He stops in the middle of the corridor. He spins around and stares at me: there's fire, yes, but it's a strange fire.
"Me?!" he says, with an index finger on his chest. "You let that idiot put his hands on you in the middle of everyone, and I'm the one who's the idiot?!"
"It was a stupid joke!" I blurt out before I can breathe. "We were laughing! There was nothing wrong with it!"
"I don't give a shit!" His voice scrapes the metal ceiling. "You're not letting anyone touch you, okay?"
I clench my fists at my sides; I can feel my nails digging into my palms. "Who are you to tell me this?! You're not my commander, you're not my boyfriend, you're nothing!"
He takes a step forward. That's enough to close the gap between us. His fists clenched, his knuckles pale. I can smell the acrid odor of the nitro he sweats when he's a millimeter away from losing his temper.
"I'm the one who kept you alive, damn it!" he growls. "The one who picks you up in pieces if you get distracted!"
My heart pounding, yet my feet stay put. "That doesn't give you the right to decide who touches me or who I laugh with!"
He runs his tongue over his tooth, a tic I recognize. He shakes his head, furious, almost in disbelief.
"You don't understand shit! You don't understand that if you let your guard down out here, you're dead! I'm not watching your back to babysit you...I do it because if you fall apart, I fall apart too!"
The sentence hangs between us, heavier than air. A door slams two corridors away, someone coughs, then silence again. I stare at him.
"Then say it!" I take a half-step toward him, my voice breaking and rising again. "Say it's not about the mission. Say you care!... About me..."
The neon light above us flickers. For a second, I see his face jerking: jaw clenched, eyes trembling with anger and that other thing he refuses to let out. His fist vibrates as if a spark inside it were gasping for oxygen. An inch from the wall, there's a dark shadow, the mark of old explosions: I know, because I've seen enough of them to recognize when he's holding them back.
"Tsk..." He turns his head to the side and spits on the ground, but his voice, when it comes, is cracked with defenses. "Don't talk bullshit."
I'd expect another wave, another threat. Instead, he simply turns his back on me, so coldly, as if turning off an internal switch. His step makes the floor tremble in those two millimeters that only those who know him notice. His back feels like a closed door without a handle.
I could grab him. I could say his name in a different tone. I could slip between that "don't talk bullshit" and the next moment slip through the crack. I don't. I remain rooted there, the corridor breathing in my ears. The lights come back on, but my heart doesn't. A recruit passes by with a sack of badly folded sheets; he gives me a sidelong glance and keeps going.
Kirishima doesn't arrive. Kaminari doesn't arrive. There's no audience, no stalls. Just the two of us, and now just me, counting the seconds his scent lingers and then fades. The words spoken settle, the unspoken ones still stir.
I lean against the cold wall with my shoulder, feeling the subtle vibration of the structure, a generator revving, perhaps. I slowly unclench my fists, my nails leaving red semicircles on my palm. I try to put the pieces back together: the cafeteria, the overturned chair, his lunge, my run, the phrase...that phrase. "If you fall apart, I fall apart too."
It's not a statement. He hates the word "statement."
I straighten my back. I take two steps forward, then stop. I'm overcome by the urge to chase him again, to sew his mouth shut with mine, to tell him that yes, I know, that I've been hearing him for days, weeks, from that cave. Another urge comes over me too: to go back to the cafeteria, get my spoon back, pretend it was just a blackout. The base taught us this too: to file things away and know when to choose.
Under the neon lights, our shadows are dark streaks that touch and separate depending on how we walk. His shadow thins at the corner and disappears, while mine remains hanging on the wall, motionless and faithful. "I didn't win, he didn't win," I think and say it softly, just to hear how it sounds in my mouth.
A fire door closing by itself. I imagine Bakugo beyond, sitting on a cot with his head in his hands, cursing everything and everyone, or standing in front of the mirror, convincing himself it was just a matter of discipline, protocol, "don't get distracted." I know him well enough to know he'll tell himself that story until he believes it. But the corridor has memories. And so do I.
I've made up my mind: I run after him down the corridor. The sound of my footsteps bounces off the empty walls, but I don't slow down. I catch up with him just before the stairs leading down to the storage rooms.
