Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Shinsou Hitoshi wasn’t actually completely sure how he wound up here.

Here, meaning in this family, not just in this house.

He knew a few things: he wasn’t in the foster care system anymore. He had been adopted after thirteen years in the system, thirteen years of going through near constant household changes. The adoption had apparently been easy, but he didn’t know a lot about the process, since he’d been told not to worry about it. The people in his previous household were—well, he was pretty sure they were mad, but he also hasn’t had to deal with that.

And then there was the fact that it was Aizawa Shouta who adopted him. The same Aizawa Shouta that Hitoshi had idolized since childhood.

Actually, it was Aizawa Shouta and Yamada Hizashi who’d adopted him, but Hitoshi was still working on getting used to the latter of the two. It wasn’t that Hitoshi didn’t like him, because he definitely did. It was just weird to suddenly have one parent, let alone two, and Hitoshi was trying to take things one thing at a time. Yamada was a kind of loud and enthusiastic guy, as well, and Hitoshi just wasn’t used to that yet.

It’d been a weird week. That was for certain. And honestly, Hitoshi wasn’t really sure how to deal with things.

He was alone in the house now, for the first time.

He’d made the decision to come home with Aizawa a little less than a week ago. Now, it’d only been a few days after the adoption was finalized. He knew that Aizawa and Yamada pulled a bunch of strings to get it done so fast and they’d done most of it themselves, constantly telling Hitoshi not to worry about it when he’d offered to help with the paperwork.

Aizawa was out now. Running errands, or at least that’s what Hitoshi thought. He could remember Aizawa waking him up when he’d been napping on the couch, asking him if he wanted to come, but Hitoshi had said no, rolled over, and gone back to sleep, waking up after Aizawa had been gone for awhile. Yamada was at work, doing some radio thing. That left Hitoshi alone in the house for the first time since coming here.

By now, he knew the layout of the house pretty well. It was  a lot different from the one he’d been living in before, the foster home he’d been at for the last two years. The house here wasn’t crowded or dirty, and there wasn’t piles of clutter everywhere. He went from being one of nine kids to being an only child, and the change had been one of the things that Hitoshi had liked the most.

 It was quiet here. He had his own space. So far, that had been one of the hardest things to get used to—having his own room, though he’d just slept on the couch the past couple days because it was so weird. He’d been offered a choice of either the room on the second floor or the first floor room next to Yamada and Aizawa’s and he’d decided on the room next to theirs. Though it was a difficult thing to get used to, no one has pushed him yet, so Hitoshi was taking things at his own pace, trying not to tire himself out with all the changes.

The rest of the house was pretty open. It was good sized, with the living room, kitchen, and dining area being open. Hitoshi never wandered into the master bedroom out of respect of Aizawa and Yamada’s privacy, but he has seen every other part of the house. Yamada told him that Aizawa has a day every week where he cleaned the house and reorganized things, and the area was almost completely free of the clutter Hitoshi had gotten used to. There wasn’t not a lot of rules here, either, and that has been something else Hitoshi has to get used to. All that he has to do is keep his room fairly clean, clean up after himself, and try to respect Aizawa and Yamada as his parents, and those are all things that Hitoshi had absolutely no problem doing.

He stated up at the ceiling. He was on the couch in the brightly-lit living room, having woken up after Aizawa had already been gone for a while.

It felt too easy.

He was used to there being a catch to everything. In his life, if something sounded too easy, it probably was, and he’d end up owning someone a favor somewhere down the line.

So far, though, there wasn’t a catch. Aizawa and Yamada have been upfront about everything with him. There wasn’t any yelling—or even scolding—or punishments or anything bad at all. It was a weird thing to have to get used to, and Hitoshi found himself continuously studying things, looking for the catch that he was almost certain was going to pop out at him at any second.

Breathing out, Hitoshi looked around the room. In the kitchen, there was the unmistakable sound of the bell on one of the cats’ collars and when he leaned down, looking further into the kitchen, he could see the household’s maine coon batting at some little cat toy.

Hitoshi clicked his tongue, getting her attention and calling her to him and sat back. The jingling continued, faster now as the cat bound over to him, rubbing at his legs for attention. With a small smile playing on his lips, Hitoshi bent down, scratching her between the ears. She purred happily in response to him.

Everything was good here. He was just nervous all the time, but right now, there wasn’t anything he could do about that. He couldn’t deny that he was terrified of screwing this up. Aizawa was the first really good thing that has ever happened to him, and since coming home with him, Hitoshi has been anxious with the fear that Aizawa will finally see the reason why he’d been shuffled from household to household his entire life.

It hadn’t happened yet, but everything in Hitoshi’s body told him it would sooner or later.

He wanted to stay here. He’d never liked living somewhere. He’d always just tolerated it. But he liked it here, and he wanted nothing more than to stay and try to hold on to the few years he had left of some kind of childhood. He’d missed out on a lot, and there’s a lot of dull jealousy that he still has hidden deep inside of him, jealousy that he never really got to do things that other kids did with his parents. Until now, he’s never had any real parents. He’s never been able to be a kid, since he’d always been expected to take care of himself. Since living here, he almost felt like he’s too adult-like for his age, and that hurt and he never had the time to realize it until now.

He didn’t know what compelled him to do it.

He spent some more time on the couch, thinking and petting the cat rubbing up against him, before he realized that he was tired again. It was cold in the house, though, since Aizawa-sensei has a tendency to keep the temperature low and on the flip side, Hitoshi had a tendency to get cold easily, and he was aware that there was more blankets in the linen closet that he could possibly use to keep warm. Yamada had made it clear that he could help himself to anything in the house and that nothing was truly off limits, but it still felt a little odd getting up and going into their closet without asking permission from anyone.

He was met with an entire closet filled with spare pillows, blankets, and quilts, and Hitoshi was forced to just take a long look at it, eyes wide. He hadn’t quite expected this, nor had he been aware that it’d been possible to have this many blankets and bedding. There was a lot to choose from, and when he glanced back at the couch, he saw his small nest of things there.

He didn’t truly know what compelled him to do it, but Hitoshi suddenly made a decision. He figured it was the best time to do it if he was going to—Aizawa and Yamada were out and he could clean it all up before they came back. They wouldn’t ever have to know and Hitoshi could live out one of the fantasies he’s had since childhood.

It took a while to get it perfect, but after a half hour, Hitoshi was finally happy with it, even if the feeling of embarrassment grew and lingered in his chest. After all, he was fifteen and probably too old to be doing this, but—

It kind of felt good.

In front of him was an elaborate blanket fort. He used a bunch of the blankets from the closet, draping them over the couch and dragging a chair over from the dining area to hold a few sheets up. He even utilized the kotatsu to hold things up. There was a thick quilt spread out on the  floor of it and he has the entrance covered. He found a flashlight in the kitchen and tossed it inside, as well as grabbed a few books from the living room bookcase and piled them in there. He looked over his work, checking the time on his phone. He would clean it up before Aizawa or Yamada get home and if everything went right, they would never know.

