Chapter 8

Once I got home, I was greeted with a scar-opening hug. I inhaled sharply, much to the enjoyment of the person clinging to my back. "Hi Kacchan! I want to go out today and do things friends do! Although I don't know much about that. I don't have friends my age." I growled. "If you don't stop tearing me open, I won't be able to go anywhere. I have to change, and I'd appreciate if you didn't fucking use that as an invitation to sharpen your knife on me again."

Deku slowly slithered his hands back to himself. "I'll take that as a yes. You have five minutes, then I won't hold myself back any longer." I caught a glance of his familiar hungry smile and felt the hairs on the unscathed parts of my back stand up straight. I quickly went to my room and changed, then Deku dragged me with him to the downtown.

We didn't talk, but Deku had a satisfied, yet somehow intimidating smile on his face. I tried to obliterate the memories of yesterday night, but they came up every time I looked at him. Suddenly, Deku stopped dead in his tracks. "This is the shop that serves your favorite ramen, right? Let's eat here." I followed him inside without another word.

After we had ordered, Deku stared at me. "What's up with you today, Kacchan? You don't talk a lot and swear even less." Since I had my had held my head low, I had to stare upwards to see his eyes. They were glowing dangerously. I gritted my teeth. "You mean in out of the obvious?!" Deku grinned. "But there's nothing visibly harming you!" "You're an asshole." Dekus smile didn't fade, but his eyes became cold. "Be careful with your choice of words. It'll fall back on you." Then our food came.

When we were done eating, Deku just ran off and left me to pay. I looked for him when I came out of the shop and found him sitting on the wall of a small park nearby. When I came closer, he jumped down and led me to an even lonelier area of the already lonely park. Deku sat down on a bench and patted on the space next to him. "Come on, sit down!"

I did and we sat in silence for a while, then he spoke up. "Now Kacchan, tell me what's bothering you." My eyes narrowed. "What the fuck, Deku. You literally added three fucking scars to my collection and you'll probably add around fifty more, you threaten me and play with me like a toy. I don't have anything not to be fucking upset about and you know that better than anyone else."

He chuckled. "Deal is deal. Anything and everything, so get used to it already." Suddenly he pulled his legs up on the bench and went into his bird-of-prey-position. "You know Kacchan…" He forced my head to look in his direction. "I don't like the way you talk to me. It's so… rude. Stop that, won't you?" I avoided his glare. "I guess…"

Deku grinned at me hungrily. "Are those… lies I smell?" I forced my face into a stoic expression. "Maybe it's your damn breath. It fucking stinks." He looked surprised, then he let go of me and burst out laughing. So hard, he almost fell from the bench and had to sit down normally again.

His laugh wasn't happy and nice like when we were little. It was a bit hoarse and sounded more hysterical than happy. After a while, he abruptly stopped laughing and stared at his feet with a slight smile. "…You idiot." I knew that. Trying to roast a crazy sociopath couldn't be a good idea, but fuck, I couldn't square his intimidation and the fear he made me feel with my damn pride.

Suddenly, I heard someone call for me. "Bakubro! Hey, Bakubro!" I looked up and saw dunce face and shitty hair coming towards Deku and me. Deku lifted his eyebrows. "Isn't that the redhead from two days ago?" I slowly nodded, then my fuckers of friends reached us. Shitty hair recognized Deku immediately. "Oh, hey! We met before, right? I'm Kirishima and this is Kaminari!"

Dunce face waved at Deku, accompanied by a bright smile. Deku smiled back. "Midoriya. You're Kacchans classmates, right?" Shitty hair nodded. "Yeah, you?" "Just a childhood friend. That's why I can call him a nickname without dying right away." The three boys chuckled, while I quietly stared at my feet. Shitty hairs eyes suddenly lit up. "Hey man, you got some really cool tricks with that knife of yours. Can I see them?"

Dunce face gave shitty hair a questioning glance, but understood when Deku took his butterfly knife out of his pocket and snapped it open. Then he whistled. "Damn, that thing looks scary!" Deku laughed. "Yeah, but I only use it for tricks." Lies. LIES. I almost winced at the memory of his knife dragging along my back, but caught myself in the right moment.

He started flicking it, from side to side, around, switching from one half of the handle to the other, occasionally throwing it in the air and catching it without cutting himself. My braincell-deprived friends watched with mesmerized eyes. When Deku stopped playing with it, shitty hair asked to have it for a moment and Deku gave it to him. "But be careful, Shishi sometimes cuts people she doesn't like."

"Your knife has a name?" Deku nodded at dunce face' question. "Every good knife has. If you look at the lower part of the blade, the Kanji 'shi' (death) is engraved there. I found that name boring and named her 'Shishi'. That has a similarly intimidating meaning (corpse), but sounds cuter."

My two friends and my childhood 'friend' continued talking about that damn knife and I felt slight panic rising up in me. After a while, Deku gave me a glance from the side. "Hey, can I have Shichan back now? I think Kacchan's feeling a bit uneasy. And yes, I have a nickname for my knife." That bitch. Dunce face gawked at Deku having a full set of names for his knife, while shitty hair burst out laughing. "Is the little Kacchan scared of knifes? Aww!" I didn't answer.

Shitty hair suddenly seemed to remember something. "Hey Bakubro, can I talk to you for a moment?" I stood up and he led me to a group of trees a couple of meters from the bench. "So Bakugou… Kaminari and I think we know why you've been so upset lately." I flinched internally. What if they actually knew? They had seen the cut on my cheek, Dekus knife, and since Deku hadn't appeared before I became so uptight all the time, it might just be they connected the damn dots.

"Are you maybe… in love?" The fuck. I stared down on him. "Huh?! What the hell, shitty hair?! How'd you get that fucking imbecile idea?!" Shitty hair fiddled with his thumbs. "Well, Kaminari and I found that drawing in the trash, and… You could be gay and have problems coming out of the closet, but maybe want to openly be in a relationship with someone…" I snorted mirthlessly. "You're talking a fucking shitload of crap there. Get lost." I turned around and walked back to the bench.

"You didn't answer! Am I right?" "Shut up." "Bakugou…" "I SAID SHUT UP!" I snapped at shitty hair. He was shocked. "Wow, alright. Calm down, man." I flicked my tongue. "What-fucking-ever." Then I left the park. Deku exchanged a few more words with dunce face and followed me. Then I felt his hand on my shoulder, with his fingernails piercing my skin through my jacket.

"That wasn't very nice." His eyes glowed dangerously through his dark hair, although his smile was nice. "You have very nice friends." Then his expression dropped. "I hate them. They're too upbeat, too smiley, too easy to satisfy. I believe we'd rather stay away from them." His fingernails dug deeper into my shoulder, while I asked myself what the hell he was hinting on. We continued walking 'home' and Deku didn't talk anymore for the rest of the way.

I had a feeling our arrival would be an awful conclusion to this awful day.