Chapter 7

After Deku left, I went to shower. The hot water was streaming over my back and I hissed when it reached the three large cuts on my back. I had Hero training in two days and wondered how to hide them from the others when we were changing. Then my thoughts wandered to Deku.

"You haven't changed at all in that matter. You haven't matured. You'd still recklessly hurt someone's feeling."

He was wrong. I had never told someone to kill themselves afterwards again. It was no longer fun to me to break people. I didn't even understand anymore why I thought it was fun in the first place. Not after Deku vanished and people deemed him dead.

Yeah, I was still crude, taunting and shit like that, but it was part of my fucking personality. And people around me knew I was simply explosive. I wouldn't actually want to kill someone, no matter how often I said so. I cared about some people and I genuinely wanted to become a Hero and beat villains' asses.

I wanted Deku to see that for himself. I wanted him to know I was fucking better than my old self now. And maybe he'd turn back to before just a little. To happy, optimistic and friendly. I couldn't fucking undo the damage I had done, but maybe I could try to fix it a bit. And if not…

No, I fucking would. Heroes didn't fucking give up. Even if I had to yell that damn motto, "Plus Ultra", out loud, I wouldn't give up, dammit! No matter how much damn pain and endurance it would take, I would get Deku out of the ditch I left him in. And that's a fucking promise.

When I woke up the next morning, I had overslept. I quickly got ready, rushed to school and came into the classroom two minutes after the bell. Aizawa-sensei had the unbearable urge to inform me about my tardiness. "You're late, Bakugou." "Yeah, I fucking know that. Sorry." I dropped onto my chair and saw all of my classmates staring at me. "Stare at something else, you dumbfucks!" My teacher sighed. "Language, Bakugou. Now let's start class."

Discount Pikachu and shitty hair immediately came up to me at lunch, while I was still gathering my stuff. Discount Pikachu spoke up first. "Hey, you okay Bakugou? You look like shit." I scowled. "Why fucking thanks. Better than looking like you fucker." Shitty hair exchanged a glance with the charger, then he came a bit closer. "We're serious, Bakubro. You're somewhere else with your thoughts all the time, and you seem… Somehow beat up."

I hissed. "I'm fucking fine and now scram. You're annoying the hell out of me." Charger lifted his eyebrows. "Are you not coming to lunch with us?" I shook my head. "No. I'm fucking tired and I don't need any damn human interaction." I had had a hard time sleeping yesterday, because my back hurt like hell, which was probably the reason I had overslept.

Dunce face shrugged and left the classroom, while shitty hair gave me another concerned look. When I raised my brow at him, he left aswell. I wanted to be alone, because I needed time to think without a chance of a random sociopath strolling into my house.

While I thought about tactics to get Deku a little saner, I had undeliberately begun to draw something on a piece of paper on my desk. Another line and another line, dots and curved lines… Suddenly I noticed what I had been drawing. It was a sketch of Deku. The old one, judging by the wide smile and the freckles I had drawn.

I flicked my tongue, stood up, threw the drawing away and went to the bathroom. When I passed by one of the bathroom mirrors, I noticed I actually looked like shit. I was pale, had dark eyebags and my hair was messier and less spiky than usual. If that damn nerd kept me up until midnight again, I would fucking murder him without remorse. Would solve a couple of my problems at once.

------- 3rd person POV -------

Kirishima came back from lunch, and noticed Bakugou throwing a piece of paper in the garbage can and leaving the classroom. The redhead had wondered what was up with his best friend for a few days, so he got curious and got the paper out of the trash again. He unfolded it and saw a rough drawing of a boy with curly hair, freckles and a wide, happy smile.

"Why are you picking up trash?" Kirishima's friend Kaminari showed up behind him and stared at the drawing. "Who's that?" "I don't know. Bakugou drew it and threw it away, but I feel like I've seen the guy on it somewhere before." Kirishima stated and Kaminari nodded. "Me too. I didn't know Bakugou was gay, though."

Kirishima gave his blonde friend a questioning look. "Gay? How did you jump to that conclusion?" The blonde grinned at him. "It's obvious! Bakugou behaves weirdly and draws some random guy. He just has to have a crush on that boy!" Kirishima laughed and discarded the paper again. "You and your stupid ideas!" But he knew Kaminari might have had a point.

"Something's off with Bakugou…"