Chapter Text
Holidays at the Todoroki household suck, as a rule.
It’s Natsuo’s second year of dragging himself home from university to see his family. Last year, Shouto had had to stay in the school dorms so he wouldn’t get murdered by villains, so Natsuo and Enji had gotten into a pretty intense fight that ended with Natsuo leaving a week early to go back to school--leaving Fuyumi home alone with Enji longer than necessary. Natsuo’s not exactly proud of how it went, but he also fucking hates his dad.
This year, though, Enji’s not going to be there for all of it. It’s the only thing that had convinced Natsuo to get a train ticket--Fuyumi’s pleading voice would have been enough if Natsuo was a good brother, but he’s not. Shouto’s going to be home, too, and Natsuo hasn’t seen him in forever, so. He might as well.
He’ll stay a week. If it starts going to shit, he can always come back early.
Natsuo packs up some bags. His girlfriend Kaori walks him to the train station early in the morning. She’s not a morning person, so Natsuo appreciates the gesture--and her face still puffy from sleep and half-buried in a scarf is cute as well.
“Have a good break.” He smiles, shifting a little because he can only see the top of her head--she’s leaning against him in an attempt to fall asleep standing up. She grumbles at the movement and stands up straight, facing him. “Text me.”
“Ugh, fine.” Kaori yawns and checks her watch. “I’ll see if I can fit you into my Google calendar.”
Natsuo snorts. “I’m not in your Google calendar already?”
“Sucks to suck.” She kisses him briefly, just as the train rolls into sight. “Be safe.”
She has no idea how relevant that advice is. Natsuo just smiles and kisses her again and gets on the train.
When he knocks on the front door, nobody answers it. Snow is starting to fall, and his toes are freezing from the walk over--but he’s also the only living family member who gets affected by the cold like this so he just sucks it up. His key still works, at least, so he lets himself in and sees shoes that must be Fuyumi’s and Shouto’s--they must both be home.
“Hello?” he calls. There isn’t an answer.
Natsuo takes off his shoes and wanders to the living room, where he finds Shouto sitting on the couch playing a video game.
“Hi,” Natsuo says.
Shouto blinks up at him, slow enough to make Natsuo feel stupid. “Hi.”
“Did you get in this morning?” Natsuo asks.
Shouto nods, perfectly disinterested.
Natsuo takes a deep breath and tries not to get annoyed. Shouto’s had kind of a traumatizing semester at UA and maybe Shouto isn’t feeling very...present right now. (Natsuo’s trying to be fucking compassionate because Fuyumi yelled at him before when Natsuo had the nerve to assume that Shouto should show interest in a conversation he’s having.)
“Cool,” Natsuo says. “Where’s Fuyumi?”
“Upstairs,” Shouto says, and then goes back to his game.
Quite the warm welcome.
Natsuo goes up the stairs and nudges open the door to his room. Everything is still exactly the same as it was before--just with a thin layer of dust over the tops of the wardrobe and shelves. The wallpaper and ceiling haven’t changed since he was born. His bed has new sheets and a new comforter now, which must have been Fuyumi’s doing, because Natsuo left without doing anything like that last time.
He tosses his duffel bag onto the futon and puts his coat down too before leaving again to find his sister.
As he approaches Fuyumi’s room, he thinks he can hear her in there, so he pushes the semi-closed door open to peek in.
It’s not a calm Fuyumi he finds. She’s doubled over herself by her desk, one hand steadying herself and the other on her knee to keep herself upright. Her breathing is heavy and her eyes are squeezed shut.
Natsuo knocks on the open door, unsure. “Hey. Are you okay?”
She jolts, and turns to face him. Her eyes are wide, but then they narrow and she wheezes, angry, “Get out.”
He takes a surprised step backwards, more taken off-guard than upset. “What the hell?”
“Get out!” she snaps.
“Jeez, I’m just asking if something is wrong--”
“It’s fine. ”
Natsuo frowns. “Are you having a panic attack?”
“Leave. I’m not kidding.” Fuyumi points a shaking hand. When Natsuo doesn’t budge, still rooted to the spot, she storms over and slams the door in his face.
Natsuo's hand is still raised as if to knock again. Inside, he can hear Fuyumi wheezing and coaching herself through breathing, but if she doesn’t want his help, fine.
Natsuo turns and retreats back to his room, not feeling all too excited about the upcoming two weeks.
Natsuo had been home for approximately forty-five minutes when his rest and relaxation is further ruined by a phone call from one of his partners on a group project. Natsuo had had to catch a specific train home, so he’d left before his group members had actually submitted the project, because he thought that maybe between the three of them they could figure this out , but--
“Kaneko said he’d submit it after he finished his part, but he missed the deadline and now--”
“ No ,” Natsuo says, and shuts his bedroom door before crossing back to where he’d been under the covers, trying to take a nap. He puts his face in a pillow and screams his heart out before picking the phone back up. “Can we email Sensei?”
