Chapter Text
Fifteen different joints groaned their complaints at the exact same time Midoriya lowered himself to the ground, the synchronicity making it difficult for him to pretend it was coincidental. He tried anyway. Ignoring instincts, he folded into a kneel. His left knee popped celebratorily, as though the knee pads in his suit were equipped with firecrackers for some sort of last minute party emergency.
He held in a wince. Regrets abound.
Too late to uncrouch now. He let out a controlled breath and peered under the car.
There. By the front wheel. He just had to stretch his arm out so his fingers could make contact...
...to nudge it a milimetre out of reach.
Midoriya bit back a curse. Great. Just great. This was the best way he could imagine spending a blazing afternoon: hands and knees cooking on the roasting tarmac, body half-under some stranger's car, stretching out his forearm for a dropped orange as if it was an unreachable green light and him its begrudging Gatsby.
He locked eyes with his morphed reflection in the shiny surface of said stranger's car. It took a worryingly long second for him to convince himself his stretched, metallic counterpart was not mocking him.
Sucking in a breath, Midoriya shoved his shoulder further under the car. Fingers wrapped around orange. Triumphant, he yanked his arm back out to examine his prize.
His elbow cracked audibly.
Disguising his pained grimace under a self-deprecating laugh, he turned to the elderly man peering worriedly down at him. In spite himself, he smiled at him. He brushed the dirt off the orange on his chest as best as he could and added it to the trolley cart of fruit.
"There we go," Midoriya said cheerily, straightening. Without hesitation he replaced the old man's spot behind the handles, to much dismay.
"No, no, I want to help," he reassured, waving away the scandalised protests. "Where are you headed? Lead the way!"
Offering a watery smile, the old man nodded. He started to hobble down the pavement in the direction of the grocer, while Midoriya felt every uneven crack underneath the trolley wheels vibrating in his palms through the handles. The weight of the trolley tensed the strained muscles in his back. This must not have been easy on the old man, he thought with some perturbation.
A gaggle of tittering teens headed in their direction. They strafed from their course to let the cart pass.
"That's Deku-san, isn't it?"
"It's the Number 1!"
"He's helping an old man, so cute!"
Midoriya turned to them. They seemed to collectively suck in their breaths. He ducked his head in greeting.
The whispering exploded into high-pitched squeals. Keeping a well-practiced smile on his lips he passed them by, hoping for no further incident. An inaudible whisper. He was considering asking her to repeat it when the source of the comment was jabbed in the side by a playful, laughing elbow.
"Don't corrupt our baby!"
Laughter. The group continued on their way. Midoriya felt his smile drop.
"Baby": that was how much of the public saw him. Pure. Innocent. Oblivious to the sexual depravity that plagued the Google results for "Number 1 Hero: Deku".
Because that was who he was: Number 1 Hero, Deku. Fighting crime, rescuing civilians, and capturing runaway oranges.
Needless to say, he was not incognizant of how the internet spoke about him. How could he be? Just because he didn't recognise most of the vocabulary in the thirst tweets he'd read for that video one time didn't mean he was ignorant of their intentions. He didn't have to understand the logistics of climbing someone like a tree in order to know what it implied.
Plus, the rest of the internet did more than imply. The things they said whenever a misguided PR staffer would upload a pic of him at the gym. That time their wildly inappropriate reactions made a particularly lewd hashtag trend worldwide and forced that nut company to take down their collaboration ad campaign after half a day. Once, someone barked on him on the street.
Barked. He didn't know if he was supposed to have pretended he hadn't heard or looked around for a stray dog that needed saving. (If he remembered correctly, he'd done neither. He'd flushed and hurried away.)
And that wasn't even counting the fanart. From virginal and naïve versions of him donning flower crowns and baffled expressions to graphic and violent reimaginings decked out in leather and armed with bloody whips and ball gags, he'd seen it all.
He didn't take offense at their characterisations of him. They weren't exactly accurate, but that was only to be expected. They wouldn't know any better. After all, close friends and family didn't have a clear picture, either. Who they thought he was was no more than a quilt of memories and impressions stitched together to form a semblance of the person they knew to be Midoriya Izuku, and after all these years it didn't feel right to inform them that he had long since grown out of that lovingly hemmed patchwork blanket.
The Midoriya he was now, he didn't tell them, was different from who he'd been as a teen. Different from after his debut. From the first few years of taking up the #1 position. Hell, he was a different person from who he'd been two months ago.
He was the type to curse in his mind, too, but not aloud. Because he was supposed to be the innocent one, the adorable one, the one who tilted his head and let out confused chuckles while reading thirst tweets. That was the Midoriya Izuku everyone knew and wanted.
Consequently, it was what he would strive to become. No matter what it took. Smiling through crises, hiding the less-than-perfect aspects of his personality, pretending he lived a easy, breezy life unshackled by ugly things like office politics or the chronic pain in both arms that kept him cradling them in his bed struggling to fall sleep until dawn broke. Anything. Everything. Whatever it took to keep them happy, he would do them all.
Well, he wanted to, at least. Whether he could hinged upon his ability to figure out what it was they wanted, and that was proving harder than expected lately.
Back when he used to take on violent villains and high profile cases, people seemed more interested in his secret visits to jails and rehabilitation centres; the trips constantly plagued by sneaky flashes from nearby bushes and 'passers-by' who always asked one too many questions. So he made them PR events, and invited press to cover them.
Then interest waned. Shaky vertical videos of him entering childrens' hospitals stopped circulating around news channels, and #Deku started to clog up with questions of whether he was doing "enough" as the Number 1. The internet buzzed with listicles questioning if online charity drives and publicised trips to orphanages was worth all the taxpayers' monies he was raking in.
