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The first time Jirou notices she’s seven years old. Her quirk had manifested around the tender age of 4, when one morning at breakfast she asked her father to play the song he’d been practicing earlier.
“What song, Kyo-chan?” he’d asked, and to his surprise she started bobbing her head and humming the tune of the new track he’d been working on in his soundproof studio. “Oh god,” he’d muttered quietly to himself, taking a long sip of coffee to drown out his daughter’s confusion.
As a bona fide rocker, his lyrics had been less than appropriate and definitely nothing that his four year old daughter should have been hearing. He hoped that she’d only picked up on the tune and not the words themselves, otherwise his wife was going to kill him. “Maybe another time, sweetie,” he had told her, reaching over to smooth out her hair and tug gently on an earphone jack. She laughed, forgetting all about it, and he sighed in relief.
At least, that is, until dinner time, when she looked up over her chicken and asked very politely, “Daddy, what’s ‘fucking shitheads’?”
Now, at the age of 7, Jirou’s relatively well adjusted to her quirk. She’s still unable to fully control her range of hearing, resulting in a pair of miniature noise-canceling headphones constantly dangling from her neck in case she gets overwhelmed by the noise, but generally when she’s at home and school the headphones can be safely tucked away.
It’s at school where she first notices, after a boy in her class sticks out his leg and trips her purposefully. In retaliation, Jirou grabs at his shirt and drags him down with her and uses him as a sort of cushion, harrumphing as he starts to whine and yell.
“It’s your fault,” she huffs, “You tripped me on purpose.” Jirou, who’s as stubborn as ever, stays seated atop him, her earphone jacks tangled in his shirt collar and draped over his neck, and she senses in the back of her mind a slow and steady beat. She looks over at the clock to see if it’s the second hand ticking away, but finds it doesn’t match the rhythm.
“I did not!” Fujihara cries, and it’s then that the rhythm shifts slightly, as if skipping a beat, and she looks accusingly down at the boy.
“You’re lying,” she says evenly.
The rhythm speeds up, but remains steady. “I’m not!” he repeats, and the beat skips again once more.
Her eyes grow wide and she looks down to where her earphone jacks lay against his skin. “Tell me your hair is blue,” she demands, pressing her jacks in slightly.
“My hair isn’t-” he pauses when he feels him jab his neck, “My hair is blue.” Another skip.
Amazed, Jirou untangles her earphone jacks and stares at them incredulously. A few moments later, a teacher comes by and yells at her for sitting on Fujihara, promising that they’ll be calling her parents and reporting her behavior. Jirou shrugs, reaching up to stroke her earphone jacks absently. She’s not normally one to make a fuss and she knows her dad will be proud of her for standing up for herself, even if he has to pretend to be angry in front of the teachers.
At the end of the day, when he comes to pick her up, she slips her hand into his, wrapping an earphone jack loosely around his wrist. “I’m so sorry,” he says to her teacher, and Jirou holds back a grin at the skipped beat, “it won’t happen again,” another skip, “Kyouka’s a very good girl and we work hard to raise her right.” There’s no skip that time and she beams up at her father, proud to know he truly believes it. He turns to her and smiles back,” C’mon Kyo, let’s get you home.”
She doesn’t say anything to her dad, after all, she’s not entirely sure what exactly this new layer to her quirk is, but when she goes home she locks herself in her room and stares into the mirror, tangling her earphone jacks around her wrists and telling lies, trying to catch the little skip in her heartbeat. It’s much harder to distinguish her own heartbeat, as it’s even further back in her mind than the heartbeats of others, almost as if her quirk cancels out the organic sounds of her own body to help her better hear the sounds around her.
Over the next few months, Jirou takes to wrapping her jacks around her parents’ wrists instead of holding their hands and asks them questions about anything and everything to further hone her detective skills. By the time she turns eight she’s gotten pretty good at zoning in on a heartbeat, and she shifts to the hem of her mother’s shirt to practice finding heartbeats through the thickness of clothes. It’s much more difficult than the clean press of skin, what with the varying textures of different fabrics and the rough drag of layers, but Jirou perseveres. She’s always been stubborn— tenacious, her mother would say— and the thought of being a human lie detector is infinitely appealing to the young girl.
…
The first time Jirou really uses her ability, there’s a crowd of boys gathered around a locker. Middle schoolers are notorious for being assholes, so it’s no surprise when she pushes through the crowd to see a scrawny teenage boy trying desperately to wipe the filth off his locker, angry red paint that screams obscenities and insults, while the crowd around him hoots and hollers, echoing the hateful words.
Normally she’s not one to interfere, but she sees the broken look on the boy’s face and the tears he’s fighting back and she exhales, knowing she has to step in.
“Which one of you idiots was it?”
A few of the boys spare her a glance, but for the most part they ignore her.
She turns to the boy standing next to her, presses her earphone jack lightly against his shoulder. “Was it you?” He shakes his head and there’s no skip in the rhythm, so she gently pushes him aside and continues on to the next boy, asking over and over until she finds their ringleader, a skinny brunette with a lazy smirk and an arched brow.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he laughs, and she hears his heartbeat skip.