“I already did, but could you email too? She likes you better.”
“That’s because I show up to class.”
“Fuck off.” Saito is clearly feeling a bit high-strung, reflecting Natsuo’s current descent into frustration. The project had been one of the biggest parts of their grade so far this year, and Natsuo’s going to commit some sort of crime if Kaneko’s mistake means all of their grades are going to be docked.
It’s supposed to be a relaxing break (if not relaxing, at least medium- to low-stress). But right now, as Natsuo is sitting up and digging through his bags to find his laptop-- where did he put it --he’s the furthest thing from calm.
“Kaneko got the easiest part,” Natsuo grumbles.
“That’s what I’m saying,” Saito exclaims. He’s a bit high-strung, even on the best days. “I don’t know how he managed to fuck it so bad!”
“Ugh, right. Kaneko will see a project compoenent and say, ‘is anyone gonna fuck this?’ And then not wait for an answer.”
While Saito laughs, Natsuo finally finds his laptop and cracks it open. He has no fewer than twelve new emails from his group members, all screaming about the missed deadline (with many impotent excuses from Kaneko). There’s a new email from his professor, too, sent right after the deadline passed--offering extra credit in wake of the massive amount of missed points.
Natsuo’s stomach rolls. He cannot get a bad grade in this class.
He starts typing an email, trying to strike a balance between begging for his life and also not sounding like he’s shifting the blame to someone else (even though it is Kaneko’s whole entire fault ). Saito keeps chattering, anxious about the entire prospect--he’s relying on a merit scholarship that costs him no small amount of lost sleep--and Natsuo doesn’t want to tell him to shut up but it’s really not helping him focus.
So it’s in this state that someone opens his bedroom door without knocking. It’s not a good time.
“Could you knock?” Natuso asks, not looking up, trying to type and talk at the same time.
Whoever it is knocks on the open door in a supremely sarcastic way--it must be Shouto.
“Oh my god-- what ?” Natuso snaps, and wrenches his gaze away from his laptop.
Shouto’s face doesn’t really change, but he takes a step back and his demeanor kind of closes off. He’s holding an Xbox controller. “I can’t beat this level. Would you help me?”
“In a minute?” Natsuo says. “I’m on the phone.”
“Sorry.”
“Close my door.”
Shouto closes the door.
“Sorry, that was my little brother,” Natsuo says, but he’s starting to get a creeping feeling of guilt and he can’t really engage with Saito after that. After he ends the phone call and sends off the email, he gives up on his nap and goes down to the living room.
Shouto is sitting quietly on the floor, scrolling through something or other on his phone. The TV is paused on what looks like Wander and the Colossus.
“When did we get an Xbox?” Natsuo asks, and his sudden appearance makes Shouto jump.
His little brother blinks at him owlishly, then looks back at the TV screen. “I bought it with his credit card.”
Natsuo laughs out loud, which makes Shouto relax a little bit. “I played this last year, but I can try this level if you want.”
“I think it’s kind of stupid,” Shouto says, seeming kind of hesitant to share his opinion. “To kill them for no reason. But this one sucks especially.”
It’s not even one of the more difficult levels, but Natsuo has also never seen Shouto play a video game before, so Natsuo doesn’t tease. He’s not sure if that’s one of the many things that’ll make Shouto shut down on him.
Natsuo sits, and plays. Shouto sits, and watches. The volume on the TV is turned to almost zero, and nobody shatters the quiet until Fuyumi appears from somewhere and sinks onto the couch next to Natsuo and says a small, “I ordered takeout for dinner.”
Natsuo hums acknowledgement and pulls his third colossus to the ground, and then hands the controller back to Shouto.
“Thanks,” Shouto says, but he’s doing his looking-distant thing again and Natsuo wonders if “thanks” is just Shouto’s automatic response to anything being handed to him while he’s like this.
Shouto doesn’t resume the game. Fuyumi looks exhausted when Natsuo glances over at her, and Natsuo kind of has a headache from his half-panic earlier. He’s about to suggest that they all just go to bed early when Shouto speaks up voluntarily.
“I got a weird text today,” he says.
“Oh?” Fuyumi asks. She’s trying so very hard to look interested.
Being in this house just makes all of them so tired. It makes all of them so frustrated and irritable and at-the-end-of-their-ropes.
Shouto nods solemnly, and holds out his unlocked phone to display a text from an unsaved number. Natsuo squints and Fuyumi has to adjust her glasses to see because Shouto’s hand isn’t perfectly steady so it’s hard to read the screen.
