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Ochako knew she was being gross.
It was disgusting, really. She knew, logically, that she was doing something that would keep her up for nights to come, staring up at the peeling star stickers on her ceiling, contemplating moving countries. If this were a television show, she’d be hiding her face behind a pillow, toes curled, tense with secondhand embarrassment.
She grabbed his sweatshirt anyways.
Ochako was sneaky about it, at least. Her omega was a sly, conniving bitch inside her, but it was also determined and stubborn. She’d nabbed the sweatshirt as soon as he’d left the laundry room, mumbling about detergent. Her heat was nearing and so she’d been snuggled inside her beloved blanket-hoodie hybrid, the one that Katsuki always scoffed at.
Fuckin’ marshmellow. Yeah, but she was inside a comfy marshmallow, one that had plenty of room to smuggle a dirty sweatshirt. It had been quickly jammed under her shirt, held in place by her crossed arms as she fled back to her dorm.
And now she was staring at a dirty sweatshirt, glaring at some band slogan faded and stretched across the dark material.
She didn’t pick it for aesthetics.
No, it had called to her. She’d just finished throwing her damp clothes into the dryer when Shinsou had appeared in the laundry room, a hamper full of clothes cradled under an arm and his pine-and-dark-chocolate scent heavy in the air.
He’d gotten a lot stronger since their first year at UA. Ochako would be lying if she said she hadn’t noticed- and thoroughly appreciated- that fact. And with such appreciations came a rather embarrassing crush on the aforementioned alpha.
Ochako and her inner omega had finally found something they agreed on.
So when she’d smelt the scent so close to a heat, she knew that she was fucked. And honestly? She was alright with that. The minute she’d seen the sweatshirt on top of the pile, well-worn and loved, she knew she was going to have to commit her first crime.
It was sitting on her bed, a dark streak across her otherwise pinkish room. Her fingers twitched. Her toes wiggled. Her teeth were grinding.
Ochako was breathing firmly through her mouth as she organized the room around her. Truthfully, she hadn’t cleaned the place in a solid week, getting caught up with assignments and exam preparation. Third year at UA was no joke.
But, again, Ochako was a little gross. She didn’t truly care about the state of her room, but she needed something to keep her from the beacon on her bed.
Once every book was placed spine-out on her rickety bookshelf, every notebook tucked away into her backpack, and every snack carefully stacked on her table, she finally breathed in through her nose.
Shinsou’s scent hit her all at once. It was potent on its own- that pine smell singing of winter woods, that dark chocolate feeling like huddling under fuzzy covers- but Ochako had it bad. Bad bad. So bad that the scent gave her memories, like the time he’d bought her red bean mochi after her first breakup. The time he’d read her favorite book so they’d have more to talk about. Even the ridiculous times, like when he’d send her a picture every few days of the paws of various cats he met on the streets.
Toe bean collection, he called it. Shinsou’s sweatshirt smelled like a toe bean collection.
So yes, Ochako was very gross. She was very gross and very much in love.
But with her face stuffed in his sweatshirt, knees up to her chest, snuggled into the makings of her nest, she was okay with those things.
She had one of Tsu’s frog plushies in the mess. One of Iida’s old, albeit clean, shirts was serving as a makeshift pillowcase. Todoroki had offered up a sock rather quickly, and despite Ochako’s initial apprehension, it found its place in her collection of things. She’d forced Katsuki to give her a headband he used to pull his hair back for workouts. Mina had shoved a fluffy, pink blanket of hers into the mix. She even kept one of Izuku’s old All-Might scarves in her next, despite their complicated history.
It was a collection of the people she loved here, omega and alpha and beta alike. It felt like home, and that was what Ochako needed most during her heats.
It had felt different the past few months, the box holding all her nest glaring at her from deep within her closet. It only came out for a few days every few months, but still, it’d just felt wrong, like she’d open the box to prepare her nest and be met with an inadequate, hopeless situation.
But her stupid, stubborn omega had known the problem all along.
Bitch, Ochako thinks, purring into Shinsou’s old sweatshirt. She’d probably known what was wrong all along, had probably let Ochako stew in it for a while.
It didn’t matter now. She had the missing piece, and that used, ratty sweatshirt would be the centerpiece of her nest this go around.
Ochako was drifting off into a pleasant nap when there was a small, hesitant knock on her door.
She sat up immediately, clutching the stolen sweatshirt to her chest.
“‘Chako?” The voice on the other side rumbled.
Ochako was stuck between wanting to promptly throw herself off the balcony, sans zero-gravity quirk, and wanting to desperately fling open that door.
“Yeah?” She says, cursing the way her voice came out high and breathless.
It was quiet for a long second, so long she’d hoped he’d left. Sadly, the universe wanted to see her die of embarrassment. It’s karma, she supposed.