Bingo, she thinks. “I’m reporting you to the principal,” she says.
“You can’t prove anything,” he scoffs. “It’s your word against mine.”
Jirou smiles, every bit her father’s daughter. “I can’t, but your heartbeat can.”
The three of them find themselves in the principal’s office an hour later, Jirou seated in between the brunette, a boy by the name of Nakada, and the other boy who’s named Kirishima. His jet black hair drops over his face as he stares at his lap silently.
“I didn’t do anything, the stupid kid probably wrote it there himself for attention,” Nakada argues, shooting hateful looks over at the other two. “He knows his quirk’s no good, so he’d rather get by on pity than actually trying.”
Kirishima looks up in shock. “Why would I-?” he sighs. “Forget it.”
Jirou stands up abruptly and snags the speaker set off the principal’s desk, ignoring his yelp of shock. She plugs herself in with one jack, pressing the other against the first boy’s forearm. The muted rhythm of his heartbeat fills the office as she flips the volume knob and she leans back in her chair smugly. “Ask him something.”
“Uh- what day is today?” the principal asks hesitantly.
“Tuesday.” The rhythm remains constant.
“What color is your hair?”
“Brown.” Still no change.
“Did you pour paint over Kirishima-san’s belongings and write on his locker?”
“No.” A skip.
The boy looks over at Jirou, eyes wide in amazement, and she can’t help but smile. For the first time, she thinks she understands why heroes do what they do, put their life on the line for people they don’t even know, because this…this feels pretty damn good.
“In my experience, the heartbeat only skips when someone tells a lie. It’ll speed up when someone’s nervous or excited, sure, but never a skip,” she tells the principal, carefully unplugging her earphone jacks.
The principal hums and nods, glancing between the shock on Nakada’s face at his body’s own betrayal and the relief that’s palpable on Kirishima’s. “You two are free to go back to class,” he says finally, gesturing Jirou and the latter away. “Nakada-san, it seems I’ll need to have a word with you about respect and integrity.”
They both stand and bow, leaving Nakada glaring furiously at their backs as they exit.
“Thank you,” the boy sputters as soon as the office door closes behind him. “You’re like my hero. They’ve been bullying me all year but no one ever took my complaints seriously.”
She shrugs, uncomfortable with the attention. “It’s no problem. Anyone would’ve done the same.”
Kirishima shakes his head. “But they didn’t. You did.” He bows one last time, before the bell rings and he’s rushing off to class, his dark head disappearing in the crowded hall.
Jirou smiles to herself, mouthing the word hero to herself as she twirls her earphone jacks around her finger and heads to her next class.
…
The next time Jirou has to use her ability it’s for absolutely and utterly stupid reasons. They’ve been living in the dorms at UA for all of three days, when Class 1-A comes to realize that someone among them has no idea how to do dishes, and instead of asking for help just leaves them in the sink until someone else does them.
“This is getting ridiculous,” Iida cries, gesticulating towards the kitchen wildly. “If you use a dish CLEAN IT UP. It’s not a hard rule to follow.” He inhales and sighs deeply, adjusting his glasses as if he’s been tasked to look over a group of kindergarteners, which looking around the room, might be exactly the case.
“I have an idea,” Kaminari cries, which is quickly followed by a soft “oh no,” from Sero. The blonde sticks his tongue out at him (yes, kindergarteners, Jirou decides) before continuing. “How about whoever’s been doing it just admit it now, and we promise we won’t get mad but we’ll just teach them how to clean or whatever so there’s no secrets among us.” He looks around hopefully at the class and grins.
Yaoyorozu nods slowly. “That’s not a bad idea Kaminari-san. This class meeting is a safe space and no one should be afraid to admit any wrongdoings.” She looks across the room. “Does anyone have any objections?”
Jirou rolls her eyes as she watches Kaminari preen over Yaoyorozu’s minimal praise, before following her gaze across the room. No one seems to be uncomfortable with the premise and judging by the nods of her classmates, they’re eager to find out who’s been doing it.
“Alright then,” Yaoyorozu says, clasping her hands together, “Whoever’s been leaving their dishes in the sink, please come forward!” No one moves. After a few moments, she frowns and tries again. “We won’t be mad, we promise, we only want our dorms and our kitchen to stay as clean and harmonious as possible.” She looks around a bit helplessly and then catches Jirou’s eye hopefully.
Jirou curses her traitorous bisexual heart as she stands up, her earphone jacks bumping together anxiously. “I have a way we can see who it is,” she says finally, “I just need to get close to you guys to find out.”
“You can get close to me anytime, sweetheart,” Mineta jeers from his spot on the couch.
Asui reaches out with her tongue and slaps him faster than Jirou can even think to respond, and she shoots the girl a grateful smile.
“My quirk doubles as a lie detector of sorts,” she explains, “if I can get close enough to hear someone’s heartbeat I can tell if they’re lying.”
“Woah, that’s so cool Jirou,” Kaminari cries, a bright smile on his face.
Kirishima nods. “Yeah! But a real man would never lie,” he adds, crashing his two fists together in what Jirou’s come to recognize as his signature move.