“Sick fight last week, bud,” it reads, “Are you and your siblings free tomorrow?”
“What the hell?” Natsuo asks.
Fuyumi looks more than uncomfortable when she and Natsuo exchange a glance. “Maybe a classmate got your number. Have they texted you before?”
“A few times,” Shouto says. He turns the phone back around to look at the text again. “Would you go with me to meet them?”
“What the hell,” Natsuo says again, which is his only current response to this situation.
“No,” Fuyumi says emphatically. “Shouchan, you can’t just go meet them.”
Shouto types something and sends it before Natsuo or Fuyumi can stop him.
“Shouto!” Natsuo exclaims. “What did you send?”
“I asked where to meet,” Shouto says. He looks unbothered. “Have they ever texted you guys?”
“Shouto wins ‘Todoroki most likely to be dead in an alleyway’,” Natsuo says, and Fuyumi is torn between admonishing him and hiding a laugh behind one hand. Both of them pull out their phones and dutifully search the number, and, horrifyingly, both of them find months-old texts they completely forgot about.
“They sent ‘happy birthday’ earlier this year,” Fuyumi finally says.
Natsuo blinks at his phone, and wonders how the hell he forgot that “They texted me ‘good luck on exams’ last semester.”
Shouto’s phone buzzes. He unlocks it and intently reads the new message. Then he holds out the phone to show his siblings what’s going on. “He won’t come unless all three of us are there,” Shouto says.
“This is a really good way to get fucking kidnapped,” Natsuo says.
Fuyumi is fidgeting, trying hard not to look too jumpy whilst simultaneously looking extremely jumpy. “Shouchan, I don’t think...Listen, your class has been targeted for villain attacks in the past.”
Shouto scowls. “I can protect us. It’ll be at a tea shop near here, so there’ll be other people there too.”
“What if we get poisoned?” Natsuo challenges.
“We won’t get poisoned, ” Shouto whines. “Please just come?”
Neither Natsuo or Fuyumi are intent to budge. Sensing this, Shouto pulls his dumbass distant-baby-brother card and sort of pouts and says, “I want to hang out with you guys outside of this shitty house for once. I thought because he wasn’t going to be here you guys would want to too.”
Fuyumi sighs. “We can do literally anything else except meet up with a weirdo at a tea shop.”
“I wouldn’t--!” Shouto takes a deep breath, and his voice sinks back into a monotone. “I wouldn’t be insisting on this if I didn’t have a feeling it was important. ”
“Have you never had a stalker before?” Natsuo asks. He dimly remembers having to change elementary schools because of something like that--and he remembers Touya having a similar issue when Dad started taking him out on hero patrols. But Shouto’s always been more sheltered than the rest of them. More valuable.
Shouto has closed off again, sensing that the two of them are done discussing the issue--he’s sensed that he’s not going to convince them, so he’s changing tactics. “Fine. I’ll go by myself.”
“Shouto,” Fuyumi says, but Shouto keeps talking.
“No, it’s fine. I’ll just go. He won’t show up but it’s okay.” Shouto gets up and turns off the TV. For someone who would have gotten the shit kicked out of him for guilt-tripping anyone for the first fifteen years of his life, Shouto is pretty good at it.
He’s kind of a brat, if Natsuo is being honest.
“I wanted to hang out with the two of you over break. It’s fine, though.”
“Oh my god,” Natsuo says. “Why are you trying to get us murdered.”
“We won’t get murdered,” Shouto says evenly.
The doorbell rings. It’s probably dinner.
“Let’s discuss this tomorrow,” Fuyumi says.
The three of them eat in near-silence. Natsuo, as usual, devours the most, but Fuyumi fights him for a fair share of rice and Shouto goes back for thirds and it’s kind of a relief that both of them are eating normally.
When they’re done eating, they continue not-talking. They gather up the containers and throw them away and wipe down the table and then retreat back to the living room. Natsuo sits on the couch and his siblings follow suit, though Fuyumi slumps against Natsuo while Shouto perches uncomfortably at the other end.
None of them seem to remember how to talk to each other like siblings. There was a time when Fuyumi and Natsuo were close (never as close as Natsuo and Touya were), but that went away once they started needing to buckle down on schoolwork. It really went away when Natsuo and Fuyumi got into a screaming argument about whether or not they should leave home--ending with Natsuo leaving for college and Fuyumi staying behind.
Natsuo, however, wants to be able to talk to them. So he jumps headfirst into conversation and says, “Are you guys seeing anybody?”
Fuyumi immediately ducks her head, which means she totally is. “Why?”
“I’m making conversation.” He nudges her with his elbow. “Who is it?”
