The train sways and rocks, moving Eri around with it. She has her arm hooked around a pole and her feet spread wide to keep her balance against the motion. Her other hand holds her phone up, as she scrolls through resource after resource, switching from page to page to page, all in search of one objective:
How to help someone recover from a suicide attempt.
A lot of them aren’t super useful to her, considering she is neither Izuku’s parent nor any sort of authority figure in his life, so she refines her search a bit, finds resources for siblings and friends. Presumptions aren’t something she wants to make, but she considers him her older brother (if a… distant one, in the past few years), and she’s fairly certain that he feels similar familial feelings towards her.
After a certain point, the articles and journals and blog posts start to repeat themselves, so she moves over to one of her groupchats, and she asks there. Some more applicable advice is given to her there, from people who have been where she is and from people who have been where Izuku is.
So now, a day and a half after he came to stay with her family, she feels a little more certain about how to act around Izuku, how to treat him and how to behave and how hard she should push. Of course, every person is different, her friends remind her. Some people need gentler approaches, some do better with sterner hands and harder pushing. Given everything she knows about Izuku, she thinks he’s probably closer to the latter category, but, well…
She’s never seen him so fragile. He’s like blown glass, delicate underneath her fingertips, and if she presses too hard, she thinks he may just shatter.
Except he’s so much stronger than that, too, she can still catch glimpses of that core of steel hiding underneath the lingering cloud of exhaustion. If she’s on the cloud metaphors today, which she is, then he’s like the sun, and his sky is filled with thick cloud cover and howling winds and heavy storms.
The speaker system chimes, startling her, and a recorded voice comes on, announcing her stop. She puts her phone away, tucking it in the breast pocket of her button-up, away underneath the blazer, and steps off, stepping into the station. Her legs carry her upstairs and out into the sunlight, and she pauses to take a breath of warm air, listening to the flow and chatter of people around her and the sound of cars driving by before moving and walking down the sidewalk.
As she leaves the station behind, the people thin out, until she’s one of the only people out and about. It’s not a long walk to her house, but the neighborhood is quiet, despite its proximity to the train. One of her neighbors, an old woman with a green thumb and a lovely artist for a wife, is out working in her front garden, and she waves at Eri and Eri waves back.
Anxiety rises up in her chest and threatens to choke her as she walks up the path to her front door. For a moment, she’s afraid, apprehension gripping her heart and jerking it around as her mind presents her with the scenario of her, walking inside, walking into her house, changing, getting her snack, going to check on Izuku…
Finding his body.
Her mind presents her with the image of finding Izuku dead, by his own hand, and won’t let go of it. She is suddenly very aware of her heart pounding in her chest, hard and fast, the way her breathing comes shallow and her hands start to shake.
No matter what reasoning she uses, no matter that she pulls her phone out (almost fumbles it, her hands are shaking so, so hard) and checks her messages with Izuku, checks that her memory of him replying to her On my way home! :D text with okay is correct, her brain still presents her with that image.
She doesn’t know which method he almost attempted, so her brain gives them all. A myriad of methods, all played out in vibrant detail, in high definition and surround sound, by her mind.
It takes three tries for her to get the key in the door and the door unlocked, and she tries not to slam it, tries not to hurry too hard as she rips off her shoes and speeds into the house, dropping her school bag on the couch as she goes. Does the way her socked feet slap against the floor give away her panic? Does the way she knocks on his door seem too rushed, too frantic? “Izuku, I’m home!” she says, thanking every deity she knows that her voice doesn’t shake.
The time in which no response is forthcoming stretches out, yawning before her, and all she can hear is her heartbeat in her ears and the hiss of air coming in and out of her lungs, before the door clicks open, revealing Izuku. He looks down at her with red, swollen eyes, a furrow in his brow as he frowns.
She cannot hold back the sigh of relief that escapes her as she sees him.
“Are you okay?” he asks, eyes flicking down and then up, traveling from the crown of her head down to her feet and back up again. “You sounded… worried.”
“I’m fine!” she replies, but maybe it’s a little too quick or she’s being a little too obvious, because that frown stays put. Whatever happens, there’s no way she can tell him exactly why she’s freaking out, because she knows him. She knows that, if she confesses that she was freaking out over the possibility of finding his body, he’d feel guilty.
That frown deepens, accentuating a faint wrinkle in his brow that wasn’t there the last time Eri really interacted with him before this. For several heartbeats, he says nothing, and she can almost see the gears turning in his head, can almost see him debating with himself about whether to push or whether to leave alone, and he must decide, because he replies.
“Are you… sure?” he asks, and she’s not sure, and he’s not sure, and neither of them are sure, because neither of them is really okay. She’s… she’s fine, honestly, she’s not hurt or in the middle of a crisis or anything like that, but the fact remains that someone she considers a brother almost killed himself.
Forgive her if she’s a little emotionally distressed.