She smiles, her cheeks slightly red from the attention. “Most of the girls know already cause I’ve shown them, but I figure you guys should know too.”
Yaoyorozu grins, affectionately squeezing Jirou’s hand. “So is everyone okay with it? Jirou-san will ask us each if we’re the one leaving the dishes in the sink and she’ll know if we’re answering honestly.”
The class nods and Jirou gets to work. Momo quickly produces a portable speaker and Jirou starts off with the girls; she’s used it on most of them already at a sleepover the first night and she’s much more comfortable being close to them.
“Ashido-san, are you leaving your dirty dishes in the sink?”
“No way, I wash those babies as soon as I’m done, promise!”
Jirou nods. “She’s telling the truth.”
Ashido lets out a sigh. “Phew!” she cries, “I mean I knew I was, but man was I worried for a second.”
The class lets out a chuckle and Hagakure steps up to be questioned. Once they finish the girls, they move onto the boys, with Iida eager to prove his innocence, followed quickly by Aoyama, of all people.
“Aoyama-san, are you leaving your dirty dishes in the sink?”
“Not me, mon ami,” Aoyama chirps, “I use my dishes once, ‘zen I throw ‘zem away.”
Uraraka’s jaw drops. “You mean you just throw away perfectly good plates?”
“Oui. Once ‘zey’ve been used, ‘zey never have ‘zat same sparkle I need.”
She inhales deeply, before screaming out, “You ever heard of mottainai?!”It’s only Iida’s strong arms restraining her and Deku’s hand clapped tightly over her mouth that keep Uraraka from leaping on Aoyama in a fit of rage.
Eventually they’re out of people and Jirou’s stunned. Her quirk has never led her wrong, yet no one had been lying and there have clearly been dirty dishes left in the sink. Her face begins to turn red with embarrassment, when Midoriya notices movement in the kitchen.
“Sensei?”
Yamada freezes. “HEY CLASS 1-A,” he cries, “WHAT’S HAPPENING?”
“It was you!” Kaminari shouts, “You’ve been leaving dirty dishes in our sink!” He turns to Jirou and nods encouragingly, and she dashes over to press an earphone jack to his shoulder.
“WHAT? NO! THIS IS THE FIRST TIME I’VE BEEN HERE ALL YEAR,” he retorts, but the steady rhythm of Present Mic’s heartbeat is interrupted by several skips.
Class 1-A cheers and Jirou can’t help but breathe a sigh of relief.
“Alright fine, maybe it was me, but-but SHOTA REFUSES TO DO MY DISHES ANYMORE AND MY HANDS GET ALL WRINKLY,” he half-wails.
In the back of her mind, Jirou can’t believe they’re letting someone like Present Mic teach them, but for the most part, she’s just glad her quirk didn’t fail her.
“That was epic,” Kaminari crows, coming up behind her to throw an easy arm around her shoulder. She smiles and shrugs him off, using her jacks to good-naturedly poke his cheek, before heading off to watch Yaoyorozu and Iida as they teach their teacher how to do dishes.
…
After the excitement of Jirou’s lie detector abilities dies down (also known as after the boys ask her to use it approximately sixteen thousand times on dumb shit and she says no) Class 1-A finds themselves on a rare night of unsupervised fun. The teachers had left campus for the weekend to celebrate Principal Nezu’s birthday, entrusting the safety of UA to the security system and heroes-in-training.
Naturally, the moment their teachers are out of sight, Mina, Kaminari, and Sero barrel up and down the stairways, banging on doors and demanding that everyone gather in the common room for a meeting.
“Thank you all for coming,” Ashido begins, clapping her hands together.
Ojiro narrows his eyes and makes a show of struggling against the tape plastered around his torso. “Didn’t really have much of a choice,” he quips dryly.
She shrugs, “Sorry Oji, that’s what you get for being a party pooper.”
“Anyways,” Sero interrupts, “We all know you’re the best at grocery runs so you had to be here.”
“Who goes for a grocery run at 8 o’clock on a Friday?” Bakugo scoffs from his position on the couch. Kirishima prepares himself accordingly, casually draping his arm across the blonde’s chest in order to pin him down if necessary. The squad has a plan and he’ll be damned if he lets his firecracker of a boyfriend ruin it.
“We do,” Kaminari begins, before pausing for dramatic effect, “When we’re throwing a party!”
The squad breaks out into cheers and terrible dance moves. The rest of the class stares with a mixture of disbelief and confusion. Todoroki raises one perfectly manicured brow.
After a minute, Midoriya pipes up. “I think a party could be fun. I mean there are no teachers around in case anything goes wrong, but then if there are no teachers we won’t get in trouble for causing disturbances or curfew violation.”
“Deku, my man, that’s exactly what I’m talking about,” Sero chirps, grabbing him by the arm and pulling him into their dance circle.
A few of the others start to chime in. Hagakure seems to be waving her arms around enthusastically, Aoyama asks if he can be in charge of decorations, and Koda’s smiling a bit nervously, but he too, seems excited.
