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Aizawa Shouta was eight years old when he first suspected people weren’t telling him something important.
He was on the playground. The sky was a bit overcast, but not gloomy, and it was warm enough for shorts and a t-shirt. It was perfect for running around on the equipment, being able to avoid the sting of sun-heated metal. So Shouta was looking back at his friend chasing him, and ran into someone standing at the boundary of the playground.
“Oof!”
As the person stumbled, Shouta stopped in his tracks, nearly windmilling his arms to keep his balance. He took a step back, looking up at the person in front of him. And his eyes sort of… skittered off. It wasn’t that he couldn’t see them. He could- but- it wasn’t right. It reminded him of when he had been watching tv too long and his eyes felt staticky with a vague aching in the back of his head, and his mom had to tell him to go play outside. But he hadn’t been watching tv today, and he had been outside for ages and ages.
As the person adjusted themselves by straightening their rumpled clothing, Shouta squinted. He knew that sometimes his eyes got a little dry, and he rubbed them, hoping the static would fade away. But upon opening his eyes, nothing had changed. So wrapped up in examining the person in front of him, Shouta didn’t notice his attention being returned, and startled.
“Well, hello.”
He blinked. “Hi.”
Shouta didn’t care much for whatever adults thought of him. Especially in school, the teachers would have certain rules, but he didn’t always understand why they were there. No one ever wanted to explain. Every time he asked why, it was taken poorly. He just wanted to know, but people seemed to think he was trying to make them seem stupid, or being disobedient or something. Whatever. He just — couldn’t figure it out. It felt like everyone was on a slightly different wavelength than him. Sometimes he was able to line up with everyone else, but other times he felt as if they were speaking another language, and he went along as best he could. So Shouta usually followed his gut. He didn’t care much for anyone else’s perception of him, and he had decided that a long time ago. At least 3 weeks.
Shouta didn’t say anything more, and just screwed up his eyebrows into a very serious eight-year-old’s frown, trying to pin down the person’s face.
“...So is there a reason why you’ve run into me and not apologized?” The stranger had quirked one of their eyebrows. Probably. Shouta was at least 90% sure they had eyebrows, but it would require further research.
“Yes.” Shouta was very involved in trying to decode their face, but he suspected that saying so would be whatever his teacher had said earlier in the week - “inappropriate” or “rude”. He shifted his feet, eyes never leaving the person. It was also that he wasn’t sorry. He shouldn’t say he’s sorry if he’s not, and if he had to apologize, they should too, because they saw him coming before he saw them. Maybe it was rude, sure.
Oh, but at the same time they were so interesting. He couldn’t just try to ignore them. There! He thinks he spotted at least a nostril. Or the impression of a nose. He was pretty certain they had all the standard facial features of a person.
He wasn’t able to explain what changed in the next moment. It just wasn’t logical, it didn’t make sense. Because, objectively speaking, nothing changed. Maybe the person shifted their feet too, or changed their facial expression. Though he wouldn’t be able to say for sure if the latter were true. But one thing, he knew. His stomach dropped. It was like he was at the top of one of the rides his mom refused to go on with him, where they went up, and up, and up, and suddenly dropped. She said it made her feel sick, and he never really understood until now. Something just felt wrong.
The person in front of him inclined their head to the left, and while he had not been able to see their eyes, Shouta could feel their gaze. It was uncomfortable. And it was definitely, 100%, without a doubt, bad. He didn’t have to ask questions to figure that out. But he kept his feet firmly stuck in the mulch, crossing his arms and looking back at the stranger.
They took a step forward, stopping just at the rubber boundary. Shouta could see their toes weren’t even a full inch from the edge, and he was less than half a foot from the edge of the park himself. They were uncomfortably close, and Shouta knew without looking back that his friend was gone. Run off somewhere else to play, probably.
He just had this- this feeling, that despite the wrongness and the bad feelings, he would be okay if he was careful. Because maybe that wasn’t a logical assumption to make, maybe it wasn’t right, maybe he was in a lot of trouble right now. But his mom was on the other side of the playground, and he knew even more than he knew the other things, that if he looked away, he wouldn’t get to find out why he couldn’t look at them. And more than anything, he wanted to know why this person was so different. It could have been a quirk, but he thought that didn’t seem right.
“Hmmm. How old are you?”
“I’m eight. How old are you?”
Shouta felt more than saw the way their eyes crinkled at that. He thought it was something of a smile, maybe. “Older than you. Would you give me your name? We should introduce ourselves, since we got off on the wrong foot,” they said.
Nothing gave the impression they were really angry, or frustrated. But he heard something of a warning in a way they held themselves, and their tone of voice. Sometimes when he couldn’t tell what someone else was feeling, he just paid extra attention to what he was. And right now, Shouta wasn’t happy. So he crossed his arms, and tilted his head too, trying to mirror the way they had turned theirs. And he was mad they avoided his question. It’s only fair he avoids theirs too.
“A lotta people are older than me. Most people are.”
Shouta saw the slightest twitch of their hand hanging at their side. It seemed wrong too. Everything about them felt like he had gone to the movie theater and taken off the 3D glasses in the middle of the movie. He could pick things out, but it gave him a headache.
“Mmm. You’re right. Though it’s considered rude to ask a lady her age, you know. I don’t want to tell you.” She inclined her head toward him, though he felt that her eyes had never left his. He appreciated her telling him why. He hated it when people just expected him to not want to know, or ignore it.
“Okay.” He conceded, shrugging.
“Your name, then?” She smiled, but he thought it was sharper than it should be. Maybe that was her quirk. Sharp-teeth. He considered her again. His stomach still didn’t feel right, but, maybe his ice cream had been bad earlier. She didn’t seem so bad, really. Just weird. And he knew he was weird sometimes, so he’d be bad if he was mean to her just cause he didn’t get her. He knew that wasn’t fun.