With that, Hitoshi let himself indulge and tried to put aside any thoughts that he was way too old for this.

His fort was much more comfortable than he’d expected. He turned on the small light and it was enough to light up the entire small space he’d created. He let the entrance fall shut behind him and he settled into the warm, enclosed space, leaning his back against the pillows pushed up against the couch and curling in on himself as he drags a few quilts over his body. It was warm in here, soft and comfortable, and Hitoshi’s eyes started to droop with sleepiness.

He’s been tired a lot, and his body was still catching up with sleep from not getting much during most of his foster care years. No one here seemed to care if he naps or sleeps in, so lately, he’s been letting himself catch up on sleep. It’ll even out eventually, he knew, once he gets on some sort of schedule. He couldn’t sleep now, though, because if he did, he wouldn’t be able to keep track of the time. Instead, he sat up a little, grabbing one of the books from the pile—one of Yamada’s language books—and settled in to do a little reading before he cleaned this all up.

The sound of the door opening jolted him awake and in that moment, Hitoshi knew that he fucked up.

He woke up with a startle, Yamada’s language book still in his hands, as he heard the front door rattle and then open. There was no moment of confusion or bliss where he didn’t know what was going on—as soon as he woke up, he knew what had happened. He’d stupidly fallen asleep in the mess he created and suddenly, he was grateful for the fact that he’d covered the entrance to the blanket fort he’d built, because if he had to see Aizawa’s eyes right now, he’d probably just die.

He couldn’t breath and his heart was beating hard in his chest, pounding loud enough that Hitoshi was almost terrified that Aizawa could hear it. It had to be Aizawa who came home, since Yamada was supposed to work late and Hitoshi doubted that he’d slept through the entire afternoon. But Aizawa didn’t say anything and somehow, that was worse, because Hitoshi was just holding his breath, waiting for the scolding to come. He hasn’t ever heard Aizawa yell and he hasn’t ever really scolded him, either, but this had to be the breaking point, the point where Hitoshi pushed him too far.

There was silence in the house. Horrible, deafening silence. And it was only broken by the cat.

A flurry of jingles erupted from the kitchen, as well as a scurry of paws on the tile and then the carpet, bounding over to the front door. That was what broke the silence of the person who’d opened the door, and Hitoshi heard Aizawa move quickly, the door slamming shut a little hard as he tried to block the cat from getting out, his voice ringing as surprised rather than irritated, “Hey, get back!”

There was a meow in irritation and then what Hitoshi assumed was the cat sulking off about not being to allowed to go outside. A beat of silence, and then Hitoshi nearly choked when he saw a hand patting at the top of his fort.

“—Hitoshi…?”

Hitoshi finally moved, launching himself across the small, enclosed space he’d created, holding his breath as he pulled on the sheet covering the entrance, accidentally causing it to come down on top of his head as he tried to look out.

He gave a noise of surprise as his fort half-collapsed on him in response, and Hitoshi raised a hand, trembling, picking the sheet off of his face so he could look up at Aizawa, still crouched on his hands and knees.

The expression he saw wasn’t the one he’d been expecting. Aizawa stared down at him, raising an eyebrow, his usual tired look on his face, almost seeming half-amused by the way his lips twitched upwards. He didn’t say anything and Hitoshi looked him over more, noticing he was holding a paper bag of groceries, and he searched for a long moment for any sign that Aizawa was mad.

“Sorry—” It was the first thing that came out of his mouth, and Hitoshi again found himself cursing the fact that he always felt this pathological need to fill the silence between them. He’d thought he was used to Aizawa’s quietness by now, but it felt like living with him had made him start over in that regard again. “I meant to clean it up before you came home, but I sort of…fell asleep.”

Another silence. Aizawa continued to stare down at him and Hitoshi forced himself not to speak, even though every nerve in his body wanted him to.

After what felt like forever, Aizawa responded, “You think I’m mad about this?”

Hitoshi looked away from him. Aizawa had a harsh gaze, even when he wasn’t being stern or strict. He had no idea if Aizawa was aware of it, but maintaining eye contact with him could be a little intimidating, especially when Hitoshi was already pretty convinced that Aizawa was mad at him. It didn’t really help that Hitoshi looked pretty stupid right now, with a sheet on his head and half his fort covering his body.

“I kind of made a mess…?” He finally eased out, still refusing to meet Aizawa’s eyes again. Instead, he raised his head, staring at the bag in his hands. He remembered Aizawa saying something about needing to get supplies for dinner.

“My rule is that you clean up after yourself. As long as you clean this up when you’re done with it, I really don’t mind,” He watched as Aizawa set the bag down on the kotatsu and then glanced back at him, sighing. “Hitoshi, I’ve been a teacher for six years. You’re not the first kid I’ve seen build a fort out of bedding. You’re a kid; no one’s going to scold you for acting like one.”

Hitoshi looked up at him, daring to meet his eyes again. Aizawa’s expression had softened, and he held Hitoshi’s gaze for a long moment before he picked up the groceries again and brought them into the kitchen, not giving Hitoshi another look. Hitoshi hesitated, but crawled out of the partially destroyed fort, picking the sheet off of his head and shaking the blankets from his body.

It didn’t take him long to disassemble the rest of it, nor did it take long to fold the bedding he’d used and pile it back in the closet. He caught Aizawa looking at him a few times from the kitchen, but Hitoshi didn’t say anything, feeling his cheeks heat up as he looked away each time. He dragged the dining room chair back into its place and with that, everything was cleaned up and put back into its rightful place. Only then did Hitoshi finally make his way into the kitchen.

His curiosity almost immediately got the best of him, and he found himself peering around Aizawa to look at what he was doing.

“What’s that?”

It still felt weird to be able to freely ask questions at home, but the fact that neither Aizawa nor Yamada ever drew attention to it made him far more comfortable with it. His questions always got answered, too, and neither one of them seemed even the least bit wary about his quirk. That was something he appreciated a lot, even if freely speaking and asking things still felt off.

“Okra,” Aizawa answered him almost immediately, Hitoshi moving a little closer to him. He was right next to him now, leaning over the counter. Aizawa had some kind of weird green vegetable cut and was covering it in some sort of powder that almost looked like flour. Hitoshi watched him, Aizawa not even looking back at him as he spoke, “It’s usually pretty slimy, but when you batter and fry it, it usually tastes better. Hizashi’s making dinner, but I was going to get things started. Have you eaten today?”

Hitoshi bit his bottom lip, nervousness creeping back into him, “I guess I forgot to.”

He was always worried of messing up, but still, Aizawa didn’t seem angry. Hitoshi watched his expression, seeing his lips twitch downwards for a moment as he focused on the task at hand, but even that didn’t come off as angry.