Jirou sighs. She’s been to a party or two before, courtesy of her dad’s label mostly, and if this party is anything like those, she knows she’s in for a long night.
Somehow she gets volunteered to be in charge of music for the night, and she loses herself in creating a perfectly curated playlist for her and her classmates. The next thing she knows, Jirou looks up and Ojiro is back from the convenience store, arms (and tail) laden with plastic bags filled with a selection of snacks and beverages. Sato is in the kitchen, whipping up some of his famous brownies, Uraraka is lowering Kirishima down after helping Aoyama put up a disco ball, and Todoroki is finishing filling up a giant bucket with his ice.
“Looking good,” Kaminari chirps from over her shoulder, and Jirou almost slams her laptop closed as a reflex. He drops his hand and practically jumps back. “Woah, sorry, didn’t mean to scare you Jirou.”
She lets out a soft huff and shrugs, “S’all good.”
He grins sheepishly and gestures towards the laptop, waiting until she nods to grab it from her and plug it into the speakers.
She can feel the bassline deep in her bones and grins, this time genuinely. “So whose brilliant idea was this?” she asks.
“I’d like to say it was mine, but it was actually Kirishima’s,” Kaminari admits, “He said that it would be good for us to have just one night where we actually get to be normal teenagers and not have to worry about training or fighting or any of that stuff.”
The two look over at Kirishima, whose has his feet back on the ground and his arm firmly wrapped around Bakugo. The blonde catches them looking and sneers at Kaminari, who lets out a low squeak and looks away. Jirou lets out a snicker, and she and Bakugo share a chin nod of solidarity.
Kaminari bumps her shoulder gently and she looks up at him. “It looks like things are getting started; you want me to grab you anything?”
“A coke is good.”
He nods and she can’t help but wonder if he’s half puppy, always so ready to please. “Be right back. Don’t go anywhere okay?” He tosses out finger guns as he walks away backwards, small sparks running up and down his pointer fingers.
Jirou leans back against the wall, rubbing her bicep absently as she surveys the common room. By now, the class has settled into various spots around the room. Kirishima’s kicked back on the couch, his head laying in the lap of a stoic looking Bakugo, who’s pointedly avoiding eye contact and nodding along to Kirishima’s babbling. Mina is perched next to them on the arm rest, prattling away, her arm reaching out to grab onto Sero as he walks by and pulling him down onto the couch with them. He huffs good naturedly and swipes her drink in retaliation, taking a long swig before handing it back to her. Asui and Uraraka are off by the kitchen, locked in a hushed but giggly conversation, the two of them pausing every now and then to shoot a glance over at the dance moves of Midoriya, Iida, Koda, and Tokoyami.
“Dope playlist.”
She turns to see Kaminari holding out the coke can, a shy smile on his face.
“What can I say Jamming-Whey, I know music,” she replies back.
“Any chance you’d be willing to pass on your knowledge to an eager student?”
“You? An eager student?” Jirou chuckles, “As if.”
He laughs, nearly dropping his bag of chips as he places a hand over his heart and pretends to swoon, “Oh Jirou, you wound me so.”
She’s about to reply when Ashido pipes up. “Hey lovebirds, care to join us?”
Jirou tears her gaze away from the brightness of Kaminari’s smile and feels her cheeks bloom with heat and she realizes the rest of the class has stopped their conversations and is staring at them. Ashido has gathered their class in a circle, a dangerous smile on her face.
“Well?”
The pair shuffles over, Jirou snatching her wrist back to avoid any possible physical contact with Kaminari and carefully picking her way over to the other side of the circle.
“So, as I was saying,” Ashido continues, still smirking at her classmates, “It’s not a party without a little game I like to call Truth or Dare.”
Todoroki raises his hand, “I believe everyone calls it Truth or Dare, not just you.”
“You know what I mean,” she sputters, shaking her hand as if to wave off his contribution. “And since we have a lie detector named Jirou, we can make sure that you really do tell the truth.”
Jirou looks up in shock. “Wait what? I never agreed to this!”
“Yeah but think about how good it would be,” Ashido argues, reaching out to clasp Jirou’s wrist.
“Please?” Hagakure chimes in, “Plus no one ever picks truth, it’s not like you’d have to do it a bunch.”
“I’m not sure if everyone would be comfortable with that,” Jirou replies. “Especially me,” she adds under her breath.
Bakugo scoffs, “Only weaklings lie anyways. If anything we’ll just get a better sense of who they are.”
“Plus it’ll be fun,” Kirishima adds, nodding enthusiastically at Bakugo, “If we’re all too scared of the truth then there’ll be a lot of good dares.”
Jirou chances a glance at Kaminari, who shrugs as if to say “why not.” She sighs deeply, already regretting it. “Okay, I guess.”
Ashido and Hagakure high five enthusiastically, bouncing up on the balls of their feet.
“Now that we’ve got that out of the way, who’s first?” Hagakure chirps.
The group looks around at each other nervously. While they’ve played truth or dare before, the added pressure of Jirou’s lie detecting skills seem to have everyone on edge.
“This is lame,” Bakugo grunts, draining his soda and crushing the can against Kirishima’s shoulder.