“Can I talk to you?” Shinsou says, finally, his voice taking on an odd tone.
Ochako makes a noise of approval, her heart racing as she starts darting around her bed.
Where could she even put it? She needed time, maybe minutes, maybe hours to find the exact position of his sweatshirt. It’d taken her a while to find the positioning of her usual nesting pieces, and now his old sweatshirt had gone and ruined everything!
For a moment, she thought of throwing it out- just the idea made her whine.
“Chako? You all good?”
If her face was a tomato by now, cheeks on fire. Ochako wasn’t sure if she could continue being friends with him after this fiasco.
Stifling back another mortifying whine, she shoves the sweatshirt under a pillow, hidden from sight. It immediately feels wrong, so, so wrong, and her omega is yelling at her, but she can’t help it now.
Finally, she stumbles over to the door, taking a few deep breaths before grabbing the doorknob and slinging it open.
The knob slams into the adjacent wall, rattling all of her picture frames.
Maybe she was a bit worked up.
Shinsou looks down at her, still towering over her after that growth spurt during second year. It makes her omega very, very happy, another thought that has Ochako wishing she could just hide in her nest again.
“Uh,” He starts, but his purple eyes are cloudy and unfocused. Ochako is used to his sly remarks and quick wits, but since she’d opened her room up to him, he seems almost awkward.
“I- uh, I was wondering if you, ah-” Shinsou continues, but he stops to shake his head, his brows furrowed. Ochako keeps a dumb, innocent smile on her face, though a bead of sweat is trailing down her temple.
“Fuck.” He lands on. “Why do you smell like me?”
Ochako isn’t quite as fast as Shinsou. He always had a comment to make, a sarcastic remark or a sharp observation that usually had her in stitches. She, however, was not used to making a tale on the spot.
“I have a lot of candy in here.” She blurts out.
Shinsou blinks at her. Time stops for a second. Ochako does the math on switching career paths.
“I smell like candy?” He says, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, I mean-” Foot, meet mouth. “Sort of? Dark chocolate is really delicious though, and kind of manly, in a way, so don’t worry about it! It’s very good with fruits, as well, so it’s also kinda healthy! And when you add in the pine scent-”
Ochako stops when she sees the corner of his mouth lift up, a small smirk challenging her.
“It’s nice.” She finishes, her voice barely a whisper.
“May I come in?” Shinsou replies, the smirk still laden in his words. Oh, she’s fucked. So, so fucked.
Ochako wants to say no, but she is fairly sure her omega would choke her out in her sleep. She’s not sure how to find a way out of this one that doesn’t involve her untimely death.
“Yep.” Ochako squeaks. She doesn’t move a muscle until he raises an eyebrow, amused at her reaction.
She moves over a few feet, wanting to put distance between them. His scent is heavy, mingling with her own in the tiny room she called home. If it were any other alpha, it may feel too big, too suffocating in the tiny space. But this is Shinsou.
He’s a bloodhound, though, and Ochako is becoming antsy.
“I think you’re, uh, sniffing up the wrong tree?” She offers, cringing at her words.
“It’s barking.” Shinsou says, but he’s still pacing around the room, searching for something.
“Please don’t bark.” Ochako jokes. Her friend is still walking, pausing at the foot of her bed. He frowns at her nest pieces, all stationed in their respective spots.
For a moment, Ochako feels sad. She wants to cry and kick and scream, because why doesn’t alpha like it? It’s her nest, her place of safety.
She snaps out of it rather quickly, because the matter under her pillow is of much more importance.
“Shinsou.” Ochako says firmly, mustering up all the alpha bravado she can find. His head snaps to her, attention all hers.
“Why are you here?” She asks.
There’s an awkward silence between them before Shinsou runs his hands over his face, through his hair. Ochako stares at the wall behind him, trying to ignore the muscles straining through his sleeves, begging to be touched.
“God, I’m so sorry Ochako.” He says, a guilty look on his face. She doesn’t see that one very often, and it makes her want to apologize. “I came in here with this alpha bullshit and you shouldn’t have to put up with that. It just smelled so damn good in here, and I knew you’d let me in and that was fucking-”
“It’s okay.” Ochako interrupted, laughing at the uncomfortable look on his face. She was used to smooth, sardonic Shinsou that always had the right words- it was a nice change of pace.
“It’s not.” He insisted, frowning slightly. “I knew you were getting close to your, uh-”
Ochako flushed, trying to ignore the sudden burn in her stomach. The fact that he knew her schedule, could likely smell the change, brought forth a million feelings she couldn’t decipher just yet.
“Yeah.” He finished, rubbing a nervous hand over the nape of his neck. “It was shitty of me, and I won’t let that voice inside me get the better of me again.”