“You really should eat more than you do,” Aizawa told him, and Hitoshi forced himself to look away, instead staring at the rest of the kitchen. It was a nice kitchen, clean and big, and Hitoshi knew well that he was allowed access to any of the food in it, but that was just another thing that he wasn’t used to. It wasn’t like he didn’t eat on purpose, it was just that for years, he hadn’t had a lot of access to food, so he’d learned to ignore signs of hunger to the point where he didn’t feel them much anymore. He was staring at the cabinets, wondering if he should eat something before dinner, since he had no idea when Yamada would be home, when he felt a hand settle in his hair.

He made a small noise of surprise and glanced back up at Aizawa, eyes wide.

“It’s fine,” Aizawa met his eyes now, having paused in his task of rubbing the weird vegetables in whatever substance was on the counter. “I know you haven’t adjusted to it yet. You will. Don’t worry yourself too much about it, but try to remember to feed yourself more often.”

He lingered a moment but soon enough, Aizawa went back to what he’d been doing, and Hitoshi stood beside him, bewildered, shocked at the small amount of affection. It wasn’t a bad feeling, though.

Aizawa had been his hero ever since he’d been five years old and had seen him on the television at his group home. He’d never imagined that he’d end up here, with him, and he still wasn’t completely sure how he’d gotten here and maybe he was still in shock, even. Aizawa had been his hero—was still his hero, now more than ever—and now Hitoshi was—

His kid?

Well, something like that, at least.

Thinking of himself as Aizawa’s kid still felt a little too optimistic, and Hitoshi had spent his entire life not expecting anything from the adults around him. The adoption had been finalized a couple days ago, but Hitoshi was still adjusting to being here, and that was a lot to handle even without adding a label to whatever he was to Aizawa now.

For once, it was easy to shake from his head. Hitoshi liked to know things. He liked words. He liked having names to put on things. But for now, he could wait. He had time. He had a lot of time.

“Hey,” He leaned against the counter, watching Aizawa still. “Can I help?”

There wasn’t even any hesitation, “Go wash your hands and roll up your sleeves. You can help me cut these.”

Hitoshi rebuilt his blanket fort the next day. It took a lot to not panic again when Aizawa wandered out of his bedroom to see what Hitoshi had done. He got a noise of amusement from him, but not much else, and Aizawa didn’t call him out or anything, instead just going into the kitchen to make tea before retreating back to his bedroom.

It was a little embarrassing, though, when Yamada started cooing about how cute it was. But it was pretty easy for Hitoshi to hide his beat-red face from him when he was hidden inside his fort.

Eventually, Hitoshi found it in himself to start moving from the couch to the bed at night to sleep.

His daytime napping was starting to peter off within the next days after the initial fort incident. One night, Hitoshi’s body just seemed to decide that the couch was no longer comfortable, despite it being a hundred times better than the bed he’d slept in at his old foster home, and he’d waited until Yamada and Aizawa went to bed to creep into the room that he supposed was now his.

The door was half-open and Hitoshi hadn’t really gone in it much since getting here. No one had pushed him to do so, so Hitoshi just hadn’t. The thought of having his own room had been too much for him and it was still a lot. The fact that it was right next to the master bedroom made it a little better, though, and Hitoshi knew he wasn’t far from other people as he pushed the door open.

For a long moment, he just stood in the doorway, looking in.

To anyone else, the room wasn’t anything special. It wasn’t decorated and was a bit of a blank slate, and Yamada had encouraged him to decorate it to his liking. To Hitoshi, though, it was almost overwhelming to just look at. The room looked bigger than the room he’d shared with six of his foster siblings and he didn’t know if it actually was or if it just wasn’t full of clutter and bunk beds like that room had been. There was a full sized double bed pushed up against one of the corners on the wall he shared with the next bedroom, a window opposite the bed, and a desk with a few shelves. There was a closet that had been cleared out for him and a bedside table, the reset of the room being empty. There was a lot of space, and Hitoshi was struggling with the idea that it was his.

Even the fact that there was a door was a little too much for him.

He forced himself to leave it, though, and take a shaking step into the room. He left the door open, not wanting to shut himself off from the world. He had this horrible, pathetic need to be close to the person he’d attached onto, and leaving his door open felt like a way to keep that connection open while he was in his own space.

Sleepiness dragged at him, urging him to the bed, and Hitoshi didn’t let himself linger on any other part of this place, instead wanting nothing more than to close his eyes and bury himself under the blankets. Soon enough, he was shoving himself under the covers, rolling towards the wall so that his back rested against it, casting a glance at the open door, at the light streaming into the dark room from the living area, staring out at the house he has been living in for almost a week and a half now, and he closed his eyes.

The bed was soft and a lot bigger than the small bunk he’d slept in at his old foster home. He was warm and…actually felt fairly safe. He was pressed up against the wall, breathing steadily, and just as he was drifting off, he heard the sound of a muffled low voice from the wall the headboard was against and another voice responding to it. He was drifting too far to really pay attention to it, though, until he heard footsteps approaching his room, at which point, Hitoshi opened his violet eyes a little to find Aizawa in his doorway, looking at him.

“Sensei…?” It came out mumbled, and Hitoshi was honestly too tired to correct himself or add an intelligible question. Aizawa didn’t seem to be expecting anything, though.

Through his bleary, half-lidded eyes, Hitoshi watched Aizawa drag a hand through his dark hair, “I thought I heard something. I just wanted to make sure you were alright.”

“I’m alright,” It was still mumbled, and Hitoshi ducked his head a little further into the covers, letting his eyes fall shut again. That same warm feeling was filling him again, and he found himself feeling it a lot here. He couldn’t really place a name to it, but he felt safe with it and liked, kind of like he belonged here.

Aizawa stayed, though, for a moment, and Hitoshi didn’t mind at all, even though he could feel his gaze on him. His voice was quiet and softer than usual when he did speak, almost lulling Hitoshi into sleep, “Feel free to come get me if something happens. Sleep well.”

With that, he was gone, the footsteps heading back to his own room. Again, there were voices, a drowsy one meeting Aizawa’s, and then quiet again. Hitoshi fell asleep soon after, the nerves from being in his own space finally beginning to subside with Aizawa’s short visit to him.

It was a couple more days before Aizawa broke the news to him.

It was on the two week mark of Hitoshi living here. Yamada was gone, having stayed late at the school to get things done. Aizawa hadn’t wanted to train today, so Hitoshi had walked home with him after Aizawa had finished up a few things related to Hitoshi’s transfer. The walk had been quiet, but Hitoshi was used to that, and Hitoshi had changed out of his uniform upon getting home and had sat on the floor of the living room to play with the cats when he’d found Aizawa standing over him, still with his work bag slung over his shoulder, almost looming over him. Hitoshi wasn’t sure if he was aware of how intimidating he looked like this, with Hitoshi sitting on the floor, a cat toy in hand and a fluffy cat rolling on her back in front of him, and Aizawa standing over him, looking down at him with an expression that Hitoshi found he couldn’t quite read.