Fuyumi’s face is red, and she won’t answer.
“You should invite him over,” Natsuo says.
“I don’t want to bring him here,” Fuyumi immediately says, voice steely.
That’s...fair.
“He’s not coming over until he has to,” Fuyumi continues, and picks at a loose thread in the couch. “It would be nice if you two wanted to meet him, but we’d have to do it somewhere else.”
This isn’t something that Natsuo and Fuyumi have talked about explicitly, but--yeah. It’s expected that they’ll move into one of the extra rooms of the estate with their spouses at some point, Natsuo thinks. There’s room here, and their father might insist on it.
Natsuo cannot think of a worse place to raise a family. It’s why nobody has told Him about any romantic endeavors (no pun intended).
“Okay. Yeah, let’s do it. Hey, if you want to come visit me at school, you could meet my girlfriend Kaori, too.”
Kaori’s a year older than him and she’s on a volleyball scholarship and she’s studying public relations and Natsuo keeps trying to convince her to go to med school with him so they can take pre-med classes together. He thinks that she and Fuyumi would like each other. Kaori might like Shouto too--she has three siblings and she might understand Shouto’s monosyllabic answers better than someone without siblings would.
Fuyumi asks, “How long?”
“Five months. And you?”
“A year and a half.” Fuyumi tilts her head, considering how much to tell them, but then comes out and says it. “His name’s Yuuto. We couldn’t really be official until he came out, because you know how Father is about that sort of thing? So really more like two years.”
Natsuo has no idea what Fuyumi is saying, but a glance at Shouto tells him that Shouto knows what’s going on, so Natsuo pretends like he does too.
“Congratulations,” Natsuo says lamely.
“Thanks.”
Fuyumi and Natsuo regard each other, trying to process the sheer amount of each others’ lives that the two of them have missed out on. And then both of them turn to Shouto in unison.
Shouto blinks at them.
“What’s up with you , then?” Natsuo asks. “Seeing someone?”
Fuyumi opens her mouth and says, “Well, there is someone he’s interested in--”
“Really?” Natsuo asks, blindsided. He’d been asking as a joke. Shouto doesn’t seem like the type to give a shit about that sort of thing.
“Yumi!” Shouto hisses, and the look he shoots Natsuo’s way can only be described as panicked .
Natsuo’s heart sinks. Shouto obviously doesn’t want him to know. “I mean, it’s okay if you don’t want to say…”
Shouto crosses his arms and avoids eye contact. “There’s nobody.”
Fuyumi hums, judgemental. “Shouchan, he’s not going to freak out.”
Freak out about what? Why is his little brother so fucking weird?
Shouto hunches his shoulders further. “It’s not like it matters,” he mutters. “I’ll get put in a Quirk marriage anyway once I turn Pro.”
Oh. Yikes.
“That’s illegal,” Natsuo says. It’s a dumb thing to say, because that hasn’t stopped Enji before, but it’s all he can think of to reassure Shouto.
Shouto shrugs.
“Who is it? Maybe Dad will actually approve of them. Does she have a good Quirk?”
Both Fuyumi and Shouto snort in the exact same way, and then give each other a weird look.
After an uncomfortable lapse of silence, Shouto finally asks, “Did you watch the Sports Festival last year?”
Natsuo nods.
“I fought them during the one-on-ones.”
This feels like a test, somehow, to see if Natsuo remembers things about Shouto’s life, so Natsuo does his best to recall. There had been the tape guy, and then the guy who broke all his bones, and then the guy who’d been shackled to the awards stage (which had been fucked up). He’s not forgetting someone, is he? “Did you fight a girl at some point? I’m trying to remember.”
Fuyumi pinches his arm and gives him a look like are you fucking stupid , and Natsuo looks back to see Shouto watching him carefully, expression guarded like it always is. Oh. Natsuo is fucking stupid.
Right. It’s not like he ever expected this, but Natsuo can roll with it.
“Which one was it?”
“You can’t guess?” Shouto asks, raising an eyebrow.
Natsuo rolls his eyes, but does his best. Tape guy was...odd, and the fight was too short for him to be anywhere near an equal to Shouto (but maybe he was nice in normal life). The explosions guy had literally knocked Shouto the fuck out and probably yelled too much for Shouto to be interested (unless Shouto was into that?). The green-haired kid had gotten Shouto to use both his Quirks, and had almost gotten himself killed, but was the most plain-looking of the three (not that Shouto seems to care about how people look).
“Midoriya?” Natsuo guesses, at random.
Shouto nods, and goes back to his phone.
“Wait, hold on--his Quirk is really powerful, though.”
“He’s a he, ” Shouto states plainly. “And he’s All Might’s protégé.”