But before he could open his mouth fully to respond, he felt his mom’s hand grab his forearm. It was cold and slick, and she was holding it tightly. It kind of hurt, but he didn’t react beyond looking up at her with wide eyes. She had come up so quickly, he had no idea that she was even there. Her expression was drawn and she smiled tightly.
His mom pulled him back towards her gently by the arm, though her grip was still iron-tight. “Sh- Dear. There might be some rain showers in a bit, and I need to get home to start prepping dinner. Would you run and grab my purse from the park bench?”
He stepped back further until he ran into his mom’s legs. “Um- okay.” He had one last long look at the woman in front of him, squinting. From what he could tell, her demeanor had stiffened as she stared down his mom.
His mom was stiff too. “Go on,” she had on a cardboard smile, and she was definitely talking to him, but her eyes never left the woman. Shouta nodded, turning and running to grab the purse. Maybe if he got back fast enough he’d be able to listen to them talk. Because his mom had her mad-but-trying-not-to-show-it face on, where she didn’t want him to hear what she was going to say. But he always tried to listen in, because it was fun to hear her get angry at someone else.
It was another story when it was him.
He approached the bench where his mom had been sitting. It was just barely within eyesight of where he had been, but all of her belongings were there. Looked like she had dropped her phone too. He picked it up and put it into the bag, closing it carefully. He looked around at the park. It was emptier than he remembered. It was more overcast than he thought too, the clouds a harsher gray than he remembered them being not even five minutes ago. Taking one more quick glance at the bench, he ran back towards his mom, but slowed to a stop halfway.
The woman was gone, and his mom hadn’t moved. She was still, the breeze ruffling her hair as she stared at the spot where the woman had been before. Her head was hanging low, and she looked sad- or worried? He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen his mom look that upset where she thought he might see her.
“Mom?” Shouta asks hesitantly, looking around for the missing person.
She took a deep breath and smiled thinly. “Shouta. Come on, it’s time to go home.” She walks back toward him, taking her purse in one hand, and his hand in the other. He thought he could feel hers shaking a little.
“Mom… Did you know them?” He scuffed his heels in the mulch as they made their way over to the plastic boundary. Just as he’s about to step over it, she jerks him to a halt, eyes wide, as if realizing something.
“Ah- Shouta- let’s, walk along here to the exit of the park, yeah? Don’t want to get our shoes wet.” She offered him another smile, but looked worriedly at the plastic. Looking closer, there appeared to be little metal bolts in it. Shouta frowned, kicking some mulch absentmindedly.
“Ok.” He mumbled, looking away from the grass and boundary. It wasn’t wet. It hadn’t rained in a few days and there wasn’t any dew. He hated it when his mom lied to him. She was upset for a reason.
Seeing his frustration, his mom sighed. Scooting her purse up onto her elbow, she ran her hand through her hair. “No, I didn’t know them.” She looked thoughtful for a moment. “She might have known your dad. I’m not sure.”
He nods. Shouta loved his mom, and he loved when she let him ask all his questions. She wasn’t like his classmates, or teachers. She never laughed, or got too confused, or judgemental. She just answered them, and she usually didn’t lie. He liked that she treated him like he could understand. So he forgives her for lying this once, and leaves it be. “Why was she fuzzy?”
There’s a stutter in his mom’s step. “Fuzzy? What do you mean?”
He screwed his mouth up, frustrated. “I don’t know. I couldn’t look at her right. It was weird. Hurt my head.” He tapped his forehead, right above his eyes. “My eyes weren’t dry, though. I checked.”
His mom looked pale. “Okay. Shouta?”
“Mm?”
“Shouta.” His mom stopped, and knelt down to look him straight in the eye. She clasped his hand between hers, purse swinging slightly. “I’m being extra serious, right now, okay?” He nodded, shoulders rising toward his ears.
“If you see another person who’s- fuzzy, or gives you a bad feeling, I want you to ignore it, okay?”
“But-”
“No buts, Shouta. Don’t look too closely, treat them like anyone else. But don’t say thank you, and if they ask for your name, I don’t want you to answer. Come find me.” Her eyes were a little too wide, her hands still clammy. He almost protested again, but her grip on his hands was just a little too tight.
“...Okay”
She smiled at him, more genuine than before. “Good. Thank you.” She stands up, brushing off imaginary dirt from her top before resuming their walk home.
After a minute of silence, he couldn’t keep quiet any longer. “Mom?” Shouta wrung his hands together, eyes firmly on the ground.
“Yes?”
“Why were you so mad earlier? Why was it so weird? Why’d you make me promise that?” He was worried she would get upset again, or act weird, and make him make more promises he didn’t understand. She knows he hates that.
His mom hummed quietly, expression lighter than before. “You trust me, right?”
A little taken aback, Shouta nodded quickly. She let out a small huff of amusement.
“Alright. I know you love figuring things out for yourself, kiddo. But you know how sometimes, you just don’t get it? Like- there’s grown up stuff you just don’t understand until you’re older.”
“Like taxes.”
She laughed. “Exactly.”
His mom paused a second before continuing, her hands twisting a hair band on her wrist. “So, it’s not really sensible to try and ‘get it’ right this second, yeah? Let the grown ups worry. You’ll learn eventually, or I’ll tell you, and you’re a pretty smart kid. If you’re not able to get it right now, and you don’t have to understand it yet, it’s only logical to wait just a bit. Just until you’re older.”
She looked back at Shouta, eyebrows raised. A very serious expression on his face, Shouta considered her words. He knew there was something more that he was missing, that he didn’t understand, and that his mom was hiding things from him. But he trusted her. He nodded again. “It’s only logical. Okay.”