Hitoshi opened his mouth to say something, to stop the silence between them, but for once, Aizawa spoke before he did.

“We need to talk.”

He’d dreaded those words his entire life and Hitoshi can feel his heart nearly stop in his chest at them. He hated that phrase more than almost any other string of words someone could put together. It was always followed by bad news, usually with a scolding, though Hitoshi had heard it used more than ever when foster parents broke the news to him that he was going to be shuffled to another house, and the second Hitoshi comprehended the words that Aizawa had said to him, he was instantly looking, searching for something that he’d done wrong.

He couldn’t come up with anything.

He was nervous a lot, yes, but Aizawa had never been anything but truthful with him, and Hitoshi didn’t think he was one to hide things. Aizawa hadn’t scolded him yet or gotten angry and every time Hitoshi had thought he’d done something wrong, Aizawa had set him straight by bluntly telling him that whatever he’d done was fine. His nerves had even started to calm down a little in the past few days—

“What did I do?” He kept his voice even, looking up at Aizawa, his own face blank as he tried to keep himself under control. He’d gotten in trouble countless times at other households, and he’d approached those times with a blunt, unfeeling acceptance that he couldn’t change anything but now—he cared about this, and it was a lot harder to keep himself steady.

“Nothing,” Came the immediate response, and Hitoshi couldn’t stop the breath of partial relief that escaped him when Aizawa crouched down to his height, scratching the cat’s stomach as she rolled over to bat at his foot. He looked a lot less scary like this, and there was something sullen in his face, striking fear again in Hitoshi. He was expecting something horrible, for Aizawa to tell him that something had gone wrong in the process of adopting him or maybe that Yamada didn’t like him here or that he’d gotten in trouble with the school for taking him in, but Aizawa said none of that.

“Hitoshi, I’m sure you know I’m the dorm parent for my class. I’ve taken a lot of time off in the past two weeks from that particular responsibility, but I need to take care of that part of my job. I have to stay in the apartment in the dorms for most of the week. I should’ve said something about this earlier.”

It felt like an apology, and Hitoshi was speechless, holding Aizawa’s gaze. This hadn’t been what he’d been expecting at all. This was a problem he could deal with.

He really didn’t like the thought of not living with Aizawa, though.

He didn’t know why. He liked Yamada. They’d had a few conversations over the past couple of weeks, and he was a person Hitoshi liked. But Aizawa—Hitoshi was irrationally attached to him. He’d been the first adult to give him the time of day, the first person to care about him, the only person who’d ever been a real parent to him and Hitoshi… He liked living with him a lot, and he was starting to not really know how he’d gotten through life without someone like Aizawa.

“Can I come with you?”

“What—?” For one of the first times, Aizawa looked and sounded completely dumbfounded, his eyes going a bit wider and his voice losing its usual solidity. He raised an eyebrow at Hitoshi, quickly regaining his composure. “Hitoshi, it’s a studio apartment. It’s one room. It’s not like it is here.”

“Is that a no?” Hitoshi didn’t try to hold back. He’d learned that Aizawa was fine with the way he spoke to him, as he’d never been reprimanded for it. “I lived in a room with six other kids for two years, Sensei.”

Aizawa paused. Hitoshi didn’t fill the silence, studying Aizawa’s face, wondering if he was thinking about it or if he was working out a way to tell Hitoshi no.

“I’m not opposed to the idea,” Aizawa told him finally. “If you really want to, I suppose you could come with me. You’re still free to go home with Hizashi whenever you want. I’m warning you, though, that it’s not a very nice place.”

Hitoshi didn’t try to fight the grin that broke out on his face, “It’s fine, Sensei. Don’t worry about it.”

Aizawa gave him an incredulous look at Hitoshi using his own words against him. He didn’t argue, though, instead taking the cat toy Hitoshi had in his hands and waving it in front of the cat at their feet, not saying anything more about it.

The apartment wasn’t nearly as bad as Aizawa had made it out to be. It was still ten times nicer than the old house he’d lived in. It wasn’t even necessarily small. It was a studio apartment, with a kitchen, living area, and a bed against the wall the door was on. There was a separate bathroom, as well. It was pretty bare, with the only furniture being kitchen stuff, the bed, a couch, and a floor desk that Aizawa worked at. It was dark and a little noisy, since it was right next to the dorm’s utility room, but it was clean and organized and Hitoshi didn’t mind it at all.

Aizawa didn’t put up a fight when Hitoshi wasn’t disappointed with it. He didn’t question Hitoshi, instead bringing a floor bed that Hitoshi could use. He still had the choice to go back to the house if he wanted to but more often than not, Hitoshi found himself staying in whatever place Aizawa was at.

“Are you sure you’re alright with going from place to place like this?” Aizawa had asked him on the second day of staying in the studio apartment with him.

“Yeah,” He’d answered, half-buried in his homework for the day. He’d paused, pencil hovering over the worksheet he was part way through, glancing back up at his teacher, who’d been working at his desk for the past hour or so. “It’s different from foster care.”

“Sure,” Aizawa had said, glancing back at the laptop he had open on his desk. “As long as you don’t mind it.”

Getting adjusted to the apartment wasn’t hard.

Moving back and forth wasn’t hard, either. The first week, Hitoshi stayed in the apartment during the school week and when Aizawa went home on the weekend, he did, too. It was easier than he’d thought it’d be, and the apartment was similarly warm and comfortable, even if it was smaller than the house. Aizawa worked a lot, usually sitting at his floor desk and grading or doing whatever else that his teaching job consisted of. On a couple nights of the week, he’d go out for a few hours on a short patrol and usually come home when Hitoshi was sleeping or about to go to bed. It was an easy routine to fall into, and Hitoshi found himself liking it a lot.

Living with Aizawa was easy, even if he was still unconsciously looking for the catch, and Hitoshi was finding himself viewing Aizawa more and more as his parent. He’d already assigned a parental role to him months ago, almost unwillingly, given that he hadn’t wanted to get attached, but now he was slowly coming to accept that this was actually happening and the teacher Hitoshi had become so attached to, the guy he idolized and wanted to be exactly like, the person who’d done so much for him—was his actual parent now.

And Aizawa took his role as Hitoshi’s parent seriously.

Despite that, not a lot changed between them, mostly because Aizawa had already taken on this role before Hitoshi had come to live with him. He still trained Hitoshi and spent time with him afterwards, usually taking him to dinner and helping him sort through his homework or whatever else Hitoshi was having trouble with. He tagged along with Aizawa to run errands. He had conversations with him, sometimes about casual things and other times about serious things. The only real difference was that Aizawa didn’t drop Hitoshi off at the train station and instead, Hitoshi came home with him.