“Oh, shit,” Natsuo says.
“See what I’ve been dealing with?” Fuyumi asks.
Shouto’s face flushes red, but it’s because he’s embarrassed and not because he’s mad.
“He’s had him over a few times,” Fuyumi says, and gives Natsuo a look that implies something and Natsuo wants to throw up at the thought of his brother getting up to anything like that in this house. Not in a homophobic way, it’s just--it’s an unspoken rule between him and Fuyumi that they don’t hook up with people here and maybe they should’ve looped Shouto in on that information. “And he told Mom about him.”
“We’re not together,” Shouto says, noticing the look Fuyumi is giving Natsuo. “He’s just a friend.”
“For how much longer, though?” Fuyumi stage-whispers to Natsuo.
This is the last straw. Without any more protesting, Shouto gets up and leaves the room.
Fuyumi and Natsuo watch him leave. When Shouto’s out of view, Fuyumi says, “I shouldn’t have yelled at you earlier.”
Natsuo says, “I was just making sure you weren’t dying of poison or something.”
Fuyumi glares at him. “I was just. Panicking. You know. Because--actually, it doesn’t matter. Holidays just stress me out.”
“I feel you there,” Natsuo says. “I wasn’t gonna judge you or anything.”
“Sure,” Fuyumi says, sounding dubious. She doesn’t say anything else.
Todoroki Fuyumi created Group: [ Todoroki Fuyumi, Todoroki Natsuo, Todoroki Shouto ]
XX/12/25
Fuyumi: why is someone singing
Fuyumi: @Natsuo @Natsuo @Natsuo shut up challenge
Natsuo: i’m performing
Natsuo: why don’t you appreciate my art i thought you were fam
Fuyumi: it’s one in the morning laws of fam don’t exist right now. some of us have sleep schedules
Fuyumi: @NATSUO
Fuyumi: if you start that song over one more time i’ll snap
Todoroki Shouto changed Todoroki Fuyumi ’s nickname to Sister Snapped
Sister Snapped: i hate you both i hate you both i hate you both i hate you both
It’s Christmas, and Enji isn’t home. He’s not due home until the 4th. Consequently, Natsuo experiences the least high-tension Christmas he’s ever had in his life.
None of them get up until around ten, and then Natsuo makes hot chocolate and the three of them sit on the couch and play Super Smash Bros. until Shouto falls asleep again. Natsuo wonders if he should be helping reduce how fucked up Shouto’s sleep schedule is, but Fuyumi gives him a look that tells him not to wake him up. Natsuo leaves him alone.
Really, the day passes without stress. None of them have gotten each other gifts, which is customary, but nobody gets hit and nobody ends up having a panic attack in the bathroom after a meal and nobody gets in an argument that escalates to shouting.
The bar for a good day is extremely low. They hurdle over it like Olympic athletes.
“You want boba?” Natsuo calls, the next morning. He knocks louder on Shouto’s door.
“He might be asleep,” Fuyumi says. Shouto’s allegedly been sleeping fourteen-hour nights since he got home, maybe to recover from the semester he’s had. But it’s almost eleven and that means Shouto should get up.
“Hey,” Natsuo says, ignoring Fuyumi. He pounds his fist into the door. “Boba?”
Finally, he hears something stir within the bedroom, and then some footsteps across the tatami. The Shouto that greets him has severe bedhead and dark rings under his eyes and red sleep-lines etched into both arms and his unscarred cheek.
“What do you want?” Shouto asks.
“We’re getting boba,” Fuyumi says.
“It’s literally lunchtime, bud. Why were you still asleep?” Natsuo asks.
Shouto blinks at him. He rubs his eyes and takes his sweet time responding, long enough for Natsuo to get irritated. “I’m tired.”
Natsuo doesn’t know what answer he expected, anyway.
“Please come with us?” Fuyumi asks. “We haven’t gone since you started UA.”
Apparently Fuyumi and Shouto used to get bubble tea together, when Natsuo first left. This is something Natsuo is learning just today.
“Can we meet with the person--”
“No,” Natsuo and Fuyumi say.
Shouto shuts the door in their faces, but Natsuo sticks his foot in the way and blocks it, and then squeezes through the opening so he’s in Shouto’s room. “C’mon bud! Let’s do it. Get changed.”
“I’m going back to bed,” Shouto states plainly.
Fuyumi is just as good at guilt-tripping as Shouto is (maybe Natsuo needs to learn this skill too, but he doesn’t have as much of a leg to stand on in the guilt department as his siblings). She proves this when she says, “Shouchan, I missed you. Are you really going to sit in here all day?”
“Yes,” Shouto says.
