Boku No Hero Academia One Shots [Book 2]

Mezo Shouji {Soulmate AU - Male Reader}

Requested by: lynx-potato

Trigger Warnings: Transphobia, Gender Dysphoria, Self-Harm, Suicidal Ideation, Depression.

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Perhaps if at birth, the doctors had assigned to you the correct gender, such a pernicious situation might have been prevented. Or at the very least...preventable.

It was discrimination without justification, and a violation of your happiness, of your dreams. It left an unravelling heart that grew more burdensome by the hour, and an obsessive mistrust of the ones who claimed to love you. In retaliation, they issued the arguments of 'I gave you life' and 'you have a roof and nice food, what more do you want?'. They called you ungrateful, excused their words with 'I've known you all your life, why are you acting out now?' and 'Are you doing this out of spite?'. As if your identity, with which you had struggled for years, was concocted simply as an attempt at rebellion. This line of thinking was dismissive. It was dysphoric. The battle between biology and...you had been won, but only in part. You neglected to conquer the all-consuming feeling of hopelessness, the thoughts that screamed 'You've turned everyone you care for against you! Why can't you just be normal?' and 'Why are you trying to become something else? Female is your sex. It's your gender!'

That was, however, the furthest conceivable thing from the truth. But you soon learned to take the pacifist approach - smile at their taunts, respond as courteously as possible and never, ever mention transitioning. Neither for serious debate nor fleeting comment. You learned a number of things, in that household. Namely, that you had to earn approval, but also that the very subjects you craved knowledge of were taboo. Your identity became that which you yourself should fear, should see as unnatural, against God or evolution or anything else...

So here you were, scratching an extra battle scar, to evoke the memories of those abhorrent days, before UA, where you conformed to their expectations, to your role...all for the sake of appeasement. All so they didn't choose to abandon you.

Your family dynamic was simple: the males entered into mechanics, and the females into carpentry. It harboured traditional values, and clearly believed in psychological abuse as a method of enforcing them. It immediately assumed that your soulmate, whose first words were etched on to your wrist as 'Why shouldn't I?', would be male, and would blanch at the idea of transgender partner. The disgust present on your father's face when he whispered those venom-laced words, as though terrified of being overheard...it served to strengthen your self-loathing; it proved your lack of worth, saddled you with all the blame...tortured you, even through the shield of recollection.

It wasn't fair, nor was it right. Surely your soulmate - someone destined to love you, even if only by the guidance of the stars...surely they wouldn't be repulsed by who you were? They wouldn't beg to be released from your bond, once they discovered that you weren't...you couldn't stand to be recognised as female, to be continuously misgendered.

Right...?

Or perhaps they would pander to your family's disgusting ideals, and spurn you just for daring to be yourself. Perhaps they wouldn't care to be enlightened, and would force you to continue deceiving the world. That was a nightmarish vision of the future - something painful, something...not worth living. If love and acceptance came at the cost of your identity, if you had to chip away at yourself simply to feel wanted, to be gazed upon as human rather than monster...then was there truly a point? Such a bleak and sorry existence didn't seem...well, you didn't want it.

So you sought an escape, an anaesthetic of sorts. Your mind started to welcome the malicious, self-degrading thoughts, instead of pushing them aside. You trialled reckless things, littering your body with reminders that you had failed, that you weren't good enough, that nobody would ever shower you with the affection for which you yearned...because it just wasn't deserved.