"Bakugo!" He doesn't stop. "Stop, Katsuki, damn it!"
He whirls around, his eyes burning. "What else do you want?! Haven't you pissed me off enough already?"
I take a deep breath, trying to keep my voice low.
"I want to understand something. I want you to tell me to my face: that you don't care about me, that you don't want me, that you don't care! So we can stop this charade, I'll go to Aizawa, ask to change partners, and that's it. As if nothing ever happened."
The falling silence is heavy. He clenches his jaw, runs a hand through his sweat-drenched hair, looking like he wants to scream but holds back.
"Say it," I insist. My voice trembles, but I continue. "Tell me you don't care. I'll just close the door."
He takes a step toward me, and for a moment I think he's going to say it.
"You want the truth? Okay." His voice comes out low, sharp. "That thing in the cave the other day was nothing at all: just a quickie. And I don't owe you anything."
Word after word, blows. Precise. Cold.
I remain still. I feel the buzz of the neon lights become a whistle in my ears, the air escaping from my chest. My breathing increases. We look at each other (a moment, maybe two) without any amnesty. Then I lower my gaze, adjust my shoulders as if wearing a uniform, and turn on my heel. I leave without a word, the dry sound of my footsteps holding together what remains.
The corridor is twice as long. The polished floor reflects back a half-figure I don't recognize. And now I'll tell you, and only you: it hurts. Not like a sharp blow...that passes. It hurts like a cold that slowly penetrates your bones. I asked for the truth, he gave it to me. Now I have to stay inside without making a fuss.
The soldier inside me takes note: okay, chapter closed, we're switching partners, we're filing it away.
The girl, however, stumbles over a tiny thing: the way he said it. Too cleanly, too quickly, like a door slammed shut to hide the room behind. And I saw that room. There were his hands reaching for me, there was that "don't go away," there was the ragged breathing and the trembling under my skin. The body knows it. The head pretends not to remember.
I'm not lying to you: for a second I want to go back, scream at him, scratch his face with words. Instead, I walk away. That counts as courage too, right? Holding the line while something inside is collapsing?
I straighten my jacket, take a deep breath, because now I have to sit down, eat, respond to a couple of stupid jokes without letting anything slip out of my eyes. Then, later, I'll go to Aizawa. Or maybe not. Maybe I'll wait a day, just one, to see if his "I don't care" holds up under the first glance he throws at me from afar.
For now, let's do this: we come in, we sit down, and no one understands anything. You stay close to me; if you see me gripping the spoon too tightly, remind me that I asked for it. And that, even when it hurts, choosing the truth is better than being told convenient lies.
***
I change floors. No cafeteria. I want to avoid the voices, the trays, the smell of curry, and above all, the act of pretending to laugh. These are all unnecessary noises that grate on my nerves today. So I do the opposite of what I usually do: I turn the corner along the staff corridor and head straight for Aizawa's office.
(Are you coming with me? I swear, I need a normal person to lean on while I do the least normal thing of all: be honest.)
When I reach his room, the door is ajar. Inside, it's dim, rain-like, even when it's sunny outside: dim lamp, cups with burnt coffee grounds, sheets of paper that smell like damp paper. Then I notice a scarf thrown over the chair; it looks like a person except it's still. Aizawa is sitting behind his desk, looking up in slow motion. He has that "I already know why you're here" look that makes me feel discovered in advance.
"Private Junko Ino... tell me." He breaks the moment.
My throat is a frictional hinge. "I want... I want a different partner."
There. I said it, I put it in the air. The words bounce in my stomach like metal marbles and make more noise than I'd care to admit.
He tilts his head slightly. "Why?"
Here comes the version that can be written on the forms, the one without emotional edges:
"Recurring conflict on the field and risk of desynchronization. I suggest rotating with Midoriya."
(I know, I know you raised an eyebrow. There's also the other reason, the one that doesn't fold into the spaces of the form. But that's what we say in here.)
He doesn't judge: he weighs his words. His eyes flick quickly over the tablet, his finger taps twice, an entire night condensed into half a second.