That he wasn't on a government salary and hence did not receive any taxpayer money aside, he was left with no clue as to what the public wanted from him. Which was it? Big cases or social work? Flashy or low-key? Because if they wanted, he would be more than glad to return to fighting villains and being able to visit victims without a hoard of cameramen trampling on each others' toes trying to film him hand a bewildered five-year-old a pudding cup. They just had to say the word.
His PR team reassured him that the internet was fickle, and he need not stress. He stressed anyway. After all, how could he be a Pro Hero if he didn't do what people wanted from him? What kind of Number 1 would he be if he didn't fulfil what people expected of him?
Who was Midoriya Izuku if he wasn't what people liked about him?
The old man stopped. Midoriya looked around. They had arrived at a rickety-looking fruit stall.
He parked the cart and kicked the safety on. Waving away the grateful bows, he did the usual song and dance of battling the customary "please take this as a token of my thanks" before failing his negotiations and leaving holding the inescapable Gift of Gratitude: this time an orange. The very one that had rolled under the car.
Or so he hoped. He wasn't sure he'd cleaned it all that well and he didn't want the dusty fruit going to some unsuspecting customer.
Midoriya checked his watch. His shift was over. Time to head back to the agency. Digging his nail into the orange, he made quick work of the peel before splitting the fruit in two and pulling out a slice pretending he was a caveman who had just discovered the wonders of segmented fruit. He was about to duck into the alley for a shortcut to the office when a voice called his name.
"Deku-san?"
Orange in mouth, he spun around.
A woman. Long hair, glasses. Decked out in office wear, she had her hand loosely holding her purse straps in place as she smiled uncertainly at him. She looked familiar, though it could be her resemblance to the many, many photos that came through his mailbox every week (from a concerned mom who had a son by 27 and thus saw being unmarried at 31 as some sort of travesty) of potential marriage candidates.
Oh. Right. She was one of them.
He removed the wedge from his teeth and put it back with the rest of the orange.
"Hello," he bowed politely, the formality hiding the fact that he had forgotten her name. "I hope you've been well."
"I have," she replied. "I hope you have too."
"Yes, I have."
A silence ensued.
Just like when they'd been seated across from each other in that VIP room as the matchmaker subtly shut the door to seal in the most awkward atmosphere he'd experienced in his life, Midoriya had nothing to say. In response to her gushing about a man who shared his name and appearance but otherwise did not exist outside of magazines and tweets, there was not much he could say. Not without disabusing her of her beliefs or admitting they made him want to hurl.
Eventually, the conversation had petered out. Like it had now. Except this time he couldn't shake her hand, leave the restaurant, and reply her texts with a lone: "You are lovely, but I don't think we will suit. I'm sorry".
He settled for slightly bruising his orange.
"So..."
She tucked a loose lock of hair behind her ear. On the fourth finger of her left hand sparkled a huge diamond. Midoriya almost let out a sigh of relief.
"I'm glad you're doing well," he said, meaning it. "I wish you happiness."
"You said that." The errant curl fell into her face again. She tucked it back in place. "I hope you find happiness, too," she added. "Are you still going for marriage meetings?"
Midoriya chuckled. "Oh, no, I begged out of them."
"Begged out?" she teased, a minute twinkle in her eye. "The Number 1 believes too much in true love to be matchmade, huh?"
He paused. Juice was dripping down his wrist before he caught himself. "Well, you know."
The woman waited. She glanced up at him through her eyelashes, the expression on her face almost hopeful, as if expecting him to elaborate.
The silence stretched. He shifted his weight, unsure of what to do.
Desperate, he held out the slightly-squished orange in his hands. "Orange?"
Her gaze fell down to the proffered fruit. Fresh juice dripped through his fingers.
She let out a resigned huff of a laugh.
"That's okay, thank you." Her phone buzzed. She glanced down at it. "Ah, I have to run."
With a polite, "See you around, Deku-san," she turned and disappeared into the evening crowd.
Midoriya stared after her for a second. Then he continued toward the agency in what he hoped was a convincing amble.
She wasn't the reason things hadn't worked out. They didn't have anything in common and he didn't remember her name, but that woman was the good sort. From his recollections, she was attractive, courteous, and seemed kind-hearted. If he wasn't set on a love match—and he wasn't—she would have made a fine marriage partner.
Admittedly he didn't really know what made a good spouse, but she seemed to understand the risks of being married to a Pro Hero, which was good enough for him.
The problem, really, was he did not live up to her image of him. Rather, he would be expected to live up to that image not just out and about, but always, in every waking moment, forever—and he did not want to do that.
True, the idea that he would have to disappoint anyone by telling them nearly everything they had knew of him wasn't quite the truth turned his stomach. He wanted to live up to their expectations. His position depended on the public's approval. He would do anything to keep them happy.
But not at home. At home, he only person he had to be was himself. He could do whatever he wanted—drink, swear, jerk off—and just... Exist. For no one to see.
Call it his sanctuary, his "mancave", his Fortress of Solitude. However others saw it, to Midoriya his apartment was the only place that still allowed him the dignity of an inner self. And there was no way he would lose that last remaining sliver to the neverending performativity of being the Number 1 Hero.
He popped the last of the orange into his mouth. Wiping his hands on his pants, he hopped onto the steps leading to the agency's glass doors. Out the corner of his eye, he spotted a crushed can atop the recycling bin.
He glanced around. The next patrolling Hero would definitely have to pass through there and they could toss it in; he could leave it to them. He was three steps from the office entrance. Going to grab and toss this single can would take him twenty steps out of his way.
Across the street, a high schooler was trying and failing to hide the fact that she was filming him.
He heaved a sigh and headed for the can.