KiriBakuKami

Chapter Fourteen

Aizawa POV:

"You want to do what?" I asked Bakugo again just to make sure I was hearing him clearly. He was sitting in my office with Kirishima and Kaminari on the first day back from break. The latter blonde was being shockingly quiet.

"I want to adopt Dunce Face's cousin when I turn eighteen," the explosive one replied stoically.

I blinked. "You know how much work that is, right? I would know firsthand."

"Yes. Trust me, I dug into it. I don't jump into things without thinking them through at least a little," he pointed out. "At least, not anymore."

I pinched the bridge of my nose. "Okay. But why?" I only looked up when he didn't answer immediately. He was looking at Kaminari instead.

"C'mon Denks, 's not my story to tell," Bakugo said, and Kaminari nodded.

"Yeah, I know," he mumbled, his voice sounding like he'd only just gotten something unstuck from his throat. In other words, bad. "Well, uh... our whole family—mine and Shiro's—is sorta shitty. Like, really sorta shitty," he started slowly. "Shiro is my cousin. She's just five. Long story short, I brought Ei and Kat home over the holiday for emotional support, almost killed myself, Shiro met them, and we realized that she was really really not safe there."

I raised an eyebrow. He almost killed himself? "That's a lot. And I don't want to pry, I don't. But it's impossible for me to help you go further with anything you want to do if I don't actually know any real details. So, if you can, no more long-story-shorts."

"I mean... okay. Yeah. Yeah, I promised myself I'd tell you about it anyway, and I got this far," Kaminari nodded, talking more to himself than me.

"You can take your time," I reminded him.

"Mhmm," he nodded again, then inhaled. "This story isn't gonna make any sense unless I start it like, two days before I actually went home. On a very uncomfortable bus ride. A guy I didn't know—his name was Meinu, by the way, which I found out later—he pretty much took advantage of the fact that I'd gotten separated from Kat and Ei on our way here from... I don't even remember where we were before that." Kaminari scratched his head, thinking. I took the time to notice a couple of clear band-aids on his forehead.

"Anyway, the bus was really crowded and I'd gotten separated from these guys and he uh... this part isn't even the hard part, it's just so weird," he shuddered. "He kinda groped me 'til we got off the bus. Then he followed us, so I electrocuted him and he passed out. He's fine," he slipped in when I started to make a comment. "That's important because it turned out this douchebag was friends with my other cousin, Inu. He's technically Shiro's biological brother, but he's dead to us for a lot of reasons that I guess I'm about to get into. He, uh... he raped me. When I was fourteen. And he's kinda been holding it over my head and we both kept it a secret from everyone else because well, no one that I could tell would believe me if I told them," he admitted. His eyes were watering. "He's like, the shittiest person alive and he just had to be friends with Meinu—Bus Guy. They both came over on the first day, along with their parents and with Shiro. Meinu didn't really do much because Inu scared him and his dad off during dinner. Like, he legitimately scared them off. He brought up a lot of shit that my dad did, basically." He pulled his hoodie off, which I hadn't expected him to do, and showed me his arms. They were both scarred pretty badly, and had burns all down them, too. "Like these, and other times my dad beat me up while Inu just conveniently happened to be there at the time. And he just said it all with a smile on his face.

"There's really a lot to go through," he said, glancing up at the clock. "If you want the whole story from Christmas, anyway. I mean, it took the author like, nine chapters."

I tilted my head. "Huh?"

"That's not important. Our lunch break is ending soon," Kaminari pointed out, and I nodded.

"That it is. But your next class can wait. Some things are more important than English with my crazy husband," I pointed out. "Like I said, you can take your time. I'll listen until classes end today. Then I have to go pick up Eri from school. She's in her second year of elementary right now," I said, allowing a small smile on my face. "Speaking of little kids, where is Shiro right now?"

"Relax, my mom agreed to take care of her," Bakugo cut in. "We explained this shit to her last night when she got back from her vacation with Dad and without me. Totally not mad about that. She may be a bitch sometimes but she's not heartless, of course she agreed to take care of Shiro. She says she'll support me in adopting that kid, too."

I nodded. "Really took a liking to her, huh?"

"Yeah," Bakugo admitted.

"She calls him 'Uncle Explosion Murder' and it's the cutest thing in the world," Kirishima said, grinning. "Y'know what he calls her?"

"Ei..." the blonde scowled, but relented. "Commander of doom," he muttered. "That's not important right now, though!"

"Right," I nodded, then looked back at Kaminari, who'd smiled at the conversation but frowned again when I turned my attention back to him. "Whenever you're ready."