My Hero

Untitled Part 1

Boys don't cry.

That's what they always tell you. From the time you start preschool to the day you graduate from college, there're always people telling you that because you were born a boy, you aren't allowed to shed tears. There's this... social construct that people have put in place that basically says that the way you were born decides exactly who you are, from the very beginning.

And, let me just tell you what a load of shit that is.

First of all, telling one person that they're not allowed to do something every human is able to do; every human is meant to do, is complete bullshit. If a human was born with tear ducts, then they damn well better be allowed to fucking use them. Otherwise, what is the point? It's a perfectly normal, stress-relieving bodily function, and it would be ludicrous to restrict someone from releasing their pain in a couple of harmless tears. Even I've cried, and even if I would've denied it up until around three or four years ago, I'm willing to accept it now. It's normal.

Of course, in middle and elementary school, I didn't think that way. I always thought of crying as weak; something a person did if they didn't have the power to do anything themselves. I think that's probably the reason why the name Deku came to mind after I saw Midoriya crying one day in elementary school. Deku; a person who can't do anything. A weak person.

I'm not sure why I thought that Midoriya was weak. I suppose it was my pride; my mind's daft attempt to undermine others in order to improve the perception of myself I'd created in my own mind. However, I've never once thought to feel satisfied with the way I'd treated Midoriya, or the names I'd forced upon him with my rough, vile hands. In fact, were I to go back and see that; see the hellish things I'd said and done to him, I might not retain my lunch. 

Something, I guess, always drew us together. I'd thought it to be due to my hatred of him, or because I was somehow tasked with protecting him, as his friend, but now that I think about it, maybe I'd had it all wrong.

Maybe, the whole time I thought I'd been protecting him, it had actually been the opposite.

Maybe the reason I hated him was because even though I was an Alpha and he wasn't; even though I had a quirk and he didn't, I was the one who truly needed protecting. He'd called me his hero. But, to be honest, I'm not sure that was the truth. Because something tells me that no matter what powers I had, no matter what class I was and am, I was not the strongest one out there.

Midoriya was never my enemy. He was my friend, my partner.

And you know what?

Maybe...

Maybe he was even my hero.