“Then why don’t you go?” Todoroki challenges.
“Maybe I will.”
Hagakure shakes her head. “Looks like someone beat you to it.,” she says, pointing to a raised hand across the room. The rest of the class turns to Tokoyami in surprise.
“Yeah!” Kirishima calls out, sitting up for half a second to bash his fists together, “Tokoyami, my man!”
“Truth or dare?” Ashido crows, eyes sparkling dangerously.
“The truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains to bring it to light.”
Ashido and Hagakure exchange a glance. “So...truth?”
He nods stoically and reaches out an arm to Jirou. The girls pause to think, even gesturing to Sero to pull him into the discussion.
“What’s the one thing you’re most looking forward to?” Kirishima blurts out, tired of waiting.
Ashido stares at him from across the circle. “Are you serious? We’ve got a human lie detector and you ask what he’s excited about?”
“I thought we were taking the first few easy!” Kirishima cries, throwing his hands up in the air and narrowly avoiding hitting Bakugo in the face, “Besides, you were taking too long!”
Hakagure shakes her head. “Toko, ignore that one—”
“The sweet release of death,” Tokoyami replies.
“Same,” Todoroki echoes from behind the couch.
“What the fuck?” Bakugo mutters under his breath.
Kirishima and Ashido cease their bickering and turn to look at Tokoyami.
“Dude are you like…okay?” he asks slowly, sitting up and reaching out to put his hand on the table. “You know that we’re always here for you and stuff.”
All around the room, eyes are wide and solemn. Everyone knew Tokoyami was pretty introverted, but how could they have missed that their classmate was hurting so much?
After a few moments of silence, Jirou can’t help but burst out in laughter and all eyes dart over to her. Iida stands up, likely to reprimand her, and she shakes her head quickly. “He’s just messing with you guys,” she chuckles, “His heartbeat skipped like four times.”
They all turn back to Tokoyami, who shrugs and flashes a rare grin. “It was all Dark Shadow, I swear.” As if on cue, Dark Shadow emerges, bowing his small head in apology.
“Oh man Tokoyami, you got us good!” Sero cries, “I didn’t know you ha d it in you! Hey if ever wanna pull some pranks, we’re always looking for someone to replace Kami.”
“Hey!” Kaminari cries, the petulant frown on his face only slightly obscured by Dorito crumbs.
“Yeah, usually it’s Jirou ‘cause she’s perfect for stealth missions, but I think your quirk would work pretty well too,” Ashido adds.
“You guys pull pranks without me?”
She shrugs. “No offense Kami, but it’s a little hard to do sneak attacks with you around. You’re so loud that it’s easy to see coming.”
“Easy to see coming?” He sputters, “What about you? You’re literally pink!”
“Tch, giving someone shit for their quirk?” Bakugo tsks, “Not cool, Pikachu.”
“Yeah Kami!” Ashido cackles.
“Augh, that’s not what I meant and you know it!” Kaminari groans, burying his head in his face.
The game continues on around him, but Kaminari doesn’t look u until he feels someone bump against his shoulder. He grins sheepishly as he sees Jirou settling down on the floor next to him and opens his mouth to greet her, but she beats him to the punch.
“For the record, I think the pranks are a lot funnier when you’re around.”
He grins, “Hey thanks Jirou.”
She shrugs, “I mean, especially when I get to watch them backfire on you.”
“Aww, you like watching me?”
“Of course that’s what you’d get from that, Jamming-whey,” she says, rolling her eyes.
Kaminari smiles at her regardless, admiring the light pink blush that settles down over her cheeks and the smile that pulls at the corner of her lips. She looks back at him and the blush deepens as she ducks her head to take a sip of her soda. “Hey, Jirou.”
“Hmm?”
“Would you ever—”
“Hey, Koda chose truth!” Uraraka scolds lightly, “Jirou, pay attention!”
She grimaces and stands, “Sorry Kami, duty calls. Ask me later?”
He nods and watches her walk away, groaning softly as he leans back against the base of the couch.
“Yikes,” Sero chirps, “That was rough buddy.”
Kaminari doesn’t even bother opening his eyes, a small smile spreading across his face as he thinks about the look on Jirou’s face (and as he zaps his best friend).
…
Normally Jirou is all against eavesdropping. She’s known for being notoriously private around the dorms, ranking closely behind Bakugo, and she’d never want to invade someone’s personal space or intrude on their private conversations. That being said, it can be rather difficult to avoid with a quirk and a natural sense of curiosity as strong as hers. Thus, when she overhears Kaminari and Mineta saying her name in hushed tones, she can’t help but plug an earphone jack into the wall.
“I get it,” Mineta assures him, “you’ve already been rejected by every other girl at UA so Jirou’s your last chance at getting a girlfriend before we graduate.”
“No, I mean really like her,” he pauses before adding, “And I haven’t been rejected by every girl here!”
“Every girl, almost every girl, it’s pretty much the same.”
Kaminari rolls his eyes. From the way Mineta speaks, one would think he’s a Casanova of some sort, but Kaminari’s pretty sure he’s been rejected by just as many girls, if not more. “Besides, Jirou’s rejected me the most of all. She always thinks I’m kidding, but I’m gonna show her that I mean it, that I really mean it.”
