#at this point if they don't make a plushie of her i will sue. like what the heck

[broccoliboix5peepeeman]

Midoriya-sensei AU

Part 8: Monday

Part 7 | Ao3 | Part 9

Excluding Todoroki, the other teachers thought Izuku was a try-hard.

They were right, of course. Izuku wasn't ignorant—he knew he was a try-hard. Maybe it was because he wanted people to like him; maybe it was because he wanted to prove himself; maybe it was the result of being forced into silence his entire childhood. The reason didn't matter. At twenty five years old, Izuku was a try-hard, but regardless of what his co-workers thought, he persisted.

He rocked on his feet, hands clasped in front of him, as he waited for his students to arrive.

He'd set up the "Greeting Board" shortly after starting at Musutafu Shōgakkō. The others—sans Todoroki and the Head—had told Izuku not to bother; it was a waste of time. He remembered smiling politely and pointedly ignoring them. 

The concept was simple: the board was split into six sections, containing a number and a drawing, and when a student tapped one of them, he greeted them accordingly. The number one accompanied a picture of two people bowing to each other, number two signalled a high five, three was a fist bump, four was a little dance, five was a hug—demonstrated by a picture of six year old Izuku hugging a giant All Might plushie—and number six was a comment.

Izuku smiled as his first student skipped towards him.

'Hi, sensei!' Nagisa chirped, tapping the number four, before flapping her arms and twirling.

'Hello to you too!' Izuku mirrored her moves with a laugh. 'Your dancing is getting better every day.'

She giggled as she entered the class, while Touta speed-walked towards him at an alarming rate. After he firmly tapped "1", the two of them bowed.

'Good morning, sensei!' Touta straightened up and adjusted his glasses, then followed Nagisa inside. Now that Shoto had pointed it out, he really did have a likeness to Ingenium… How hadn't he noticed sooner?

As the rest of his students filtered in, Izuku found that dancing and comments were the most popular—as was usual for Monday mornings. Distantly, he wished he had as much energy as they did. 

A few more minutes passed, and just before the first bell chimed, his final pupil arrived.

'Hi, sensei!' Hiru panted, examining the board for a moment, before pressing the number six and looking up at Izuku expectantly.

Hiru was best friends with Nozomi, and was one of the three heteromorphs in his class. His quirk was called "Hedgehog", so while most of his body resembled a regular—if not hairy—human, his head was covered in fur, accentuating his pointy nose, beady eyes and rounded ears that were similar to the small mammal. His uniform also had to be custom-made to accommodate the plethora of spines on his back. 

Izuku thought he looked super cool, but knew from experience the sentiment was not shared by his student.

'Hi, Hiru-chan.' He smiled warmly, noting how skittish he looked and how rumpled his clothes were. 'You're energetic this morning! Too much sugar over the weekend?'

'Nope, just eager to get to class!' He laughed nervously, whilst looking over his shoulder.

'Hey.' Izuku crouched down to be at eye-level, which gained Hiru's attention. 'You can talk to me if something's bothering you. We're HQA buddies, remember?'

HQA stood for the "Heteromorph and Quirkless Alliance", which was formed as the original safe space for people whose discrimination was a result of quirk-focused society. They still had a long way to go with acceptance, but the alliance was internationally recognised, as well as part of the reason why their rights were protected and enforced by law. Most high schools had a HQA extracurricular club, but Izuku had been the first to set one up in a Japanese primary school—after pestering the Head until he finally signed off on it—so he could support his students and assure them they always had someone to talk to.

Izuku was a try-hard, sue him.

'We are.' Hiru said slowly. 'But I don't think you'll be able to help this time, sensei…'

'What makes you think that?' He tilted his head to the side, patient.

‘Because if I tell, it’ll only get worse, because they’ll know I told.’ Hiru rubbed his arm, looking at the ground. ‘And I don’t want to get people in trouble.’

Izuku pulled his lips into a thin line. He knew this behaviour and mindset well; the closed off posture, the averting eye contact, the lack of trust in the school to solve a problem, not wanting to incriminate anyone. He'd been the same growing up, and despite his best efforts, it was now happening to his student.