One thing he did notice, though, was that Aizawa didn’t talk a lot about himself. It wasn’t that he had before—Hitoshi had noticed it before Aizawa had officially taken him in. He’d been curious then and he was even more curious now. Living with Aizawa had only made him want to get to know him more. He did know things about Aizawa, things that he’d gathered from either tidbits of information or just things that he’d gathered from being around him—things like Aizawa liked cats and routine and disliked crowds and cold weather, things like the fact that he had a sleep disorder that caused him to take a lot of naps and things like the fact that he and Yamada have known each other for fifteen years are were married. But he didn’t know little things, things that, for some reason, he was dying to ask Aizawa.

But Aizawa didn’t talk much about himself.

As he’d found out from his short interactions with his class, they had similar experiences, though Hitoshi knew more about him than any of them did. It was almost relieving, because Hitoshi’s jealousy of 1-A had been cropping up again in the past couple weeks, but at the same time, Hitoshi came to the conclusion that Aizawa just didn’t like talking about himself to his students.

He was curious. Really, really curious. He wanted to know more about the man who’d adopted him, the man who Hitoshi gladly followed at his heels every day. He liked living with him and Aizawa was a great parent and Hitoshi was so illogically attached to him that he wanted to know everything he could find out about his new parent. He felt terrible about it, too, because there was no rational reason for wanting to know more about Aizawa other than he just wanted to know and be closer with him.

Hitoshi held onto it for about a week. And then, right after he went back to the apartment with Aizawa on Sunday night, Hitoshi decided to go forward with the plan he’d devised. There was no telling if it’d work or not, and he knew Aizawa was probably too smart to not figure out what he was doing, but Hitoshi was starting to realize that the worst thing Aizawa was going to say to him was going to be no.

Aizawa was already buried in his work when Hitoshi finally worked up the courage to go through with things, and he’d been sitting in the same place, on the floor against his bed, the floor desk pulled over his lap, for the last few hours. He hadn’t been saying much, and Hitoshi had assumed that he was working on something important, and Aizawa hadn’t even said anything when Hitoshi had gotten up and put a kettle of tea on the stove.

“Aizawa-sensei,” He said quietly afterwards, having debated with himself in the kitchen for what felt like forever. Now, he stood in front of Aizawa’s desk, making sure to keep himself quiet so he didn’t startle Aizawa, holding two mugs of hot tea.

Aizawa glanced up at him, and his typing stopped. Hitoshi shuffled his feet, but offered one of the mugs to him, and Aizawa’s dark gaze softened as he took it from him.

“Thanks,” Aizawa’s voice was quiet, too, and Hitoshi watched as Aizawa leaned his head back for a moment, closing his eyes. He was wearing glasses now, something Hitoshi rarely saw him do, and his hair was drawn back into a bun so that his bangs were out of his eyes. He looked almost a little stressed out, his eyes more red and tired-looking than usual, and Hitoshi wondered if whatever he was doing was stressing him out.

“What are you working on?” Hitoshi took a breath, but lowered himself to the floor, sitting cross-legged next to Aizawa’s desk, across from him. Aizawa didn’t comment or even react to it, pushing his glasses up to rub at the bridge of his nose, and Hitoshi wondered if he should offer to bring him the medication he used for his dry eyes.

“A villain case,” Aizawa told him, pushing his glasses back up again. He looked different with them on and his hair back—almost a little older, a little more middle-aged than he usually looked. Hitoshi waited, holding his cup in his hands, the warmth from the tea warming his fingers. “I’m working with the police on it. It’s the leader of some big underground crime ring and I’ve been trying to track his movement and find out what I can.”

“Sounds stressful,” Hitoshi commented, frowning at him. Stressful and dangerous. The prospect of his childhood hero taking down some big gang leader would usually be exciting, but… it was a little different now. He took a drink of the tea in his hands, glancing at the carpeted floor of the apartment and then back up at Aizawa. “Do you…want to play a game with me? You can keep working, but it might take your mind off of things a little.”

To his surprise, Aizawa didn’t immediately say no. He kept looking at Hitoshi, tapping his fingers lightly on the wood of his desk, and Hitoshi forced himself to wait for a response. Aizawa closed his eyes again, exhaling, and then spoke, his voice soft in the room.

“What kind of game do you have in mind?”

“Oh, uh,” Hitoshi struggled for words. He thought he’d had this all planned out in his head, but actually speaking the words was different from mapping them out, especially when Aizawa was right in front of him and not in his head. “It’s pretty simple. I ask you questions, and you answer.”

It sounded even more stupid when he said it out loud. And Aizawa just made it worse by giving him a questioning look.

“Questions,” Aizawa repeated.

“Yeah, and you have to answer truthfully,” Hitoshi was trying to cover his tracks, but it clearly wasn’t working.

“How do you win?”

“You, uh,” Hitoshi dropped his gaze, rubbing at the back of his neck. He was pretty sure he’d gotten caught already. “You don’t.”

“It doesn’t sound like much of a game if you can’t win,” Aizawa continued fixing him with that stare, the stare that made Hitoshi fidget and bite his lip. After a moment of silence, Aizawa sighed, leaning back and pushing his glasses up to rub at his eyes. “If you want to know things about me, just ask.”

“You don’t like talking about yourself,” Hitoshi blurted out, suddenly finding himself running his mouth again. “That’s what all the other students say.”

“I don’t like to cross my personal life with my professional one. There’s no reason for my students to know things about me,” Another pause, Aizawa staring at him again, tapping his fingers on the desk once more. “But you’re part of my personal life. It’s different with you.”

With that, Aizawa got up from his place on the floor, not waiting for a response from Hitoshi. Hitoshi just stared at him for a moment, speechless and trying to comprehend what he’d just been told, and watched as Aizawa crossed the floor to the closet, giving Hitoshi a look back.

“Come here.”

Hitoshi scrambled up, nearly tripping over his own feet. He hardly let himself think, instead just following directions as he all but ran over to Aizawa. Aizawa didn’t say anything more, not even looking at him, and Hitoshi held his breath, having no idea what he was doing as Aizawa opened the small closet in the apartment and immediately reached up, the top shelf of the closet to high for even him to properly reach without standing a little further on his toes. Hitoshi didn’t do anything, not even able to see what he was reaching for until Aizawa brought the box down and wiped the dust from it with his sleeve.

Hitoshi squinted at the box.

“Chess…?”

“Do you know how to play?”

Hitoshi dragged his bottom lip between his teeth, “No.”

He honestly didn’t realize that people played this game. Shogi was more common here, and Hitoshi had really only seen people play chess in movies. The fact that Aizawa knew how to play—

Well, he’d like to say it was surprising, but the game, as far as Hitoshi knew, was completely based around logic and reasoning and the more he thought about it, the more he realized how stereotypical it was that Aizawa knew how to play. It was almost amusing—of course the teacher who based everything he did off of logic would know how to play a logical game.

“I’ll teach you,” Aizawa tucked the box under his arm, shutting the closet, and Hitoshi followed at his heels as he crossed the apartment again.

“I thought you were working?”