"Available. We'll do a two-week trial, review after the third." Then he looks at me seriously, not through glasses. "There are consequences: missions with Bakugo reduced by about ninety percent. You'll see each other in group training, not as a pair."
Translation: moments for the two of us (and for you, who keep my thoughts under wraps): they almost disappear entirely.
I nod. "Okay."
Aizawa pushes a form toward me. "Write it down, please."
The pen weighs as if it were a weapon. I look at it. I write the name, the department, the reason: the bureaucratic jargon of decisions. As I write, my hand already knows the letters but my chest knows nothing yet. And here, since we're among friends: yes, Bakugo is involved. Yes, that sentence. "It was just a quickie," said in the neutral tone of someone pretending the fire won't burn unless you look at it. Except that I was there, inside that fire. And the body, when the mouth lies, notices.
(I don't need you to tell me "he didn't deserve it," okay? That's not the point. The point is that I don't want to fight with an open wound under my uniform.)
I sign. I take a deep breath. A jerky breath, like when your zipper gets stuck.
When I hand him the paper, Aizawa takes it without fuss: "Don't confuse escape with choice." He pauses, not coldly, but dryly and decisively. "In both cases, you have to work hard."
I nod again. I don't promise anything out loud. Promises, these days, stick to my throat. (I need margin. Call it what you will: oxygen, respite, free reign. I need it.)
I stand up, the chair scraping the floor: a loud noise that marks a boundary. And as I put my hand on the handle, I feel like laughing without a smile: imagine, me...me...asking for a break from Bakugo. The part of me that… loved him a little (yes, I said that quietly, okay?) wants to turn around and backtrack. The other part, the one with the scratches and the discipline, pushes me forward.
(Oh, and if you're thinking I'm exaggerating, I understand. Maybe tomorrow I'll think so too. But not today. Today I want to get to the dorm with my head intact.)
I'm going out.
The hallway is the same, but the sound of footsteps has changed: hollow in some places, almost light in others, as if the floor were trying to tell me something and couldn't find the right language. I avoid the cafeteria like I avoid a deep puddle: I look straight ahead, take a deep breath, and head toward the room.
(Are you coming? Just for a moment. I need someone to stand by my brain door while I put the boxes away.)
I close the door. My shoulders against the wood.
Okay, let's be clear: it hurts.
Not like a slap...there's no flash, no burning skin. It's like a cold that creeps in slowly, under the stitches of the scars. There, the same as the cave, but without the contrasting fire. And without the noise, unfortunately: the silence stings longer.
I chose Midoriya as my training partner because he's good. Because with him, everything clicks into place, but also because Aizawa, with this choice, can get some shut-eye and sleep soundly. Honestly, I also chose him to stop bleeding and feeling bad. (Yes, I know you know that. But saying it out loud straightens my posture.)
And so I ask myself: why am I reacting like this? Did I really think that someone like him could do something different? Bakugo Katsuki doesn't soften, he doesn't console. I don't even think there's a right verb. And yet... a part of me, small but stubborn, hoped. Like when you look at the gray sky and convince yourself that at any moment a gap will open up and the sun's rays will peek through.
I collapse onto the bed without taking off my boots, my feet on the floor. The mattress sighs. On the nightstand, the sheet with the new assignment.
"Operative: Midoriya Izuku and Junko Ino." Reading that name puts the air back into my lungs. It's a straight line on the monitor, a regular heartbeat. It doesn't make my hands tremble.
And now? Now I breathe. Imagine storing all my thoughts in different boxes. For example, I make this decision, put it in the "procedure" box, and close the lid. (Clear label, no glitter. Not everything has to sparkle to work.)
If you ask me tomorrow if I did well today, I'll tell you today's truth: I needed space. If the day after tomorrow you tell me that he's looking at me from afar with that "nail swallowed" look on his face... okay, that'll be a problem for the me of the day after tomorrow. (I'll leave it a post-it.)
For now, I'll stay here, with you. I'll wait for the noise in my ears to subside. I asked for the truth, it was given to me, then I chose. This truth it's not elegant, it's not romantic. But at least it's mine. (And when something is yours, it has to be enough. Even if you don't like it).