“Oh,” Fuyumi says. Her face looks sad, but Natsuo’s almost entirely sure she’s acting. “I thought we could have some time together outside of the house. But if you want to stay here, I guess that’s okay.”
Shouto stares her down. She holds his gaze.
“Fine,” Shouto finally mumbles. He scowls when Natsuo ruffles his hair.
“Get changed! We’ll see you downstairs.”
Shouto keeps texting someone while they’re walking towards the nearest bubble tea place, about ten minutes away. He almost runs into a few obstacles while he’s distracted, but he scowls at Natsuo every time Natsuo pulls him out of a collision course anyway.
“Are you texting your stalker?” Fuyumi asks.
“I’m not ,” Shouto says. He pulls his phone closer to his chest, but not before Natsuo can read that he’s texting someone named Izuku.
“Is that--”
“Stop,” Shouto says, and then bonks his forehead into a lightpost at full speed as he tries to evade Natsuo.
Fuyumi stops, and tries to assess the damage to Shouto’s forehead, but Natsuo just takes the opportunity to look at the screen again. There are...too many heart emojis for them to be mere friends. “Who’s Izuku?” he asks, teasing.
“Stop it,” Shouto says, and swats Fuyumi’s hands away from his face. He puts his right hand onto his forehead to ice his bruise.
“Stop texting, we’re having sibling time,” Fuyumi says.
Shouto glowers at her, and then resumes typing.
“Shouto.” Fuyumi jabs her arm out to smack at his phone. He swings it out of the way. “Shouto.”
She swipes again and hits the phone out of his hand and it tumbles towards the sidewalk, but Shouto grabs it just in time and grumbles about how it could have broken. He shoulders Fuyumi hard enough for her to get knocked off-balance. She shoulders him back and he careens into another lightpost.
“Ow,” Shouto complains, monotone.
“Put your phone away,” Natsuo says.
Instead of appreciating the backup, Fuyumi gives Natsuo a dirty look. “I’m in charge.”
“Fuck you, you’re not in charge of anything.”
“Fuck you, I’m in charge,” Fuyumi says, as if swearing louder will make her point better.
Shouto goes back to texting Midoriya, ignoring the power struggle.
When they reach the boba shop, Natsuo and Fuyumi cut off their argument so they can enter the establishment in a respectful manner. Their icy silence goes completely unnoticed by Shouto, who’s always silent anyway. Fuyumi and Natsuo keep “accidentally” treading on each other’s feet and then hissing at each other.
Group: [ midnight is 30 not 56 ]
XX/12/27
Sister Snapped: someone get the door
Sister Snapped: @Natsuo answer the door right now
Natsuo: i can’t i have homework :/
Sister Snapped: why do you suck so bad
Natsuo: vacuum cleaner quirk :////////////
Shouto: Can someone answer the door i heard someone knock
Natsuo: no
Sister Snapped: no you do it
Shouto: That was a test and you both failed. I ordered meat buns and they couldve been yours
Natsuo: WHAT
Todoroki Shouto changed Todoroki Natsuo ’s nickname to Hungry Idiot
Shouto: :-)
Todoroki Natsuo changed the group name to shouto is #1 worst younger brother
Todoroki Shouto changed Todoroki Shouto ’s nickname to #1 Worst Younger Brother
Sister Snapped: ugh i love seeing you reclaim that for yourself
Hungry Idiot: @Shouto where the FUCK are you hiding you little bastard
Natsuo gets out of the shower and sees Shouto sitting on his bed, talking on Natsuo’s phone like he owns it. He hears Shouto say, “Yeah. What are you studying?”
“Who are you talking to?” Natsuo demands in a whisper.
Shouto raises a middle finger at him and says, “Oh. That’s cool. Yeah. No, I go to UA.”
Natsuo charges across the room and makes a wild grab for the phone, but Shouto dodges out of the way and then spins out of another grab, still managing to sound boring as hell when he says, “Thanks.”
Natsuo glares, and asks again, louder, “Who the fuck are you talking to?”
Shouto glares back, and his tone turns more spiteful. “He’s out of the shower. Sorry if he’s cranky, he’s been complaining about his group project for three days now.”
“I haven’t--” Natsuo manages to snatch the phone and finds that Shouto’s been talking to his girlfriend. “Dude, what the hell?”
He hears Kaori laugh, tinny in the phone speaker.
“Sorry,” Shouto says.
“Why are you even in my room ?” Natsuo asks.
Shouto just stares at him, and then gets up and leaves.
Natsuo puts the phone to his ear and says, “I’m sorry, he’s just--I have no idea why he was answering my phone.”
Kaori laughs again. She sounds like she’s enjoying the drama, which is better than her being weirded out by Shouto. “It’s okay. He seemed nice.”