Jirou leans back from the wall, her earphone jack retracting and her heart beating fast at the conviction in the blonde’s voice. Could he really be interested? She shakes her earphone jacks, not wanting to get her hopes up. She can hear muffled laughter from within the room and pauses, plugging back into the wall.
“Even Hagakure has better curves than her and she’s friggen invisible.”
“Y’know Mineta, looks aren’t everything,” Kaminari huffs.
“Yeah, but they sure help, don’t they?” he replies, waggling his eyebrows. Kaminari lets out a reluctant bark of laughter. “See, now you get it. Forget Jirou, Yaoyorozu is where it’s at,” he adds as the chuckles die down.
Kaminari shrugs. He knows that no amount of explaining will convince Mineta that what he feels for Jirou is real, that even though she’s not the curviest or girliest, he still thinks that she’s the cutest girl in their class. “Yeah, I guess.”
On the other side of the wall, Jirou feels her heart sink in her chest. The lack of facial expressions, full context, and the natural distortion of the wall doesn’t give her the full picture but she figures she’s heard enough. Stupid, stupid, stupid, she chants, you shouldn’t have gotten your hopes up. Quickly, she retracts her earphone jacks and stumbles to her feet, nearly running into Bakugo as she does so.
“Watch it,” he snaps instinctively, then does a double take as he notices her face. “Yo Headphones, you okay?”
She nods, jaw clenched tight, and he clicks his tongue in sympathy. “No you’re not. C’mon,” he offers, jerking his head to the side, “I’ve got a drawer full of junk food with your name on it and Eiji gives the best hugs.”
Jirou smiles weakly and Bakugo can’t help but return the smile as she wraps an earphone jack around his wrist and squeezes gently.
“Whatever it is, you’ll be okay,” he says gruffly.
She nods, following him down the hall to his dorm room.
“’Suki, what took you so—” Kirishima frowns, scrambling off the bed and onto his feet. “Hey hey Jirou, what happened?”
Bakugo shrugs, admiring the care and comfort the redhead exudes, who by now has wrestled Jirou into a bear hug. It’s a testament to how she’s feeling that she’s accepting the overt display of affection without a struggle.
“You wanna talk about it?” he asks, rocking back and forth a little.
She shrugs and buries herself further into his chest. “Not really.”
Kirishima nods and shuffles them back towards the bed. Bakugo feels the bed dip with their weight and scooches over to accommodate them.
They sit in silence for a few minutes, before Bakugo’s had enough. “Oi, Headphones,” he says, sitting up enough to elbow her roughly, “This whole sitting around thing isn’t going to solve shit, and we can’t do anything to help if we don’t know what’s going on.”
Kirishima shoots a glare over at the blonde, “But only if you’re ready,” he reassures quickly.
“It’s stupid,” she sighs, “I overheard Kaminari and Mineta talking about me and some of the other girls and it made me upset. I feel dumb just thinking about it; I don’t even care what they think anyways.”
“Bullshit.”
Both Bakugo and Jirou look up and stare at Kaminari in alarm.
“What?!” he cries, “You wouldn’t be this upset if you didn’t care.” Kirishima nods, stroking an imaginary beard, “If I had to say what happened, my guess is its Kaminari.”
She huffs out a laugh. “Yeah maybe.”
“So it was Dunce Face then?” Bakugo asks, palms sparking dangerously.
Jirou shakes her jacks wildly, “Augh no, it’s not his fault. I just misunderstood something and thought he liked me when he really doesn’t.”
“Are you sure?” Kirishima asks thoughtfully, “If I had to guess, I’d say Kami definitely likes you.”
She shakes her head, “No, I heard him say it.”
“That doesn’t sound like Kaminari,” he frowns. “All he ever does is talk about you and how cool you are.” Jirou feels her cheeks heat up and shakes her head again. “Maybe we should just go talk to him and clear things up! I can go with you!” Kirishima offers excitedly.
“Kirishima, I will literally stab you to death if you make me do that,” she drawls, shaking her head one last time and straightening up. “I feel better now anyways.”
Bakugo grabs her wrist as she turns to leave. “Hey, he’s just trying to help,” he barks. “Besides, there’s nothing wrong with needing help or whatever.”
She can’t help but smile at the stiffness in his jaw. For all his loud mouth and tough exterior, he was just as kind and compassionate as Kirishima, albeit in a much different, subtler way. “I know, Bakugo, but I’ll be okay. Thanks you guys.”
The door closes behind her and Kirishima turns to Bakugo, eyes wide and pleading. “So we give it couple weeks and if Kaminari hasn’t fixed it by then, we get to kill him right?”
Bakugo huffs out a laugh and wraps an arm around his boyfriend. “Make it a week and you’ve got a deal.”