'Hiru-chan, I want you to know that I will always have your best interests at heart.' He smiled softly. It was difficult territory, especially with the school's policy around safeguarding; depending on what Hiru did disclose, this could escalate. 'You can talk to me, and if something is wrong, the only people I would tell would be those who can help the situation. Okay?'

His student fidgeted, unsure, and held his chin in his hand, while his pointed nose twitched in thought. However, when the bell chimed, he jumped and looked up at Izuku, hesitant. 

'Can I think about it, please?'

Izuku regarded him—expression never wavering—then nodded.

'Of course.' He slowly got to his feet and gestured for them to enter the classroom. He knew better than to force the issue. 'I'm here when you need me.'

Hiru bowed, then crossed to the middle of the class, where he took his seat next to Nozomi. Izuku sighed, smile faltering slightly, before he shut the door and walked over to his own desk, facing his students.

At the start of the year, the classroom had looked clinical, the only decoration being the kanji and maths cut-outs scattered around the walls, along with the All Might poster he had pinned up at the back of the room. Even after just one term though, everything was significantly brighter: blank display boards had been filled with creative work, personalised workbooks were neatly organised on shelves, and several drawings now surrounded All Might.

Some teachers called them distractions. Izuku thought they were miserable fucks in the wrong profession, much to Todoroki's amusement.

'Okay, Mighty Minions!' He clapped his hands twice, and the class fell silent. 'I hope you all had a great weekend. I'm going to quickly do the register, then we can head down to the assembly hall.'

Izuku called out each name with no issues—only one explained absence—and soon, he was leading his students to the main hall. Luckily, they weren't the last class to arrive, and after his kids were seated, he stepped over to the side of the hall, next to Todoroki.

'Hey.'

'Morning, Midoriya-kun.' She smiled, eyes crinkled; it was that rare time of the day when her glasses weren't smudged in some way. 'How was your weekend?'

'Good, thanks.' He pointedly looked away as he felt his ears redden. Despite the nonchalant way she'd asked the question, Izuku knew for a fact that she was privy to what happened yesterday. 'I was going to text you, I promise, but I needed to recharge after everything.'

'Mhm.' Todoroki crossed her arms and leant forwards into his field of vision with pursed lips, which were upturned with amusement. 'So, when am I going to get all the juicy details? Shoto's given me nothing, and it's driving me bonkers! It's like you're his little secret—it's like the boy has forgotten that you're my best friend, damn it!'

Izuku's mouth pulled into a gentle smile, filled with affection.

'We're best friends?' He searched her eyes, and when she shot him an unimpressed look, he fumbled. 'L-Like, it's obvious that you're my best friend, but I figured you had tons of others to choose from.'

'Honey, we've got to work on your self-esteem.' She patted him on the shoulder, both of them watching the last class enter. 'Of course you're my bestie, and I wouldn't have it any other way… even though you dodged my original question.'

Izuku's eyes shone with emotion—he quickly blinked them away—before releasing a wet chuckle, which was thankfully swallowed by the idle chatter of the rest of the room.

'Okay, bestie.' He nudged her playfully. 'How about we head to the gym after school, and I'll tell you everything that happened?'

'Ugh, you're insufferable.' Todoroki rolled her eyes, just as the Head cleared his throat and called for everyone's attention. As the hall fell silent, however, she tilted her head towards him and whispered, 'Fine, but I'll need to go home and change first. Didn't think I'd need my PE kit today, for some reason.'

'You fool.' Izuku teased, then crossed his arms and leant against the wall, turning his attention to the Head. 

The assembly was nothing special; mostly formalities and reminders about Sports Day, which was coming up soon, along with a brief lecture about leaving the getabako clean and tidy. However, the final topic did gather Izuku's attention.

'As you all know, we had a very important visitor last week: number two hero, Shoto.' The Head flashed his first smile of the day, while his ant-like antenna rubbed together. His quirk allowed him to use their vibrations to detect the quietest of sounds. It was useful for determining who was paying attention, amongst other things, but Izuku didn't like to think about what kinds of unorthodox conversations he'd likely heard through the years. 'Let's take a moment to thank Todoroki-sensei for making that possible.'

