My Light

Mild manga spoilers, assuming all my readers are up-to-date with S7.

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It was at long last that the classes 1-A and 1-B had finally graduated as first years, and are rewarded a two week long break as their belongings are moved to a different, second-year dorm, since the scheme had worked to synthesise a focused learning environment. Their graduation ceremony today, in their classroom for the last time, was spent with very few tears, plentiful laughter and drawings on different casts. Shoto, with his own burnt arm wrapped in gauze, had a little heart drawn by Uraraka, who had insisted on it. In return, he drew his own on the cast around her stomach. Even Aizawa, hobbling in with his prosthetic leg that he was still getting used to, allowed Ashido and Sero and many other people pestering him to draw their own silly illustrations in random coloured pens.

Shoto is happy, as is everyone else basking in the peaceful atmosphere after the war. No more league of villains, no more being pestered by his father, no more painful thoughts about needing to fight his brother, severing all of his attachments to, at the very least, kill him. It was weird, not being forced to think about anything, and he knows their work is far from over. There was still the road they had to being pro heroes that can fight for a place on the top heroes billboard, those out there who are still against heroes, or refuse to have faith in them, the heavy criticism and the painful interviews, his hero name being transformed to 'Five Weenies' or something equally as random, more emotional fights that will probably test his resolve, or fights that will damage him or lose his sleep.

But, for now, this is a peace that he could get used to. And he felt weirdly enough, as his eyes follow the stiff figure heading towards the front of the class, that peace seemed to be strongly tied to his class president.

He tries to hide the fond smile he feels spreading across his face, and also tried to avoid the piercing green eyes and cheeky smile that he knows is marvelling his reaction. Due to his impressive analysis, Midoriya was quick to pick up on his profuse blushing with the odd interaction between him and Iida. One thing lead to another, and he eventually acknowledges his crush, which means a permanent set of eyes glued to him on anything he does Iida-related.

Has he ever done anything about it? Actually yes, though it was at the hospital after his first encounter with Toya, when his throat wasn't in the best of conditions. Iida was one of the first people he remembered checking up on his wellbeing, since his physical condition was much better than the state of others. Still under the influence of morphine and probably some other drugs dulling his pain, as well as the swell of relief after realising Iida's handsome face and the rest of his body had not been injured, Shoto remembers croaking out an "I love you" in the heat of his own thoughts, but his exact memory of the incident was too fuzzy to recollect much. He couldn't even tell if Iida heard him, if he reacted.

Finding his love for Iida was a complete accident. He had always had these kind of emotions, and liked to think they grew stronger over time, just at a rate he could barely notice. It was probably when he'd overheard a conversation amongst the girls one evening that he was sort of introduced to the idea of romance and love, a partner he'd want to hold and cherish, and vice versa. The only people he could seem to think of, that he roped in with that same warm comfort he could only imagine would come with it, was Iida. Iida, Iida, Iida, just that man floating around in his brain between the quiet run-up to the war - that, at least, occupying the space he had in his head at that time. Theoretically, he figured it had been squeezed out of his brain during the war, and he was too busy genuinely trying to keep himself and other people safe to think about it. But bedridden in a hospital? It seems Iida being the forefront of his thoughts really meant he was wearing his brain the wrong way around. That's probably a way Bakugou would phrase it.