“He’s.” Natsuo doesn’t know what to say. He hasn’t introduced Kaori to any of his family for a reason, and the sudden merging of his two separate lives is kind of throwing him off. “Yeah.”
Kaori moves on. “You’re still mad about that group project?”
“Of course I’m still mad about the group project! Kaneko’s a dickface.”
Kaori says, “Want to FaceTime about it?”
“ Yeah, I miss you. Let me get dressed, though.”
“If you insist,” she says. “No worries either way.”
“Wow,” he says flatly, just so he can hear her laugh again.
As Natsuo is wont to do when he’s at home, he has a nightmare.
It’s not even an original one. It’s the one that kept him up every night for about a month when he was younger, until someone got tired of hearing his yelling and got him on some trazodone to maybe make him sleep deeper. He doesn’t take the meds anymore, because his nightmares don’t make him scream anymore.
Unless he’s at home.
It’s because the wallpaper and ceiling he sees in his dream is the same of the night he’d woken up to blood-chilling screaming and crying and--that’s Fuyumi yelling and Natsuo tumbles up out of bed and his bare feet smack on the tatami and he sees Touya.
Touya’s--melting.
Touya’s face is peeling off of itself. Fuyumi didn’t see it all but she was the one who was there for the most of it--Fuyumi won’t tell Natsuo whether it was Touya or Enji who started the fight or if it was Touya or Enji who started the fire.
Enji’s--yelling.
Natsuo is frozen in horror. His feet won’t move. He should get water. He should call the police. He should. He should--
He should manifest a Quirk already maybe it’ll be ice and maybe it’ll help--
Fuyumi’s--yelling.
Touya hits the floor, writhing. Are the flames blue or red?
Natsuo can’t move.
Natsuo--can’t move.
He hears his mom crying, sees her corral Shouto so the six-year-old won’t see it--Natsuo wants to ask why do I have to see it if Shouto’s the one who’s going to be a hero .
Touya finally starts screaming when Enji reaches for him. His screaming blends with everyone else’s screaming and then it’s Natsuo that’s the one screaming and he flinches away from the hand on his arm and he bangs his knee into the wall and-- fuck.
He’s in his room. He’s nineteen. It’s getting light outside.
Fuyumi’s older too and she’s not crying and she managed to avoid his reflexive kick in her direction.
“Sorry,” Natsuo says. He tries to breathe. His sheets are damp with sweat and so is the hair that’s plastered to his forehead.
“You’re nineteen, and you’re at home,” she tells him. “It’s seven in the morning.”
Natsuo breathes.
She sits back on her heels. “Do you need anything? I’m going back to bed.”
“I’m fine. Thanks for waking me up.”
The ceiling and wallpaper of his room haven’t changed a bit.
Fuyumi smiles a tight smile and gets to her feet. He wants to ask if she still has nightmares, living here.
She leaves before he can find a way to word it.
“Where are you going?” Natsuo asks. It’s early, and Natsuo has a mouthful of omurice, and Shouto is trying to slip out the front door without being noticed. Unfortunately for Shouto, Natsuo has the hearing of a bat, and he’d also given up on falling back asleep after an hour.
Shouto freezes, a deer in the headlights, one shoe half-on and the other still untied.
“You want breakfast?” Natsuo asks.
Shouto shakes his head.
“So where are you going?” Natsuo asks. His top guesses are either hanging out with Midoriya or maybe trying to meet up with his stalker, and one of those is definitely okay but the other one is not and Natsuo has a duty to stop Shouto from ending up in a ditch somewhere.
Shouto says, “I’m visiting Mother.”
This is somehow not what Natsuo had expected.
“...Do you want to come?” Shouto asks, which is also unexpected.
“Okay,” Natsuo says. He shoves the last of his breakfast into his mouth. “Can I invite Fuyumi too?”
“She didn’t sleep well,” Shouto says. Natsuo considers asking how Shouto knows this, but leaves it alone. It makes sense that Fuyumi and Shouto would be closer than Natsuo would be with Fuyumi, but it’s still not something Natsuo wants to dwell on.
Natsuo has never been hurt by his mother. There’s not really an excuse to have not visited her, besides the fact that he wouldn’t have been physically able to until a few years ago. Still, the idea of seeing her is nerve-wracking--but if Shouto can do it, Natsuo can too.
It’s a quiet train ride, and then a quiet walk to the hospital. Shouto is half-submerged in a thick scarf around his neck, and Natsuo keeps yawning and having to brush snow out of his hair before it melts. The flakes have been falling all morning, and there aren’t many people out this early, so everything seems soft and cold.
