Engine Boy, I Love You!

EBILY | Ch. 5: Carry You

Author's Note: Just saying, I changed the title of EBILY chapter 4 to "Change Each Other". At the time I'd been really flip flopping through the titles, but in the end I decided: "I like this one better because it includes the point I wanted my readers to take away from it. Also 'Unmerited Apprehension' doesn't even work because Iida is still apprehensive by the end of it lol."

So yee.

Enjoy the chap lol.

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Iida rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand after he'd finished stirring. The pot in front of him bubbled with a savory scent, drawing curious glances from his friends as he finished the recipe. It was a homemade chicken noodle soup—the same kind his mother would make whenever Iida or his brother caught a cold. He figured if Hatsume was as sick as he guessed she was, a nice, warm broth would do a lot to help her.

"I have some soup left over, in case anyone's wondering," Iida casually declared aloud, pretending not to notice the prying eyes of Kaminari, Shoji, and Aoyama behind him, "I made enough for more than just myself."

He then took that opportunity to discretely pour some of the soup into a thermos, hoping that no one would ask him questions if he pretended like he'd made the soup was for everyone. After all, given that it was already around seven o'clock, Iida couldn't waste any time explaining himself if he wanted to see Hatsume before she fell asleep.

Luckily, at Iida's suggestion, the others got out of their seats and started to pull out bowls without even questioning it. A line even started to form, which Iida took advantage of by sneakily heading in the opposite direction.

Now I just need to slip out without notice—

"Hey."

Iida nearly jumped out of his skin at the sudden voice from in front of him, and turned his head to find Bakugo glaring indifferently at him with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his sweats. He swallowed harshly at first, but managed to keep his voice steady as he spoke.

"Bakugo?" he responded evenly, "Something the matter?"

His explosive classmate gave Iida a stolid glare at first, looking him over as if to scrutinize him; but eventually Bakugo answered back with his typical but non-threatening sharpness.

"Just that I remember you struggling to peel a potato not too long ago. I'm not sure what made you suddenly decide to try cooking a whole soup."

Iida internally grimaced at the unwelcome observation. Bakugo was referring to summer camp, where he'd been assigned cooking duty despite it not being his forte. It wasn't a particularly noteworthy memory, yet if Iida sincerely thought about it, he supposed he had needed a moment to remember how to hand-peel potatoes at the time. They had a hand crank peeler at home, so it'd taken him a minute to recall the proper technique. It was dumb that Bakugo would even remember something this trivial, honestly.

"When I have instructions, I can cook decently enough," Iida remarked flatly, suppressing an eye twitch, "Is that all you wanted to say?"

Bakugo grunted apathetically, then strode over to the line where everyone else was waiting. On the way off though, he commented: "I'll give you my opinion on it. For what it's worth, it seems to at least smell good."

A rather off-handed compliment. Iida noted, then shook his head and proceeded on his way in the opposite direction.

He managed to slip out of the 1-A dorms without detection rather easily, thanks to his soup distraction. From there, it was a short but heart-racing walk to Hatsume's dorm building. He eventually came to a stop in front of a building nearly identical to his own, save for a sign on the front that read: "1-F Alliance". Hatsume had mentioned once that she belonged to class 1-F thankfully, so despite there being two other support buildings, Iida knew which one to approach.