The room clapped on cue, but with more enthusiasm than usual. Todoroki flushed at the attention and bowed.

Once the noise died down, the Head continued. 'Now, before Shoto-san left, we had a little chat, and I want you all to know that he was very impressed with every single one of you. You were respectful and eager to learn, and he's sure many of you will make amazing heroes one day, so you should all be very proud of yourselves.'

Automatically, Izuku's eyes sought out Nozomi, who was practically beaming. The sight resonated something within him, and his own smile played at his lips.

Shortly after, the assembly came to an end, and Izuku bid Todoroki farewell, before escorting their students back to homeroom. Once they were settled, they began the first lesson of the day: Basic Japanese. To start with, he used the chalk board to take them through sentence structure and placement of nouns, then wrote up an example for his kids to figure out themselves. Once they seemed confident, Izuku decided it was time to start the individual activity, but was interrupted by Hana raising her hand.

'Sensei?' Her eyes were wide and she was smiling—her look told him that she wasn't excited about the Japanese. 'Is it true you're friends with hero Shoto now?'

Izuku swallowed heavily and cleared his throat to deter from the quickly rising blush on his face.

'Hana-chan, that's not an appropriate question to ask.' He lightly chastised, trying to ignore how much more interested his class suddenly appeared.

'Sorry, sensei.' Hana, to her credit, looked a little apologetic, but it didn't stop her adding, 'It's just that my nii-san saw you two talking outside Shoto-san's agency yesterday, so I was wondering.'

Immediately, the class was in uproar—shooting questions and exclamations—far too quick for Izuku to comprehend, and he froze. Usually, he could handle their rowdiness, but this was unexpected, and the volume was overwhelming. Luckily, he'd trained to be able to persist in these situations.

'Alright, that's enough.' He raised his hands and clapped twice, loudly. 'Five, four, three, two, one!'

There were a few murmurs, but mostly the class quietened down—albeit they still looked excited. Izuku sighed as he watched them, even though they were settled, he could tell their concentration would be harder to repair. That being said, an idea suddenly emerged in his head; one that could turn out inordinately effective.

'Okay, I understand you're all excited, but there was no need for that.' He scanned the room, emphasising his point with a disappointed frown, before relaxing back into his usual expression. 'As a one time thing, however, I will answer your question, Hana-chan, but only if you all promise not to go crazy again.'

He waited for them to nod, before cutting the suspense. 'I did hang out with Shoto-san yesterday. We are friends.'

There were audible gasps throughout the class—several students even shook their desk buddy with excitement—but otherwise, they kept their promise. In all honesty, Izuku was surprised; he was proud of their restraint.

'That's so cool!' Daisuki whispered from his seat just in front of Izuku. His eyes were squeezed shut as he clenched his fists with passion, reminiscent of Red Riot.

'It is very cool, yeah.' Izuku smiled, doing well not to get carried away himself. 'So! I have an activity for you all. Using what we've learnt today about sentence structure and the placement of different kanji, I want you all to write a letter to Shoto-san about what you want to be when you grow up and why. Any questions?'

Haku's hand shot up, eyes wide.

'Is Shoto-san going to read our letters?'

Izuku's mind immediately pictured Shoto in his office, going through each one as he sipped his tea—a cute furrow in his brow as he read—before shaking himself.

'Maybe.' He shrugged, smiling. 'Depends on how well you write them. Heroes are very busy, after all. He would only have time to read the ones with perfect grammar.'

When there were no more questions, Izuku grabbed some lined paper and handed them out to his eagerly awaiting students, along with an array of stationary. Once everything was set up, the class got to work, surprisingly quiet. Occasionally, someone would raise their hand to ask whether a certain sentence was correct, and Izuku was always happy to walk them through it.

'Five minutes left.' He called, as their first period almost came to an end. 'Time to add finishing touches, and if you're already done, read through your work to see if you're happy with everything.'

By the time they moved on to second period—maths—Izuku had a pile of letters on his desk, and a room full of happy students.

Even Hiru seemed affable when he approached Izuku before lunch, resolute and determined.

'I've decided I want to talk about what happened, if that's still okay?'

Izuku smiled encouragingly.

'Of course.'

[smile-files]

fear the tear