“It’s—” she begins, before biting her tongue and cutting herself off. Izuku could sniff out any lie she gives, so it’s best she tells some form of the truth. “I’m a little stressed,” she settles on. “But… I’ll be okay. Okay?” She smiles, and for a moment, it surprises her how genuine it is. Even now, it’s still so easy to smile for him, to smile around him, even while he’s this fragile, broken thing.
Not broken, she corrects herself, admonishes herself. Bent, not broken. He’s not broken.
His mouth twists, that little downturn she thinks means guilt, means self-loathing, and despite her best efforts he’s still standing there, blaming himself.
You’re not responsible for other peoples’ emotions and responses, her therapist’s words echo in her head, and she reminds herself of this, because this is true, but also… Also, he’s fragile, right now, he’s been fragile for a long time, he’s just been hiding it, hiding all the soft, hurt parts of himself behind an iron wall of faked smiles and endless work.
So, yes, maybe she’s not responsible for his emotions, but he’s not exactly in a spot where he’s capable of being responsible for his own emotions, and if she’s capable of picking up the slack there… She can take care of him, now, because she knows he danced this same line when she was much, much younger, and while there’s a world of difference between a traumatized child and a traumatized, depressed adult…
She just.
She wants to see him live. She wants to help him do so. She wants to help him smile again, to really smile, full of joy and life, the same way he once helped her learn to do so.
It’s been so long, so many seconds have passed, that when his expression smooths over and he nods and says “okay”, she has to search for what, exactly, he’s saying okay to.
And she knows, she knows, okay, she knows, that he’s not taking her at face value, but he’s not pressing, and that worries her. Does he not have the energy to? Does he just not care to?
She can’t tell which it is, and that scares her.
The two of them stand there, staring at each other, the sound of his phone playing music quietly in the background drifting out from his room. In life, there are crossroads that you stumble across. Sometimes, you don’t recognize them, and sometimes, you do. Eri recognizes this one: she could turn one way, let him go back to his room, satisfied that he’s not dead, and go do her homework and chat with her friends and email Mirio, and maybe that way would turn out fine in the end.
She’s not going to be doing that, though.
Izuku has his one hand up, bracing himself against the doorframe, and she can see him shifting his weight, eyes flicking back towards the inside of the room and its relative bubble of safety.
“I’m going to be doing my homework in the living room,” she says, jerking her chin over her shoulder, a gesture in the direction of said living room. “You should… come. We could… we could put an anime on in the background, or that one… oh, one of my friends recommended me this one American TV show? We could watch that together! Or just put on some music.”
He blinks. His eyes don’t lose that half-lidded exhaustion, but they widen, just a bit, and she sees his throat bob as he swallows. It takes him a few moments to reply, a few moments of chewing on his lip—and she can see the slight swelling there, don’t think she doesn’t—before he’s opening his mouth to reply.
“Okay,” he says, nodding. “Let me just… get my phone.” He jerks his chin over his shoulder, an echo of her earlier motion (she knows exactly where she picked it up from).
“Alright!” she nods and smiles, a rush of relief and happiness and more emotions she can’t quite pick out from the tangle fizzling up in her. “I gotta go change, anyways, so I’ll meet you in the living room!”
She waits to see his nod, to get his confirmation, before turning and running off, running upstairs into her room. There’s too many rooms in this house, too many empty ones, and it feels good to have one more of them filled, however long it lasts for, it feels good to have one of her brothers home again (even if this isn’t quite home for him, she hopes he stays, she hopes it can be home for him, for however long he needs).
Her uniform is shucked off in record time, tossed haphazardly onto her bed—her bed, a mess of colors and fluffy blankets with tigers and horses and unicorns on them, her bed, with its pile of stuffed animals of all shapes and sizes and colors, most of them gifts from others, most of them remaining from her childhood, but some more recent—with her uniform off, she shucks her bra and pulls on one of her large, soft shirts, one she’s stolen from Kouta (and maybe they had briefly dated, when they were in their last year of middle school, in the middle of their mess of Eri realizing that she’s maybe just a little bit lesbian and maybe a little bit non-binary, and Kouta realizing that, hey, maybe she’s a girl, and the two of them ended up closer friends than before as they navigated their way through gender and sexuality together, and she can remember Izuku’s advice and help there, she can remember the exact visit, the exact moment, when Kouta had summoned the courage and come out to him, she can remember the way Izuku’s eyes lit up and the way he had smiled and said, me too, had come out in turn…)
She shakes her head, pulling herself out of her memories, realizing that she’s been running her hands over the soft fabric of her best friend’s T-shirt the entire time. It has a graphic on the front, displaying characters and the logo of her and Kouta’s favorite slice-of-life show, one featuring a pair of best friends realizing they’re both trans together, and can you see why they both like it?