“I could use a break,” Aizawa stopped in the living area of the apartment, near where Hitoshi’s bed was. Hitoshi stopped, too, watching as Aizawa sat on the floor again and Hitoshi did the same, sitting across from him. Aizawa didn’t immediately say anything more, instead opening the box and taking a black and white checkered board out, setting it between them and then glancing over his reading glasses at Hitoshi again, “It’s not a hard game, but you have to think your moves through. It’s good to train yourself to try to predict what your opponent will do.”

Something broke through the shock of the last few minutes, and Hitoshi felt his lips lift up into a half-smirk and he didn’t try to hold his tongue, “Oh, I didn’t think we were training today. I just thought you wanted to play a game you could win.”

Aizawa gave him a snort of amusement in return, Hitoshi watching him as he opened a small bag of black and white pieces and started sorting them out on the carpet, putting some on the board between them in an order Hitoshi couldn’t figure out. He hummed, and Hitoshi swore he almost saw a hint of a smile on his face as he spoke, “Winning’s just a bonus.”

“Yeah, well, take it easy on me,” Hitoshi did his best to pull a fake-pout, frowning and sticking his bottom lip out. Aizawa continued to place pieces on the board, Hitoshi growing more and more confused as he did so. “...Looks complicated.”

“It’s not,” Aizawa didn’t look up at him. “I taught Hizashi how to play back when we first started dating. He can beat me now if he tries hard enough and doesn’t make stupid mistakes.”

That sounded like a challenge. Hitoshi couldn’t bring himself to pout anymore when Aizawa was challenging him to beat him in a board game.

This was something else that he’d never gotten to experience in childhood. When he’d been really young, young enough that he’d still fit in at most group homes and young enough where better families had tried to give him a chance, he’d occasionally played a board game with one of his foster siblings, but never with any of his foster parents. He wasn’t going to deny that it was a little exciting that Aizawa had taken a break from work just to play a game with him, especially after he’d figured out Hitoshi’s initial plan earlier.

There was a grin on Aizawa’s face as he glanced up at Hitoshi, “I’ll try to take it easy on you. Listen closely so I can tell you how every piece moves.”

Hitoshi did as he was told. He listened as Aizawa explained the game again, thinking that this was probably the most he’d ever heard Aizawa talk in one setting. He imagined this was what his lectures were like, but Hitoshi was still a little ways away from being transferred into his class—winter break was two weeks away and after that, he’d be in his class—and he made sure to hang on to everything he said. He asked a question occasionally, trying to take in all the information.

Eventually, he thought he got it, and with an assurance from Aizawa that he could ask for clarification at any time, he agreed to start a game with him.

—A game in which Aizawa promptly beat him in four moves.

Hitoshi just stared at the board, wide-eyed, after Aizawa announced that he’d trapped him and thus, won, trying to work out a way to get out of it. He picked up a piece a couple times, trying to move it around, but each time, finding that there were no legal moves left for him.

Slowly, he raised his head to Aizawa, finding the man giving him a wide, toothy smile that told him that he’d been planning this all along and got way too much amusement out of beating Hitoshi in his first chess game. Hitoshi narrowed his eyes, glaring at him.

“You said you’d go easy on me!”

It came out louder than he’d meant and honestly, it was mostly for show. There was momentary panic that he’d be scolded for being loud, but the cheshire smile on Aizawa’s face just seemed to grow.

“I told you that you need to think ahead,” The smile didn’t falter in the least, and Aizawa looked overly pleased with himself as he started to move pieces back.

“Yeah, but it was my first game. That was just mean,” He pulled his face into a pout again, sticking out his bottom lip and scrunching up his nose. “You just wanted to win.”

“Maybe it was a little cruel,” Aizawa’s grin subsided into the slight smirk he saw him wear sometimes. “Let’s play again.”

“Be nicer this time.”

“Sure.”

Hitoshi fixed him with a disbelieving stare. He was really just playing around—seeing Aizawa get so much amusement out of beating him right after teaching him the game was actually pretty funny, and Hitoshi just wanted to joke around a little, especially since Aizawa didn’t seem to mind. He didn’t really care if he won or lost. Just playing was fun.

“Playing the same trick twice isn’t any fun. We can play a real game.”

Hitoshi nodded, satisfied with that answer, waiting for Aizawa to make the first move. There was silence between for the first two rounds, Hitoshi concentrating on trying to remember how the pieces went and trying to think each move through properly. Aizawa was the one to break the silence, and it was during Hitoshi’s turn on the third move, when he was trying to decide which of his pieces to move.

“Didn’t you have things you wanted to ask me?”

Hitoshi looked up, fingers hovering over one of his horse pieces, staring across the board at Aizawa. He’d almost forgotten how this had started, with him trying to get Aizawa to tell him more about himself by trying to frame it as a game. With that, he remembered Aizawa’s words, with him telling him that he was part of his personal life and because of that, it was different than with the other students.

“It’s nothing important,” Hitoshi sat back slightly, feeling his face heat up a little. “Just, you know, stupid personal questions.”

He picked up his knight piece, but Aizawa made a sound at him.

“Don’t make that move,” He told him, and Hitoshi glanced up to find Aizawa studying him. “You’re opening yourself up for attack if you do. Choose a different one.”

“You’re coaching me…?” Hitoshi raised an eyebrow at him, but set the piece back on the board.

“You’re not going to win if I keep beating you over and over and don’t tell you what you’re doing wrong. Try over here,” Aizawa pointed at the right side of the board, where Hitoshi had moved a couple of his pawns out. “Don’t be so quick to move the bigger pieces around.”

Hitoshi nodded, studying that side of the board again, using it as an excuse to not look at Aizawa when the man spoke to him again, voice softer than before.

“I don’t mind answering things. I’m just not the most interesting person.”

At his sides, Hitoshi’s fingers curled into his fists and he really was trying to concentrate on the game, but the words escaped him anyways, quiet enough to be a near-whisper, even as he tried to stop himself, “I think you’re interesting.”

Another snort of laughter, “That makes one of us.”

Exhaling slowly, Hitoshi picked one of his pawns up and advanced it, giving an opening to move a different piece if he wanted.

“Good choice,” Aizawa commented, and Hitoshi slowly raised his eyes to him. It was embarrassing, but Hitoshi really did still idolize Aizawa. Actually, he looked up to him now more than ever, because the more he got to know Aizawa, the more he realized that Aizawa really was a good person, the kind of person Hitoshi wanted to grow up to be, even if he was a little weird and had a reputation for being strict. The reason he wanted to know more about him was because he thought he was interesting. He was Hitoshi’s hero, and even if he still wasn’t quite sure how everything had cumulated to him living with and being adopted by his personal hero, he wasn’t about to take it for granted in the least.

Aizawa was looking down at the board with dark, tired eyes, his black-rimmed glasses sitting low on his nose. He didn’t wear them much, and Hitoshi assumed he only wore them when his eyes got strained, but with that and his pulled back hair, Aizawa looked a little more like a normal adult.