Despite this, Natsuo’s hands are sweating as they enter the lobby. He takes off his gloves and wipes them on his jeans once, then twice, and then it’s gotten to a point where he’s just obsessively doing it and even Shouto notices.
“You’re nervous,” Shouto states, sticking his visitor’s badge to his chest and handing one to Natsuo.
“Not all of us are incurable mama’s boys,” Natsuo snaps.
Shouto is supremely unoffended by this. Or maybe he just doesn’t let people know when he’s offended. Either way, he walks very calmly up three flights of stairs and reaches Rei’s door without faltering, and Natsuo trails behind and tries to breathe.
Shouto side-eyes him. “It was hard my first time too,” he says, a rare dalliance into empathy.
Natsuo lets out a breath. “Okay.”
“She asks about you a lot.”
“Oh,” Natsuo says.
Shouto opens the door, then. He steps inside and ducks his head when Rei stands up to greet him, and Rei gives him a hug and Shouto doesn’t flinch away from her.
Rei’s eyes fall on Natsuo, and she freezes. So does Shouto, still in her grip.
“Natsuo,” she says, eyes already teary.
“Hi, Mom,” Natsuo says, even though his throat is closing up.
Rei looks...older. There’s a pasty shine to her skin, and her eyes look tired tired tired, but there’s also some spark of life in her that had gone away in the months leading up to Touya’s death--Natsuo remembers his mother, suddenly, in a way he’d repressed before.
She releases Shouto, and Natsuo is already there to hug her, moving into her arms like the last time he’d seen her, more than a decade ago.
“Hi, baby,” Rei says. Her hand is on the back of Natsuo’s neck, pulling his face into her shoulder. “You’ve gotten so big.”
Natsuo has always thought he takes more after his mother. Case in point: when he feels her smile against the side of his head, he starts to cry.
“I’ll be outside,” Shouto says in a low tone. The door slides open and shut behind Natsuo.
“He’s allergic to feeling things,” Natsuo says. He sniffles, and chokes, but when he tries to move away his mom won’t let go.
Rei pats his back. “Be kind.”
Natsuo laughs. It sounds almost out-of-place in the drab hospital room.
He’s finally released, and he stands up straight and Rei looks up at him. She wipes his cheek with her sleeve, but her own face is just as damp.
“I missed you,” Rei finally says. She raises her other hand to hold the other side of Natsuo’s face, cradling it like it’s something precious. “How are you, sweetheart?”
“I don’t know,” Natsuo says, because he’s instantly forgotten everything about his life and he’s scrambling to make himself sound interesting to her. “I’m--um, I’m good. I’m studying health, it’s my second year. And. I have a girlfriend.”
“Really? Why don’t you tell me about her?” Rei asks, face brightening just a little bit. She leans around Natsuo and calls, “Shouto, you can come back in.”
“Oh, speaking of,” Natsuo says, as the door slides open. “Fuyumi said Shouto told you about someone named Midoriya--”
Shouto says, “Shut up.”
“Don’t tell your brother to shut up,” Rei says, looking sternly to Shouto, who sulks and sits down in a chair and shoots a glare at Natsuo. “ Hey. Apologize.”
“Sorry,” Shouto mutters.
Natsuo is having the time of his life. “Apology not accepted.”
“Natsuo,” Rei chides, but even as she gently swats the back of Natsuo’s head, she’s almost smiling.
They end up staying for a few hours. Even though Natsuo dominates the conversation, because he keeps thinking of new things to tell his mom about what’s been going on with him, Shouto doesn’t get on his phone to ignore him. Rei’s attentive too, sitting calmly and participating in conversation, and it starts making Natsuo wonder how long she actually needs to be staying here. She seems fine, and she hasn’t tried to murder Shouto again, and she smiles at the jokes Natsuo tells.
Maybe this is just a good day for her, though.
Around lunchtime, they stand up to go.
“I’ll be back soon,” Natsuo promises, and gives his mom another hug. Shouto follows suit, and accepts a kiss on the forehead from Rei.
“I’m looking forward to it,” Rei says, and smiles.
Shouto picks up his backpack and produces a small wrapped gift, which he sets on Rei’s bed and then immediately bolts for the door. “Have a good New Year,” he mumbles.
Natsuo...didn’t get his mother a Christmas gift. He hasn’t done that for more than a decade, now, but he still feels like shit.
“Natsuo,” Shouto says, and slides the door open.
“Happy New Year,” Natsuo tells his mom, and follows after Shouto.
"Why didn't you tell me you got her a gift?" Natsuo asks Shouto, annoyed, as they leave the hospital.
"Sorry I'm best child," Shouto says, and winds his scarf back around his neck and then takes off before Natsuo can put him in a headlock.