“Well, I guess we’re even then.” Ochako giggled.
Her own inner voice was practically groaning in exasperation, but Ochako had already made up her mind. She wasn’t meant for a life of crime! She was a hero, damnit.
She fixed her face into a stony, firm expression, channeling her inner Tenya Iida as Shinsou raised a purple eyebrow.
“Your sweatshirt is under my pillow.” She admits.
It felt a lot better in her head.
In real life, the words hang between them, as heavy as their combined scents.
“How’d you get my sweatshirt?” Shinsou asks, his voice devoid of any disgust or anger Ochako had been bracing herself for.
Ochako briefly thought about lying on the details- she admitted to the biggest crime, what was the harm in the meager details?
“I stole it from your hamper when you weren’t looking.”
Shinsou lets out a quick breath, as if she’s wounded him, and Ochako is ready to sign her will now. She hopes her parents took out life insurance on her, so they can ease their grievances with a few months of fully-paid bills.
“I’m so sorry,” Ochako moans, now picking up his previous stance. She can’t even look at him, instead covering her face with her sweaty palms. “It was my stupid inner voice this time, and it was loud and I couldn’t help it, okay!”
“Chako.” He says softly, voice almost a purr. There’s electricity at her wrists, and she realizes he’s pulling her hands away from her face, careful not to brush the delicate scent patches.
“It’s embarrassing.” She whined. Heroes definitely didn’t whine, but heroes usually didn’t steal things, either.
“If you wanted my dirty clothes, you could’ve just asked.” Shinsou said, that smirk back on his face.
Ochako groaned. “I don’t want your dirty clothes!”
“But your omega does, I take it?”
“Don’t say it like that!”
She’s genuinely upset at that point, her guilt and disgust and pre-heat all wrapping up into a mess of hormones. He seems to sense that, and to her surprise, he brings one of her hands up to his mouth and presses a little kiss to her knuckles.
It’s warm and soft, his lips, and Ochako bites at her own to keep quiet.
“Take all the clothes you want, okay?” Shinsou says, something sparkling in his eyes. The smirk is long gone, replaced with something that makes her feel on fire.
Ochako nods, a bit frantic, but she’s more than happy with that permission.
Yet another thing her and her omega have in common.
“I have something better, though.” He says.
For a moment, Ochako is gross again. Her brain goes somewhere straight out of her heat thoughts, thinking of something she knows they’re not ready to venture into yet. Luckily, Shinsou has already left the room, leaving her to fluster alone.
He’s back quickly, not having her wait for long; and with him, to her delight, is his comforter. It’s a dark purple, a color she’d already grown infatuated with for completely unrelated reasons, but even better is that it reeks of pine and chocolate.
Ochako is purring before she has it in her hands, before he wraps it around her, turning her into a human-sized burrito.
“See? Much better.” Shinsou says, and she can see from the way that he surveys her, a small, gentle smile on his lips, that he’s just as pleased as she is.
She’s almost too caught up in her happiness to realize the obvious.
“Shinsou-” Ochako starts, but he interrupts.
“Hitoshi.” He says, and she buries her face in the comforter, hiding up to her eyes. She’d given all her friends permission long ago to use her name, but Shinsou rarely gave others that permission. He’d technically corrected her, long ago, but Ochako had been too frazzled, instead pretending as if she didn’t hear him.
“Hitoshi.” She says finally, digging her face into the comforter. She peeked her eyes out to watch him grin at his name.
“Won’t you get cold at night?” Ochako said, still firmly gripping his blanket around her.
He would surely get cold and uncomfortable sleeping without it.
But on the same hand, she wasn’t giving it back any time soon.
“I have a spare.” Shinsou said, chuckling. The tips of his ears were slightly reddened, that hand back on his neck.
“But, ‘Chako. You do owe me something in return, of course.” He said, sly as a cat.
“Of course.” She mimicked with a frantic nod. At this point, she’d probably give him her left arm for the blanket.
“I’m taking you to the cat cafe next Saturday.” Shinsou said. His voice was that same strong rumble as before, but she could see a bit of nervousness peak through, his fingers tapping against the doorframe.
“I can’t wait.” Ochako says, a little breathlessly, her face still shrouded in comforter, trying to hide her red cheeks and wild smile.
Shinsou nods, but she can see the genuine smile stretching across his face as he closes his door, one hand in his pocket, cool as ever.
Ochako squeals a little, throwing herself onto her makeshift bed-nest. The nesting items bounce and tumble, getting out of their designated spots, but it’s okay now that she’s nestled in the pine and chocolate covers.
There was one item that she still needed, though, and Ochako grabs it quickly, unfolding from her blanket burrito and swapping it out with her hoodie.
He can bide some time with the comforter, but she’s not giving up that old sweatshirt any time soon.