…
The next few days are awkward at best and Kaminari doesn’t know where they went wrong. After the moment they’d shared at the party he’d been gearing up to confess to Jirou— debating whether or not to do it through one of the notes they pass during class, or with a fancy bento during lunch, or even maybe by dedicating a song to her during one of their jam sessions— but all his plans came to a grinding halt with the radio silence he’s been receiving as of lately. Texts went unanswered, notes thrown on her desk were swept onto the ground, and to his surprise, Uraraka had given him a particularly harsh glare during lunch when he’d asked after Jirou.
“I don’t know how much longer I can take this,” Kaminari laments, dropping his head back on Sero’s bed. “Things were going so good. For once she was actually flirting back and then nothing.”
Sero sighs. “Have you tried actually talking to her? Asking her what’s wrong?”
“Don’t be ridiculous Hanta, why would I do that?”
“Mina, back me up here,” he groans. “You’re not going to solve anything sitting around and moping.”
Ashido shrugs, passing the blonde another bag of chips. “It’s worked out pretty well for me in the past.”
“God you guys are pathetic.”
“Hey,” Kaminari cries suddenly, sitting up in bed, “Mina, you’re a girl!”
Ashido stares at him disdainfully. “You’re kidding me, right?”
“No, I mean like you’re a girl, so you can ask Jirou what’s wrong without it being suspicious. If Sero does it then she’ll know it’s really for me, but if you ask, it’s just because you’re her friend!”
“So since I’m a guy, Jirou and I can’t be friends?” Sero asks, not following the blonde’s logic.
He waves his Dorito covered hand at Sero. “You know what I mean. Mina’s gonna be our guy on the inside.”
“First of all, still a girl,” Ashido quips, “And second of all, you’re the one who messed things up, not me. So you’re going to be the one who fixes them. Not me.”
Kaminari frowns and collapses back onto the bed. “I just really like her,” he says softly, stretching his arms above him and watching sparks dance between his fingers, “And I thought we were getting somewhere and maybe she’d like me.” He lets out an aborted laugh. “I should’ve known it was too good to be true.”
Sero and Ashido share a glance, then scooch closer to the blonde.
“Kami, if she doesn’t want you then that’s her loss,” Sero says gently. “You’re a great guy and anyone would be lucky to have you.”
“Yeah,” Ashido chimes in. “And I don’t know exactly what’s going through her head right now, but I know Kirishima said she was real torn up after overhearing you and Mineta the other night.”
“Me and Mineta?” Kaminari muses. “What were we— oh!” He frowns and swears softly. “She probably only heard the end of our conversation, where Mineta was trying to tell me that Jirou was the least attractive and I didn’t bother saying anything cause I knew he’d just keep arguing on and on and-and I was tired of hearing him go on and on about our classmates and the pros and cons of their hero costumes, y’know?”
“Yup, that would do it,” Mina nods as she pats the increasingly anxious Kaminari. “If that had been me and I’d overheard it, I would be pretty angry.”
“She’s not even angry though,” Kaminari says. “Angry Jirou I can handle when she’s yelling at me or sticking me with her jacks. This Jirou is different. She won’t even look at me, let alone yell at me or make physical contact.” He sighs and buries his hands in his hair. “I think I really fucked up guys.”
Sero shakes his head. “If there’s one thing you’re good at its fucking things up,” he begins, ignoring the hiss of “not helping” from Ashido. “But if there’s another thing that you’re good at its making up for your mistakes.”
“Yeah!” Ashido cheers, “All we need is a plan.”
…
As it turns out, plans are a lot harder to come up with than they had initially anticipated. All of Kaminari’s ideas had been nixed by Ashido, whose ideas had been nixed by Sero, who seemed unwilling to come up with any plan other than “just talk to her Denki!”
“C’mon guys, you know how important this is to me,” Kaminari cries. The trash can by Sero’s desk is filled with crumpled pieces of paper and candy wrappers. “We’ve got to have at least one good idea. Just one!”
Ashido frowns. “I had plenty of good ideas, but someone trashed them all.”
“Hiring a skywriter to write “Jirou will you go out with me?” is not a good idea,” Sero shoots back. “Do you know how expensive that would be? Plus, what if you can’t even get her to go outside and she misses it?! And don’t even get me started on the ‘write your own song’ idea. Imagine how badly that would go, he can’t even rhyme too with shoe.” He shakes his head. “Denki, just talk to her. Even if you manage to think of a good way to ask her out, she’s not going to listen to you if she thinks she’s just some back up plan or a way to get close to the other girls.”
“He’s got a point,” Ashido concedes, tapping her pencil against her lip. “Maybe we’ve been thinking about this the wrong way. Instead of thinking about how to ask Jirou out, we need to think about how to apologize, then ask her out.”
“A two-step plan,” Kaminari muses. “Yeah, I like that.”
The three look up at the sound of a soft knock on the door and after some pushing and arguing, Sero gets shoved off the bed and grumpily walks over to open it.
“Hey, Sero, can I talk to you?”
He frowns, his body blocking their visitor from view. “Er now’s not the best time, you see—”
“I’ll make it quick, I promise. I just really need to talk to someone who gets it.”
Sero moves back reluctantly and opens the door fully, allowing Jirou to step into the room.
Kaminari can pinpoint the exact moment that she realizes he’s there— her eyes, open and vulnerable, harden and he can almost see her walls shooting back up.
