False Heroes

So Long As You're Here

Having Asui as a girlfriend was actually pretty nice. Nothing changed between her and Shinsou, really, anyway. The only difference is that they held hands that one time the previous day. It wasn't nearly as bad as Shinsou had thought it would be. Though, it still felt kind of weird referring to her as his girlfriend; it still felt like they were only friends.

It was now Tuesday, and classes had just ended. Hitoshi was on his way back to his dorm after an exhausting day, planning to not leave even once, if possible-- and to perhaps have Asui over, though he was still contemplating that.

But he couldn't get much farther than the commons room before he heard a voice calling after him.

"Hey, Shinsou?"

To his astonishment, it wasn't Kaminari or Midoriya or Aoyama or even Asui. It was Uraraka, which surprised him, to say the least.

He decided that it must be important, whatever she wanted to talk to him about. It wasn't like her to randomly bound up to like the others, and he'd only really spoken to her when she was with the rest of the Dekusquad.

So he turned around to face her, leaning against the wall of the hallway. They were mostly out of view and earshot of the rest of their classmates, but that didn't seem to be enough for Uraraka.

She glanced around at their surroundings before asking him, "I need to talk to you. Can we go to your room maybe?" Shinsou thought about it for a second. He didn't like the idea of bringing the girl back to his dorm, but his was closer...

He sighed and nodded, motioning for Ochako to follow him. He opted for taking the steps, seeing that they would probably be faster.

His classmate was close behind him as he opened the door to his dorm, allowing her to enter first. He was antisocial, not rude.

She stood awkwardly in the middle of the room while Hitoshi slumped down against the floor, pressing his back onto his bed. He patted the spot next to him, feeling a little bad about her not being able to get comfortable, and she complied as she sat next to him, bringing her knees up to her chest.

It was obvious she was upset, had been for the past couple of weeks. Shinsou felt guilty for never talking to her like he promised Tsuyu, and he decided that now was as good a time as any.

"What's wrong?" he asked slowly, carefully. She looked up at him and plastered a painfully fake smile on her face.

"Nothing is wrong!" she assured him. "I just wanted to ask about you and Tsu. You seem to have gotten pretty close." Hitoshi pursed his lips, turning his head away from her to stay at his bare floor. He had wanted to put a rug in there but had never gotten around to it. Maybe he should. The floor looked too barren, too empty for his liking.

"Yeah," he said distantly, still somewhat lost in thought. If Uraraka noticed, she didn't say anything.

"I just wanted to know what happened," she continued, glancing at him. He pursed his lips again, contemplating on telling her. Ultimately, he decided it would come up again eventually.

"We're dating," he said, and the silence that followed was deafening. They sat in that silence for a few beats, with it hanging over them.

"Oh," Ochako said, at last, staring at the floor in front of her with her eyebrows furrowed deeply. "You are?" Shinsou sighed, nodding.

She didn't say anything afterward, and Hitoshi thought that the conversation was over, not that it had been a very eventful one. He was about to ask Uraraka if she was done there when he heard a soft sniffle. His head snapped to look at her. She had her face buried in the arms wrapped around her legs but he could tell by the sniffling and the way her shoulders shook that she was crying.