all

Third person pov

Something shifts after that. Barely, imperceptibly, but Shota is too attentive not to notice.

Once Hiroki bounces back-- and he does, after a tearful night, even if he's still tender afterwards-- there's a change. Not in the way Hiroki acts, per se. He's still as tactile as ever, willing to get close and give affection in leaps and bounds. That's not it. 

The was he regards Shota isn't the same anymore. Shota doesn't think that's a necessarily bad thing, he just doesn't really know what it means specifically or why it's happened now. Hiroki looks at him differently. Shota almost wants to say the looks are skeptical, but he doesn't think that's it.

It throws everything off. And again, that's not necessarily bad, it's just... different. Different in a way Shota doesn't know how to deal with. He doesn't know what to do or how to respond. He already fumbles where Hiroki is concerned-- with his words, and his actions, and his thoughts. 

Shota will never regret holding him whilst he cried and told stories about his nephew, but that doesn't change the fact that their dynamic has been thrown off its usual track. It's almost as though Hiroki is looking at him for the first time, and there's newfound consideration in his gaze when he does. 

Despite the definite change, nothing else seems off. Classes go by and Hiroki keeps his throne as favorite teacher with cookies and lectures so engaging nobody else could dream of comparing. Shinso settles into their apartment, and they start looking into getting a larger one for Todoroki's anticipated arrival.

Hiroki keeps going to the gym, and cooking, and meeting with his older niece and nephew. Hiroki wants to have them over soon, and Shota is sort of dreading it. If he doesn't get an in with them and they decide he's creepy, he's pretty sure that means Hiroki will be packing his bags before Shota can so much as blink. 

There are little things, but overall it's... it's okay. Perfect, even, though Shota does admit to being biased.

Hiroki sits closer to him now. He's a bit more open. His touches don't have the same, friendly edge that they do when he sidles up next to everyone else, but that's not bad either. No, on the contrary, everything Hiroki does around him has become lax. Natural, in a word.

Absentminded and casual, Shota soaks the newfound closeness and the easiness of it up like as greedy sponge and pretends he's not over the moon happy with the new layer of their dynamic. He still wasn't entirely sure where it was coming from, but if he thought hard enough, he could maybe trace it back to the day Hiroki came home crying. 

Shota had comforted him, then, and that must have been the trigger more so than the tragedy of the news. It was the first time he'd really made the first move on anything. Before, the space between them had felt so fragile. Shota had been so afraid of messing it all up and scaring him away that trying to get closer had never seemed worth it. 

Letting Hiroki decide where the boundaries laid was the safer, more rational option. But then Hiroki had come home upset, and--

That... had been different. Even if that had backfired miraculously in his face, Shota never could've brought himself to regret it. Not that he's not infinitely glad it all worked out for the better or anything. The point just... still stands.