falling behind | ✰ katsuki bakugou

ੈ✩‧₊˚ chapter twenty two - closer

Its officially been around three days of Iyana sort-of-kind-of avoiding herx friends and hanging out with Izuku more often.

Even right now, they were hanging out. The second the bookstore closed they both walked to the icecream shop together. As always, Iyana ordered a single scoop of strawberry and Izuku with his two scoops of mint chocolate chip.

Iyana picks at her icecream with her spoon. "That flavours disgusting, might as well eat toothpaste at this point." She eyes at Izuku's icecream.

"Oh be quiet, its a really good flavor. Honestly really underrated." He rolls his eyes.

"Maybe to someone with really bad tastebuds." Iyana shrugs.

"Ive seen you eat hot cheetos with milk like it was cereal before," He grimaces. "my icecream seriously cannot be bad compared to that combo."

"That was once! When I was like, eight!"

"Still counts."

Iyana rolls her eyes and takes a spoonful of her icecream. It was so nostalgic to her, the frequent hangouts, the constant back and forth, it was awesome.

Izuku puts his spoon down in his empty cup, which makes Iyana look up. "So, four days left. Anything interesting happen with your friends?"

Iyana thinks back to the few texts she recieved from Mina. "Not really, to be honest. The pink haired girl you met, Mina, she texted me."

He thinks for a second. "Oh! I remember her! Continue."

"Right so basically, around this morning she sent me a text like 'are you mad at me?'" She takes another spoonful of her icecream before continuing. "I didn't know what to reply with so I just said 'no.'"

Izuku tilts his head, a small smile on his face. "Its sweet that she was worried. Shouldn't you tell her that your tired of their secrets instead of doing all this?"

"See, now that's what I thought too. I asked Hakagure and she said that if they were real friends they would've told me a long time ago."

He nods. "That's true." He stares at Iyana blankly, as if he was zoned out and thinking about something. He still does that even years later.

"What's up?" Iyana tilts her head in confusion.

Izuku blinks, sitting up straight. "I was just thinking that talking about this makes you a little sad so we should probably switch topics."

Did Iyana's face slip? Nobody could usually ever tell with Iyana, it felt like a secret skill she had. Until now, that is.

"Right. We should probably head out soon or else he's gonna lock us in here again." Iyana motions towards the icecream shop owner.

Izuku snickers at the memory. "Yeah."

The two get up from the booth seats and throw their disposable icecream cups and spoons in the garbage.

The old icecream shop owner behind the counter waves them goodbye as they exit the store. "Nice seein' ya kids  again, have a good night!" 

They exit the icecream store and walk alongside eachother on the sidewalk. It was getting cold lately, Iyana might need to invest in gloves soon because her pockets certainly weren't enough.

She looks up, the sky was turning dark. The moon was in view and it was pretty, Iyana wished she had some digital camera of some sort to capture it with.

Izuku puts his hands in his hoodie pockets. "So, we never really talked about Shoya."

"Yeah. We haven't." Iyana replies.

Iyana didn't like to think of him much, but Shoya was Iyana's elder brother. Shoya Miizumi.

Izuku looks at Iyana. His eyes were filled with genuine sympathy. Iyana hated looks like those, she truly did not need any sympathy.

"I know it's been hard on your family. I'm here for you, y'know. Not in an obligatory way or anything, I mean this as a friend."

The same speech Iyana's been through multiple times.

Iyana gives him a small smile. "Thank you, but seriously it's fine. It's in the past now and we're doing good."

"The bookstore feels empty without him, doesn't it?" He looks down at the concrete of the sidewalk.

"A little bit, yeah." Iyana admits.

Izuku stays quiet for a bit before speaking again. "I don't think I've ever seen somebody so energetic and loud in my life. You guys were seriously the opposite of eachother."

Everyone talked about Shoya being extroverted and loud, and it was true. If you knew anybody in the town, chances are, he was friends with them.

His funeral basically had the entire town present in one place.

"We were?" Iyana tilts her head.

Izuku nods. "Yeah. You were always into reading books and staying in corners, while Shoya made paper airplanes from books and threw them at people for fun."

"Oh, I remember that actually. Mama got really mad and told him he wasn't allowed to touch books again." Iyana snickers.

"I was in a lot of his classes at school. Safe to say, all the teachers hated him. I swore they looked happier when he was absent." He jokes in a soft tone.

Iyana smiles. "I know. Parent-teacher meetings never went well with him."

Izuku looks over at Iyana's smile, causing him to smile as well. "Finally."

"What?" Iyana looks over at a smiling Izuku looking straight at her.

"You finally smiled. You haven't done that all day." He points out, which suddenly makes Iyana self-conscious.

"Yes I have. At the icecream store, when we..." She trails off, not actually remembering.

Izuku bumps shoulders with Iyana lightly. "Told you."

Iyana takes her hands out of her pockets, reaching up her hand to ruffle his green locks playfully. Man, had Izuku grown tall. Iyana actually needed to reach to hit the top of his head now.

Izuku pushes her hand off, laughing. "Hey!– I just detangled all of this in the morning!"

"I'm sure you could do it again." Iyana rolls her eyes, putting her hand back down into her pocket.

Seconds later, they reached the doorstep of Iyana's home. Time had passed so quickly, it was fun.

"I'll see you tomorrow at the bookstore then. Goodnight, Iyana!" Izuku waves, walking away from her front porch.

Iyana waves back. "See you then. Goodnight Izuku!" She watches as he walks to the house beside hers, opening the door and disappearing.

She turns back around, taking out her key from her pocket to unlock the front door. From just the corner of her eye, Iyana swears she sees something move.

Quickly, Iyana spins around but nobody was there. Faintly, she hears footsteps but they're far away.

Ignoring it, she turns the key and steps inside, locking the door behind her.

When Iyana went to bed that night, she dreamt of meeting Shoya again.

--
1115 words

so basically I meant to post this last night but fell asleep so here it is now!

this chapter was basically an introduction to her brother (which I mentioned like once btw many chapters ago if anyone noticed)

okay anyways leave a star (⭐) if u liked the chapter. feedback always appreciated!