“Hey Jirou, funny story, we were just talking about you,” Ashido babbles, practically vaulting off the bed to shove Sero out the door. “Anyways, we’re on our way out, but we’ll talk to you later!”
She slams the door behind them, leaving Kaminari and Jirou staring at each other in shock, the sound of Sero complaining “but it’s my room!” trailing down the hallway.
“Heey,” Kaminari tries, shoving the blankets off his legs and standing up to reach out to her. He tries not to take it personally as she flinches and pulls away, instead taking a deep breath and trying to put himself in her shoes. How would he feel if he’d overheard Jirou talking with the girls about how he’s the least attractive?
That would never happen, you’re easily one of the most attractive, Denki, his brain snorts and he shakes his head to clear the thought away. I would feel hurt, he decides, and I would feel embarrassed and I would wonder if they were making fun of me this whole time.
“Mina told me that you overheard me and Mineta talking,” he begins, trying to infuse his voice with all the honesty he can, “And I want you to know that I’m sorry for what I said— or I guess for what I didn’t say— for not telling him off for being gross and not saying anything when he was comparing you to the other girls. He knew how I felt about you— how I feel about you— and he can be pretty shallow, so he doesn’t get what I see in you. But Jirou, I see so much. I see how your eyes light up when you hear a good song, the way you don’t back down from a challenge, how you hold back a smile when I do something dumb, and the way you’re never ever afraid to say what you think.” He shrugs, palms up, a bit taken aback by his own honesty. He’d revealed much much more than anticipated, but at this point there’s no going back “I-I just thought it’d be easier to agree with Mineta so he’d shut up and move on, but he kept going and going and going. It was really dumb and I should’ve said something and I’m sorry that I didn’t. And this wasn’t how I planned on telling you, but I really like you Jirou.” He exhales, heart pounding in his throat. “Jirou…can you like…say something?”
Jirou bites her lip, the tips of her earphone jacks tentatively tapping against each other. “I mean, I appreciate the apology, but can you honestly say you’d be telling me the same thing if I hadn’t overheard you?”
“Yes?”
“You’re lying,” Jirou scoffs, shoving her jacks in Kaminari’s ear.
“Gyah!” he shouts, electricity dancing around him in shock, “Okay, okay, so maybe I was.”
“You’re not apologizing because you’re sorry, you’re just apologizing because you got caught,” she huffs, flinging open the door and stomping out into the hallway. She’s halfway to the stairs when a hand catches her wrist and she attempts to pull away without looking back.
“No! Jirou, I’m apologizing because I’m sorry and because I got caught.” Kaminari cries, tugging her a little so she turns back to face him. “And I wasn’t lying about liking you, Jirou-san.” He drops her wrist and holds out his hand, gesturing to her jacks, “Honest.”
Jirou reaches out slowly, wrapping an earphone jack loosely around his wrist and letting the soft rhythm of his heartbeat fill her ears.
“I like you Jirou, like I really, really like you. I think you’re really cool and super talented and I know I’m kinda dumb sometimes but I’ve got a good heart and I think I’d be good at loving you.”
She stares at him incredulously, her anger almost forgotten as she absently untangling her jacks.
Kaminari grins sheepishly. “What did I tell you? I wasn’t lying.”
“I— I’ve never—”
“I don’t care,” he says honestly, smiling down at her hopefully. “Please Jirou, you know how I feel now and you know I'm telling the truth. So please, even if it’s just once—will you go out with me?”
“Say yes!” Kirishima cries, clutching Bakugo’s hand and wiping away happy tears.
Startled, Jirou looks around to see half her class poking their head out their rooms in curiosity. “Get out of here, you losers, this isn’t a romcom,” she huffs, despite a small smile on her face.
Ashido begins to chant, “Ji-rou, Ji-rou, Ji-Rou!” with Kirishima and Asui joining in.
Thankfully, Bakugo takes this as his cue to let out a minor explosion. “She said scram you damn extras,” he snarls, shoving the group down the hall and into the elevator. Before the door closes, he whirls back around to glare at Kaminari. “She’s too good for you Dunce Face. Don’t fuck it up.”
Kaminari grins nervously, “Aye aye captain.” He waits for the doors to close then turns back to Jirou and grabs her hands gently. “So? What do you say?”
“This doesn’t mean everything’s okay,” she says softly. “I’m still mad at you.”
“I get that and I’ll do whatever it takes to make it right,” Kaminari replies, “But I don’t want one stupid mistake to ruin something great.”
Jirou laughs, “It was stupid. But a part of it was my fault too. I should’ve come to you and gotten the full story instead of ignoring you and getting upset.”
“I’m not the only dumb one in this relationship,” he quips, relishing the way her face turns pink at the insinuation.
“We’re not a couple yet, Pikachu,” she hedges, “You still have to take me on a date. Dazzle me, woo me, the whole nine yards. Then we’ll see.”
Kaminari grins. “Jirou Kyouka, I’m going to woo the shit out of you.”
Jirou laughs, her smile bright and blinding. “I’m looking forward to it.”