Garden of Green (MHA / IzuOcha)

The Fifth Petal

A/N: I really don't know what to say. Just read and enjoy, folks! Or hopefully enjoy. I don't know. Anyway, this took me two weeks, and I'm sorry for that, but it is 8,400 words, so I hope that explains and makes up for it. And thank you guys for all of the votes! It really means a lot!

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Class 1-A had noticed something was off about Ochako Uraraka.

During their daily training, she was slow, no longer vibrant and colorful and iridescent. She no longer radiated positivity, flamboyance, but instead pain. A tired, achy pain.

She rarely stayed downstairs in the dorms, cooping herself up in her room as soon as the school day was done. Sometimes they'd lose sight of Izuku as well.

The mask only intensified their worries.

Especially the girls.

Seeing Ochako hack up a lung all day concerned them. Three weeks in without any inclination of improving was frightening.

And so they brought it up. At their preplanned girls' night, they brought it up.

But first, they'd break out the drinks.

"Hey, Mina, don't you think this is a bad idea?" It was Yaoyorozu this time, reaching over their small circle for Hagakure's bottle of whiskey. She raised an eyebrow, inspecting the labels and their fairly-fancy-but-still-easy-to-read fonts.

"Yeah. So? It's fine, as long as we don't get caught," Ashido said, a bit of a too-bright grin on her face.

"I second that!" chirped Hagakure.

This wasn't the first time they'd gotten drunk. Ashido and Hagakure did it a lot, usually in secret without any of the other girls around, because this was high school, and in high school you were supposed to go wild. So what if they were breaking the rules? They could be sneaky about it. But now, with all of the rest of the girls here, caution was thrown to the wind.

"Where'd you guys even get this from?" Jirou piped up. "I don't trust it. And I'm not drinking hard liquor straight from the bottle. You guys bring a mixer or something?"

"From my totally chill twenty-two-year-old neighbor," Hagakure replied. "I got it from him last week while I was away seeing my family. He gave it to me for cheap." She lit up, reached behind Ashido's back. She pulled out a couple of dinted cans of lemon-lime soda. "This good enough for you?" She smiled, looked at Jirou, and although nobody saw it, she had a devilishly devious grin on her face.

Ashido snickered, set down some ground rules. "Listen, I've done this kinda thing with Kiri and Kami before, too. You guys don't have to join us. If you don't want to, I mean. And if you ask, we won't even drink. But I thought it would be fun, you know? We never let loose! We're always so busy all the time! Just"—Ashido lifted up her pointer finger as if she had something incredibly important to say—"one of us has to stay sober, 'kay? To keep us all in check."

Yaoyorozu began to fret. "Mina, you do know the consequences if we get caught, right? This isn't acceptable behavior for future Heroes!" She then pulled herself back, brought her hand to her chest. She looked down at the ground, eyes empathetic. She looked around Hagakure's room, her bed and bureau and girly mirror and makeup. She felt safe here. "But... I also do understand where you're coming from. Just leave me out of it. And respect everyone's wishes. But know that I will not be taking part."

Ashido nodded. She was up for a good time, but she also understood she needed to respect people's boundaries. Yaoyorozu's, especially, were not ones she was willing to cross. In Ashido's absence, her silence heavy and uncomfortable, Hagakure spoke up for her, shorts riding up her thighs as she sat up. "Yup. Sounds totally fine to me. I get it, Yaomomo. Probably not your thing." She then turned toward the rest of the girls. "Anyone else backing out?"