The outfit, as much as you can call lounge clothes an outfit, is pulled together by fuzzy plaid pajama pants, and she grabs one of her blankets and tosses it over her shoulder before she runs back downstairs to find Izuku curled up in one of the armchairs, staring at something on his phone. He glances up as she comes into the room, a brief look up, before returning to whatever he’s reading, and she skips over and holds one hand out to him.
“Come on,” she says. “Couch. It’s not hot-chocolate-and-cuddles weather but it is a hot-chocolate-and-cuddles day and that chair’s not fitting both of us.”
He looks up again, blinking up at her, face slack in an utterly disarmed expression.
“Oh. Uh,” he closes his mouth, swallows, frowns. “Your homework?”
“I don’t have much,” she replies, shrugging. “Not today! I’m not a huge procrastinator, dad never let me learn how to do that, but one day off won’t tank my grades!” She wiggles the fingers of her extended hand, and, as if moving automatically, Izuku puts his phone in it.
They both stare at it for a moment, before he groans and throws his head back against the chair and Eri… Well, the laughter bubbles up, and she releases it, wrapping her arms around her chest as she doubles over. It takes her a little bit to get herself under control, breathing deep and even as she reaches up to wipe tears from her eyes. Izuku is very steadfastly refusing to look at her, lips pressed together and a blush rising high on his cheeks, reddening even the tips of his ears. It brings life back to his face, an animation returning to it that had been missing for some time now.
Her cheeks hurt from how wide she smiles as she tosses his phone over onto the couch and holds her hand out again. “That’s not what that was for,” she giggles. “Did you, like, have a flashback to dad or your mom or someone grounding you and taking your phone?”
He huffs, shaking his head, a little ghost of a laugh and the shade of a smile making its way across his face as he sits up and puts his hand in hers. It’s rough, and calloused, and she can feel his swollen knuckles and twisted fingers, bent and beaten from years and years of… she can’t call it carelessness, but she can call it recklessness, a lack of self-care… His hand is still larger than hers, and it’s still steady, still warm, and she can still feel the almost electric buzz of his quirk arcing from him to her.
Even despite all that’s changed, he still takes her hand.
She pulls, and he lets her, he lets her haul him to his feet, and the smile on his lips stays there. It’s not big, and it’s not bright, it doesn’t shine like the sun… but it’s there, shining like a distant star, flickering and fading and waxing and waning, but it’s there and it’s real and she helped put it there.
Rather than just depositing him on the couch, as had been her initial plan, she tosses her blanket there and leads him into the kitchen instead, refusing to release his hand. And, while that renders him unable to help with the process of making hot chocolate, while Eri only having one available hand makes the whole process a little longer and a little harder than it needs to be, she still clings, holds tightly, her fingers threaded through his.
It’s a feat, getting two large mugs of hot chocolate out to the living room with only one arm useable between them, but she refuses to release his hand even when he suggests that, hey, maybe it would be easier to carry them out if there were three arms to carry them with.
Instead, she just shakes her head, squeezes his hand once, and figures out the best way to tuck a mug between her elbow and her hip without spilling its contents all over herself.
She does end up having to release him so they can get settled on the couch, so they can wriggle around and get comfortable and pull the blanket across their laps. He reaches, tentatively, for her, and she lets him come, leans into his touch as he puts his arm around her and pulls her to his side. He’s not tall, not at all, but she’s very small (she’s not sure if it’s stunted growth from her early childhood traumas or if she just got hit hard by the tiny genes stick) and fits very nicely next to him, tucked under his arm, and she leans into him, lets her head rest against his shoulder as she picks up the remote and goes to hunt down that one TV show her friend recommended.
They make it through two episodes and are partway through a third when the front door opens. Both she and Izuku perk up, heads twisting to catch sight of her dad and pops walking through the door.
“Oh my god, please tell me that’s not the rip-off American Naruto show, my classes will not shut up about it.” Those are the first words out of her pops’ mouth, and she laughs.
“It is!” she replies, grinning, and pops groans, loud and long. Her dad smacks him on the arm and mutters something, probably about taking a shower, and pops laughs and says something back before heading off towards their bedroom. Dad, for his part, walks towards the living room, his expression softening infinitely as he catches sight of the two of them.
“How does delivery, from that one American diner, sound? To go with your rip-off American Naruto,” he asks, raising an eyebrow at them. Eri nods, fast and enthusiastic—that diner has some great food, and it’ll be the perfect way to round out the afternoon. Binge-watching TV while drinking hot chocolate and cuddling on the couch with her brother, takeout from one of her favorite food places… even with everything hanging over their heads, she’s rarely ever been happier than she is now in this moment, as her dad goes to call and order their food, and she and Izuku turn their attention back to the show.
And, if a candid picture of herself and Izuku, cuddling on the couch and focused on the TV, her head tucked in the crook of his neck and her legs in his lap and his cheek resting on the crown of her head, taken by her dad since her pops was in the shower, shows up in the groupchat with just the three of them?
Well, she saves it to her phone and then texts it to Mirio.