He had a million questions he wanted to ask, and they were all frivolous, unimportant stuff, things that Hitoshi would have no use in knowing other than feeling closer to him.

“Favorite color?” Hitoshi blurted out suddenly. He was quickly finding that though he’d thought he had a good grasp over language and speaking in general, he had a tendency to lose that around Aizawa. He rubbed at the back of his neck, voice a little quieter, “I mean, if you have one?”

“Yellow,” Aizawa answered him without even missing a beat, picking up a white piece from the board and moving it a couple squares. “Your turn.”

Hitoshi smiled, lips pulling into a smirk, “Is it because of Yamada?”

Aizawa gave him a stare that looked more dumbfounded than anything, “Because of Hizashi? It could be, I suppose.”

Hitoshi bent his head, surveying the board, looking over the move Aizawa had made. It really did seem like he was going easier on him this time, given that this was their fourth move and Aizawa hadn’t suddenly won and he was actually coaching him this time. Still, Aizawa’s answer was funny to him. He’d always wondered why his goggles were bright yellow when he did everything else to blend in. He supposed it made a little more sense now, when he looked at the person Aizawa had married.

Hitoshi picked up the diagonally moving piece, glancing up at Aizawa to see him give him a slight nod, and moved the piece a couple squares, smiling to himself, “It’s probably because of Yamada. Favorite food?”

“Black licorice,” Aizawa continued studying the board, not glancing up at Hitoshi, even when Hitoshi made a face at his answer.

“Gross,” He stuck his nose up at the thought of the gross food. “That’s not real food, either, Sensei.”

“It’s not? Hm, I guess jelly packets don’t count either, then,” Aizawa made his move and met Hitoshi’s gaze. “Yakitori is good. At least it is when Hizashi makes it.”

Aizawa didn’t cook much. Hitoshi had begun to realize that that was probably because he wasn’t the best at it. Yamada was the one who did most of the cooking. Even when they were here, in the apartment, Yamada sometimes came over to make dinner or brought them pre cooked things. Other days, Aizawa would just get take-out or pick something up on the way home. He hadn’t ever seen Aizawa make a full meal by himself, and that was a little amusing given that Aizawa also didn’t seem to have the most balanced diet.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you cook, so…favorite season?” Hitoshi continued on, absentmindedly picking up a piece and getting ready to move it.

“Don’t, you’re leaving your queen open to vulnerability. You don’t want to lose that piece this early in the game,” Aizawa stopped him before he could make the move he wanted to, and Hitoshi directed his attention to the left side of the board instead. He picked up another piece and hesitated before moving it, but Aizawa said nothing. He made the move and sat back, listening to Aizawa answer his question, “Fall, probably. I don’t like the sun and I don’t like the snow. It’s a hassle on both counts, and summer is unbearably hot for me.”

Aizawa hardly even looked at the board, knocking one of Hitoshi’s pieces off of it with his own.

“—Hey!” Hitoshi cried out in surprise.

That smirk from before was back, “I can’t tell you how to avoid everything, can I? You’ll never learn if I do that. I’m just preventing you from losing prematurally.”

Hitoshi frowned, studying the board hard. Aizawa had said this game was about logic and predicting the other player’s moves. That was a little hard when this was his first time playing the game.

“Where are you from?” Hitoshi was trying, trying to figure out if Aizawa even had a plan to beat him or if he was just seeing what Hitoshi would do. Tentatively, he pushed another pawn forward and waited.

“Here,” Aizawa told him.

“‘Here’?” Hitoshi repeated, not quite understanding. “You grew up in this district?”

“No,” Aizawa’s voice sounded a little different, but Hitoshi couldn’t quite place how. His face was back to his usual stoic expression and he didn’t move to take his turn yet. “I grew up in Tokyo.”

“It’s a big city, Sensei.”

No immediate response. Hitoshi was just starting to wonder if he should prod Aizawa with the question again when he made his move, moving a piece towards one of Hitoshi’s in what looked like an offensive move. He glanced up at Hitoshi, face blank and tired eyes looking right at him, “It was a district near the outskirts of the city. Near the industrial district. You’ve never lived there, so you’ve never been there. It’s not the type of place you go unless you live there.”

Hitoshi just stared across the board at him, not even thinking about the game anymore.

Maybe there was a reason Aizawa never talked about his past. Hitoshi knew little things about him, but next to nothing about his past. He’d never mentioned any family outside of Yamada, to the point where it was weird to even think about Aizawa having parents or being a little kid. He knew a couple things—Aizawa had told him that he’d been in general studies when first attending UA, like Hitoshi was, and then that he’d met Yamada in high school, but beyond that, Hitoshi knew nothing, and it was odd for him to even imagine Aizawa as anything other than the middle-aged teacher he saw him as now.

Hitoshi bit at his bottom lip again, wondering if he was getting into territory that he shouldn’t be, “Do you have any siblings…?”

“No,” Aizawa’s expression didn’t change. “Just me. My parents actually weren’t fond of kids.”

Hitoshi looked down at the board, realizing Aizawa was waiting for him to take his turn. He pushed a pawn forward, more preoccupied with the conversation than anything.

“Your parents…?” It took him a moment to realize that it wasn’t a question. He dropped his head again, face heating up in embarrassment. “Sorry. I don’t mean to—”

“If I didn’t want to answer something, I’d let you know,” Aizawa knocked another one of his pieces off the board. Hitoshi didn’t look up at him. “My mother still lives in that district, as far as I know. We don’t speak much. I have no idea where my father is, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

“Oh,” Hitoshi was tempted to apologize again, but he kept his mouth shut, knowing he’d get the same response as before. “Uh—How did you and Yamada meet?”

The serious expression cleared off of Aizawa’s face and Hitoshi saw the barest hint of a smile on his lips, “He annoyed me into being friends with him, though he’ll probably tell you a different story if you ask him. I was moved from general studies and he decided, as class president, that he wanted to follow me everywhere and anywhere. I imagine Iida will do the same with you, though probably with less…permanent results.”

That was enough for Hitoshi to stop being as embarrassed, and he let out a small laugh at the thought of that intense, persistent kid following him around once he was transferred to Aizawa’s class. He was still dealing with his jealousy of 1-A but that kid was one of the ones Hitoshi didn’t harbor a lot of jealousy towards, mostly because he seemed a little more down to earth than the others. Maybe he wouldn’t mind hanging around him.

“He seems alright,” Hitoshi said, smiling as he made another move, having thought this one over a little more so that Aizawa wouldn’t immediately take another one of his pieces. He was pushing towards one of Aizawa’s on two sides. If he couldn’t win this game, then at least he could take a couple of the other’s pieces. “I’m not really sure I’d want to get married to him, though.”

“You’re too young to be thinking about that,” Aizawa dropped his gaze, raising an eyebrow at the state of the board, murmuring something under his breath, “Interesting.”

