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Izuku struggles with returning to UA after everything is all said and done. The months he spent in constant motion, always on the lookout for trouble, every sense straining to catch villains before they caught him; they’ve left their mark on him. He lays awake at night, staring at his ceiling and trying to convince himself that it’s okay to be here.
It’s okay to stop moving.
It’s okay to rest.
Every time he does manage to fall asleep, it’s shallow, and he snaps awake at the slightest bump or scuff from the rooms around him.
The lingering exhaustion only worsens his other problems. He races to catch up, academically, to his classmates. Months of lectures and reading and homework have been backlogged for him, and while the teachers are being more than generous and lightening the load for him, that doesn’t do much for his struggles to understand the material he’s supposed to be learning now.
His classmates help, in that regard. Aoyama is one of his greatest tutors; a flip in roles that leaves Izuku reeling for the first few days. Yaoyorozu and Todoroki’s insights are invaluable, and even Kacchan helps in his own, gruff way.
Being surrounded by his classmates and given almost-constant companionship is both culture shock and yet it feels like coming home. Uraraka and Todoroki are both reluctant to leave Izuku’s side while Kacchan lurks nearby like a cat: aloof yet showing affection in his own way.
All of which makes Iida’s avoidance of Izuku stand out even more.
For the first few weeks, Izuku hardly notices, caught in the rush of reacclimating to the dorms and the classroom and the lack of constant threats. Danger Sense is the quietest he’s ever experienced it, reduced to a low-level hum in the back of his head. Its lack of presence overwhelms him in its own way.
Once he notices Iida’s absence, however, he can’t stop noticing it. The few times they do interact, Iida is stilted and closed-off.
Izuku can’t help but be reminded of the days after the Sports Festival in their first year.
When he asks Uraraka and Todoroki if they know what’s going on with Iida, Todoroki just shrugs noncommittally.
Uraraka, on the other hand, has half an answer.
“I think he’s hurt,” she says, tapping her index finger against her chin in a gesture she picked up from Tsuyu. “And he doesn’t know how to deal with it. We all spent a lot of time worried for you, and I’m not sure why, but he took it harder than anyone else. At least—that’s my guess! My quirk’s not mindreading.”
She laughs, then, an awkward little half-giggle. Izuku lets her shrug off the heavy atmosphere, and she and Todoroki strike up a conversation about something entirely unrelated. Izuku half-listens to them, that cloud of seriousness still hanging around his head as he chews over what Uraraka just told him.
Guilt gnaws at his stomach. He has known they worried about him. They only told him so the first time he walked back in the door. Still, whenever it comes up, that guilt comes surging back, as strong as always.
Izuku continues mulling over Uraraka’s thought for the next few days. His chest and head are twin storms, thoughts and emotions twining around each other like cyclones. He can hardly name each of the sour feelings which sit in his gut, guilt and resignation and indignation twisting together until they’re inseparable.
One evening, he manages to lose his Kacchan-shaped shadow and catch Iida alone.
“Can we talk?” he asks, snagging Iida’s elbow with one hand to keep the other boy from pretending he didn’t hear him. It’s happened a few times already, although Izuku has been pretending it hasn’t been happening.
“Oh, yes, of course,” Iida responds quick. Izuku tries not to read too much into the speed of his reply, but it’s hard not to—is he uncomfortable? “What do you want to talk about?”
“Um, maybe somewhere … private?” Izuku tries for a smile, the corners of his mouth curling up.
He’s not sure it worked, because Iida still looks down at him with an unreadable expression.
Tension grows between them the longer Iida goes without replying. Finally, when Izuku’s about to shake everything off and say ‘nevermind’ and retreat back to Kacchan, Iida speaks.
“Very well. We can speak in my room, I suppose, if that works for you?”
Izuku nods. “Sure. Yeah, that’s fine with me.” He tries not to sigh in relief, instead carefully exhaling. The smile feels a bit more real, now.
He lets his hand drop from Iida’s elbow and follows him upstairs. The air between them is still fraught with tension, but at least Izuku didn’t get immediately brushed off.
Once they’re in Iida’s room, Iida shuts the door behind them. The room has changed, somewhat, since their first year. It still has shelves and shelves of books and an absurd number of spare glasses, but there’s also more mess, now. Paperwork and pens and a couple books are strewn across the desk and a few shirts hang off the end of his bed.
“Well?” Iida asks. He does not sit down, nor does he gesture for Izuku to do so anywhere. “What did you wish to speak with me about?”
“Ah ….” Izuku ducks his head and fidgets with his hands, wringing his fingers together. “Are you upset with me? You’ve been … avoiding me.”
