Hot-Headed (Now also a podfic on spotify!)

Chapter 25

"Ochako-chan?" Mina asked, knocking on her door back at the dorms.

She opened it without receiving a response and a yellow pillar of light peeked into Ochako's room for the first time in hours, making everything in it barely visible although she preferred it to be pitch black.

She still didn't respond despite being awake and hearing just fine. She was just curled up on her bed, hugging a pillow, replaying her last disastrous exchange with Deku and Katsuki over and over and wishing she'd done things differently a thousand times over.

They would lose their licenses...

It was the last thing she ever wanted and could hardly even imagine a world without Deku or Katsuki as heroes in it. It wasn't possible. A world like that had no right to exist.

Not for the first time she wondered if she could convince Principal Nezu and anyone else who helped make this decision, that she should be the one to lose her license. She was more than happy to lose it in their stead. The world could live without Uravity.

She'd also wondered if they were back in their rooms yet or if they would even get the chance to come back.

Part of her hoped they were so she could go to each of them individually and prostrate herself on the floor in front of them, begging them for forgiveness. It had all gone so wrong, it was the least she could do.

Another, more selfish, part of her hoped they weren't back yet and wouldn't come back to the dorms. She didn't want to have to face them. She didn't want to see the blame and regret in their eyes, especially Katsuki's.

"Ochako-chan, I'm turning on your desk light if that's okay," Mina said gently, "I can hardly see in here."

Her lamp turned on, casting a warm, diffused light about the room.

"There we go," she said jovially and Ochako felt her bed dip slightly as Mina came to sit next to her.

"Ochako-chan," she began, "I'm sorry I was so judgmental toward you during the exam. I was so blindsided finding out about you and Bakugo having history and then, the next thing I know, I'm seeing you two cuddling up to each other and on first name basis and I hadn't heard anything about you and Midoriya breaking up so it just looked so bad to me. I should've had more faith in my friend, I realized, when all that went down in the parking lot. But I do wish you'd told me more. I wish I could've been there for you. Any of the girls in the class would. We know both of those boys fairly well too. We could've helped you."

Ochako took all of her words in and rolled to face her pink-skinned friend, tears still glistening in her eyes.

"I'm sorry, Mina-chan," she croaked, her voice cracking from disuse and constant crying, "I wanted to talk to you and tell you all about everything after New Year's but I was afraid of you judging me for having anything more than a partnership with Katsuki or the fact that I struggled choosing between him and Deku, especially after how things were between us first term. I thought you might think I was dumb for considering anyone who wasn't Deku."

"Yeah but Bakugo isn't the same as he was first term," Mina considered, "When you guys came back from summer break and were all friendly and work partners, you both acted really differently with each other. If it had been any other girl, I would've told them that Bakugo is a horrible choice. But, before winter break, most of us agreed- even Kirishima and Kaminari- that you two looked really good together, although we figured you guys didn't really notice it. You know how to handle him being a complete grump and his anger doesn't scare you. He pushes you and has helped make you way stronger. I actually thought you guys might start dating eventually cuz there was just a whole lot of chemistry going on there, everyone could tell. So I think a lot of us were really shocked that you came back from winter break on Midoriya's arm. It was weird, especially when Bakugo was giving you the cold shoulder and both of you looked pretty sad around each other."