“You sound like an old man,” Hitoshi teased, letting his usual sarcasm slip out a little more.

Aizawa frowned at him, “I’m old?”

“No, you just sound old,” Hitoshi told him. Aizawa gave him a stare and then moved his piece. Hitoshi just grinned, making a move to take his knight, triumphantly putting it to the side of the board.

“Interesting,” Aizawa repeated, tapping his fingers on the board. His next words filling Hitoshi with pride and warmth, “Good strategy.”

Aizawa won, unsurprisingly, but Hitoshi was able to take a few more of his pieces before he did. He asked him more questions, never straying back to the topic of his childhood, though Hitoshi would be lying if he said he wasn’t curious about it. He found out more about him, even asking Aizawa a little about his work and why he became a teacher (because Kayama-sensei had made him interview for it, as Hitoshi had found out). He couldn’t deny that he was a little disappointed when Aizawa started sweeping the chess pieces back into a bag and closing up the board when they were done.

He expected Aizawa to go back to working on the case he’d been going through before he’d taken a break, but when Aizawa put the game back in the closet, he made no move to go back to sitting at his floor desk. Instead, he turned to Hitoshi, raising an eyebrow at him, “Hungry?”

“Uh, sure,” Hitoshi really wasn’t sure if he was, but it’d been awhile since he’d last eaten. Yamada had made lunch before they’d come back to the dorms and honestly, Hitoshi’s body was still used to only eating one meal a day, as much as he was trying to change that. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans, slouching slightly as he looked up at Aizawa. “Is Yamada coming over?”

“No, I’ll make dinner tonight.”

There was no further explanation and before Hitoshi really processed the words, Aizawa was in the kitchen, crouched down and looking through one of the bottom cabinets. Hitoshi followed him, leaning back on one of the counters opposite where Aizawa was, trying to stay out of his way.

“You’re going to cook?” He made no attempt to hide the surprise in his voice. It was a little funny, since he’d made the comment earlier about having never seen Aizawa cook before.

“Sure,” Aizawa stood, having found a large pot, setting it on the stove. Hitoshi watched as he moved around the kitchen, gathering supplies and things from the fridge. From what Hitoshi saw, he was probably making some kind of stew. Hitoshi had made it clear right after Aizawa taking him in that he would really eat anything, though he’d just found out from his further questioning during their game that Aizawa was no doubt a picky eater.

He looked different like this, when he wasn’t working, and coupled with the fact that Aizawa still had his glasses on and his hair pulled back, he almost looked like a completely different person than the hero Hitoshi had followed for a decade of his life. He grinned, watching as Aizawa started boiling water in the pot, and had to hold back a laugh.

Apparently, Aizawa noticed, though, when he turned to get something else and saw Hitoshi.

“What’s so funny?” He asked him, narrowing his eyes at Hitoshi, pausing in what he’d been doing.

Hitoshi just grinned more.

“You kinda look like a middle-aged dad,” If there was one thing he’d learned today, it was that Aizawa didn’t seem to mind Hitoshi joking around much. Aizawa did undeniably look different here—a little older, a little less scruffy, maybe a little more his age.

“I suppose that’s fitting, then, since that’s what I am.”

Hitoshi moved out of the way for Aizawa as he opened one of the drawers Hitoshi had been leaning on, digging through it until he found the cutting board he’d been looking for. Hitoshi’s grin faltered into less of a smirk and more of a genuine smile as he did so, hanging onto Aizawa’s words.

“Thanks for teaching me how to play earlier,” His tone was softer and soon enough, the sound of Aizawa cutting vegetables filled the room. “It was fun.”

“It was a good distraction,” Aizawa paused in what he was doing. “I don’t mind playing if you’d like to again. Just ask.”

“Okay,” The chopping resumed. For a moment, Hitoshi lingered back, just watching.

Living here was good. Even if he was still getting used to things, it was good. Hitoshi was starting to not be a bundle of nerves all the time, and the nervousness was beginning to fade into contentedness. When the anxiety was gone—and it was becoming less and less, now really only popping up when he was wandering into territory he wasn’t sure of—it was really relaxing being here. It was quiet here, and Hitoshi found that he could actually focus on homework or reading or whatever else he wanted to do, something he was never able to do at his old home. When Aizawa held conversations with him, they weren’t anxiety-inducing, and Hitoshi really looked forward to talking with him. Aizawa was a good parent and Hitoshi was—

For the first time in his life, he was pretty happy.

He had a home to come back to. He had a parent who spent a lot of time with him. He had food and a bed and a warm place to sleep. He had guidance and someone there for him, someone who didn’t seem to want to hurt him, someone who actually wanted him and not just a paycheck for taking him in.

Hitoshi moved to the opposite counter, leaning over it slightly to look up at Aizawa, asking the same question he’d asked on the day he’d built the fort at the house, “Can I help?”

Again, Aizawa didn’t even hesitate in answering him, “You can peel potatoes if you want. Wash your hands first.”

At some point, Shinsou decided that they must’ve done something wrong, because the stew ended up stinking up the entire apartment, enough so that Aizawa got a knock at his door from one of the kids in his class. Hitoshi had to bite back laughter as Aizawa explained that nothing had died and that it was just his own cooking. Despite the smell, though, the stew actually tasted good.

“I should get a coffee table or something,” Aizawa had commented at one point, after Hitoshi had sat on the ground against the couch to eat. “It’d be nice to have somewhere to properly eat.”

“Most people eat at a dining table,” Hitoshi had joked.

“Unfortunately, there’s not enough room in here for that. A coffee table will have to do.”

Unsurprisingly, the next day, when Yamada came over, Hitoshi watched him and Aizawa struggle to build a coffee table, a task that went a few hours longer than it should’ve.

Afterwards, while Yamada and Aizawa talked about school things, discussing grading and plans, Hitoshi snuck away to the closet, stood on the very tips of his toes, and grabbed the box from the top shelf and brought it to the newly built table, setting it down in front of Yamada.

They’d stopped talking immediately, and Yamada had given him one of his trademark wide smiles, “You wanna play me, kid?”

Hitoshi sat on the floor, opening the game box, giving Yamada a small smirk, “Sounds like a challenge.”

There was a snort of laughter from Aizawa, and Hitoshi paused, looking up at Aizawa, finding him sitting back, feet across Yamada’s lap, holding the mug of tea Hitoshi had made him, “Careful, Hitoshi, Hizashi’s smart enough to beat me. There’s no telling what he’ll do to you.”

Yamada turned to him, sticking out his tongue at his spouse, “Jeez, Shouta, I’ll take it easy on the kid. I’m not some kinda monster.”

Hitoshi let them bicker playfully for a moment, watching between the two of them. He felt warm inside, happy, for once in his life. It was a foreign feeling, and Hitoshi wasn’t at all sure how to react to it.

But he’d figure it out.

He had time.