Iida blinks. “I’m not avoiding you. I’m talking to you right now.”
That is a terrible lie, and they both know it. Izuku’s patience is thin at best these days, and he shoves down the impulse to huff and roll his eyes. “Don’t play dumb with me. You’ve hardly talked to me outside of class. You barely spend any time with me.” Izuku chuckles dryly. “I think you talk to Kacchan more than you talk to me.”
“Are you jealous?” Iida asks, brow furrowing.
“I’m not—no! No, I’m not jealous, and that’s not what I’m saying.” Izuku takes a deep breath. Where the hell did he get jealousy from?
“Then what are you saying?”
Izuku takes another deep breath. “I’m just. You’ve been avoiding me. I want to know why. Did I do something wrong?”
Iida frowns and glares at nothing in particular. He takes some time to reply, time which Izuku spends shifting his weight from foot to foot.
“Do you remember what you told to me in our first year, before we went to our internships?”
“Uh, yeah, I think so?” Just about as well as he can remember anything he said in their first year. Izuku tilts his head, watching Iida carefully.
“You told me that if I needed someone to talk to, I could always talk to you and Uraraka, because we’re friends.”
“Right ….” Yeah, Izuku remembers that. He should have tried harder to get Iida to talk, but that’s a regret he doesn’t like to dwell over.
“And I chose not to talk to you. I stewed in my anger and let it consume me. I let revenge motivate me and I chased an enemy I could not face. I could have died for that, you could have died for that, Todoroki could have died for that, and it’s only through dumb luck that we didn’t.”
As he speaks, his face grows darker and stormier.
Izuku’s gut burns as he realizes where Iida is going with this.
“And almost a year later—“—Iida turns that stormy gaze on Izuku—“you do almost the exact same thing.”
“No.” Izuku surprises himself with how steely his voice comes out. “These aren’t two situations you can compare like that.”
Iida crosses his arms. “Aren’t they? After a devastating fight, one that kill—killed Midnight, one with countless civilian tragedies, one that almost killed Bakugou, how is that not a revenge mission?”
Well, for one thing, I was the bait. Izuku won’t say that, but he thinks it as he takes a deep breath. “It’s different because Shigaraki was hunting me. I didn’t …. I couldn’t stand it if UA was another Jyakku.”
“You could have talked to us. We were all there at Jyakku or involved in our own missions. You could have …. You could have said something instead of vanishing. But rather than talk to your friends, you never said a thing.”
“I’m. I, I don’t ….” Izuku fishes for the right words. “I’m sorry, okay? It was just, there was a lot going on at the time, and there just. There wasn’t time to explain or talk to anyone more than we were already involving.”
“We didn’t even get to see you after you woke up,” Iida says, quiet, shaking, dangerous.
“I’m sorry,” Izuku repeats, running a shaking hand through his hair. His vision begins to blur with tears. “Is, is this why you’ve been avoiding me?”
“I haven’t been avoiding you—”
“Yes, you have.”
“—I’ve been giving us space while I work out my feelings,” Iida finishes, talking right over Izuku.
How can he not see that those are the same thing? “You could have told me that!” Izuku snaps, tugging at his hair with one hand. “Because you have been avoiding me! Your reasons for doing so aren’t erasing the fact that is what you’ve been doing.”
For several long moments, Iida doesn’t reply. “I think,” he finally says, pausing like he’s worried about what he’s going to say next. “I think neither of us are in the headspace to be having this conversation right now.”
“I’m fine.” Izuku takes a deep breath, scrubbing the tears from his eyes with the palm of his hand. “I cry all the time. It’s fine.”
“This isn’t because you’re crying. We are very emotionally charged and clearly are not communicating well.”
Izuku grits his teeth and fights down the urge to snap back. He’s trying, okay? He’s trying to listen to what Iida has to say but that’s hard to do when it feels like Iida isn’t listening to a single thing Izuku says.
“Fine. Okay,” he bites out, voice just a hair shy of a growl. “Okay. We can, we can come back to this later, I guess.” He turns on his heel and strides for the door.
“Midoriya, I—”
Izuku pauses, his hand on the doorknob, and glances back at Iida. Iida is caught, stuck, between stepping toward, reaching toward Izuku, and hanging back.
“I—” Iida starts again and cuts himself off again. His hand drops to his side as he swallows. “That … sounds good. I’ll … message you?”
A wave of sudden exhaustion crashes over Izuku and all he wants to do is curl up and sleep. “Yeah. Sure. Sounds good.”
Before Iida can get another word in, Izuku steps through the door and pulls it shut behind him.