ellie's corner

Oh my god, there was no way…

“Hey!” a tight but cheerful voice called, “which one of you back there has the fire?”

Touya closed his eyes and prayed, please tell me that isn’t who I think it is. Please. I’ll do anything: visit mom more, call Shoto, text dad back, just please tell me-

“Hey there.”

Damnit.

Touya cracked an eye open to find sunshine in human form looking down at him, and his heart hop-skipped behind his ribs. Of all the heroes who could have come to their aid…

Hawks’ head cocked right. “You okay?”

Touya didn’t even have a chance to open his mouth (not that anything intelligent would have come out), before twin shrieks pierced his ears, and the two women flung themselves into Hawks’ arms, fear forgotten in the face of, well, Hawks’ face.

“There, there, ladies. You’re okay now.” Hawks patted their shoulders as they blubbered their thanks, but his eyes had yet to leave Touya, stirring a flurry of feelings Touya did not have time for. “So,” Hawks tried again, “which of you has the fire quirk?”

Not Touya. Not right now, anyway, when he was late and didn’t have time for the paperwork and interrogation and legal bullshit that came with ‘unauthorized quirk usage’. Oh god, and if his dad found out…

Lips pressed together, Touya laid his hands flat over his thighs and forced himself to stay still.

Hawks made a good show of considering them each, but it was clear he already had his answer when he settled on Touya once again and wielded his unfairly good looks as a weapon to stir up a whole mess of wriggly feelings that made Touya squirm like he was guilty (he was, but that was beside the point.)

Hawks smiled and planted his hands on his hips. “Anything you’d like to share?”

Yeah, I think you’re hot but probably really arrogant like all heroes. I own two of your limited-edition Fierce Wings hoodies and the keychain exclusive to the first ten orders but refused to go to your signing event because I will not be lumped in with your Chicks. Sometimes, you work with my dad and that pisses me off. And if you keep smiling at me like that, I’m likely to take this entire city down in a blaze of glory.

“Nope, and I’m late!” Touya blurted instead, shooting to his feet and brushing the chalky dust from his jeans. “It would have been nice if you’d been twenty minutes faster, but thanks for the save I guess. Bye!”

Real smooth, Touya, he chided himself as he bolted across the street, dodging worthless heroes swooping into cuff the four villains pinned under Hawks’ feathers, and trying to ignore the heat rising in his cheeks. The one and only time you’ll ever meet Hawks, and you didn’t just roast his feathers, but you roasted his hero work too.

If Touya never saw Hawks again, that would still be too soon.

It wasn’t until Touya was safe behind closed doors that he dared to look back, and his racing pulse downshifted. Hawks was surrounded, nearly obscured by an army of lurking civilians and the flash of enough cameras to make Touya dizzy, even from this distance. That was good. Very good, actually.

He rushed to the front desk and spammed the bell until a terrified worker poked his head out of the back room. “Package for Todoroki. And hurry it up.” The fans would only keep Hawks busy for so long, and Touya needed to be long gone before the hero’s attention turned toward finding one civilian do-gooder.

“Here you… is that Hawks?” The postal worker gaped, and when Touya turned, his heart hopped up into his throat; Hawks and his sunshine smile were right outside the doors, hand on the handle as he tried to ease away from the crowd.

Touya snatched the package and dashed his name across the signature pad. “Sure is. In fact” — Touya rounded the counter, grabbed the guy, dragged him towards the doors — “he’s taking civilian statements about the attack. Better go give him yours.” He shoved the worker forward, spun on his heel to head for the back exit, and over his shoulder called out, “don’t leave a single detail out! He wants to hear everything!”

Touya ran out into the bright morning light and for as many blocks as his ill-exercised lungs allowed, and didn’t relax until the bus had carried him – sweaty and coated in slimy concrete dust – and his butterflies, an entire cities’ length away from Hawks and all the problems he posed.

What a damn morning.

🦋🦋🦋

Touya made it to work with five minutes to spare.

He slipped in the back door, package cradled under his arm, thermos of steaming coffee in hand, and hurried across the Center in a surprisingly good mood. Despite missing a session with his therapist, despite the very loud, very angry riot going on in his very empty stomach, despite there not being enough time to warm his Palos Verdes up to meet his Little Explorers today, he really couldn’t complain about his morning, all things considered.

He was alive, for one (not that those low-life losers could have taken him down), he didn’t have any new burns and had avoided a quirk-misuse citation, he’d managed to shower off several layers of chalky building dust, all of his butterflies were alive and well as far as he could tell, and — he rounded a corner to cross the glass walkway connecting the Nature Center to his domain, excitement thrumming through his veins — he’d seen Hawks, in person. Talked to him even! So what if it was only because Touya had technically broken the law, those stunning amber eyes had still been on him.

It was a moment he wished he could transfer from memory to memento so that he could display it right beside his signed (thank you, Natsuo) Hawks’ hero card. He halted at the door. Maybe he could, there had to be a quirk for that, right?

Later, he would dig into that, right now…

Touya turned his focus towards running over a mental list of the activities he’d planned for his class as he unlocked the outer door to the Butterfly House and stepped into the vestibule. Two steps to the left and he was in his office (a repurposed closet) to swap out his good boots for work ones and shelve his Palos package. After class he would check on the little guys, and hopefully by then they’d have warmed up enough to introduce them into the house.

He bent to tuck the bottoms of his navy work pants into his boots, wincing at the ache in his glutes, and half-heartedly vowed to add a little cardio to his days going forward as he tied his laces. Not that he expected he’d be skirting the law again… it just never hurt to be prepared.

Stifling an old-man’s groan, he straightened, and after one longing look at his still-too-hot coffee and a gentle pat to his box of butterflies, he headed back out to meet his class in the Center’s lobby.

🦋🦋🦋

Only six kids - five girls and one very lost looking boy – showed up, not even half of the number that had signed up initially, just a quarter of the spots he’d made available. He tried not to let his disappointment show as he led them through the Nature Center and on a tour of the near-acre expanse of the Butterfly House, but it was difficult when yesterday’s meeting with the board of directors had ended on a threatening – ‘remember, the house doesn’t need a keeper on staff to stay running’ – and every coworker he’d walked his little class past would happily turn on him if it meant adding his salary to their exhibit funding.

Leading the class deeper into the house, Touya explained how to handle the butterflies if they landed on them, what not to touch (just about everything) and challenged them to spot as many different species as they could while he set up the shadowbox displays he’d made yesterday and tried not to panic.

There wasn’t anything else he could have done… was there?

He’d shared the hell out of the event across every major social media site, plastered fliers all over town, written up a blurb about the house and the program for the Center’s monthly newsletter, manned a booth at the Summer Solstice Festival and actually talked to people (ew) about the program.

He’d run with every suggestion they threw his way.

Well, every suggestion but one; Touya refused to ask dear old dad to make an appearance.

He had tried other heroes though - Ms. Monarch: The Butterfly Hero, Wildflower Hero: Kosumosu, and a handful of others whose gimmick fit the theme - they just hadn’t come through for him. One excuse after another had flooded in from their agencies - the drive was too far, the time away from patrol was too risky – excuses they would have saved if Touya hadn’t refused - on principle - to take advantage of his last name when signing the invitations.

It boiled down to one thing - his event was too small to boost their popularity the way a patrol could, and with the polls for the Hero Billboard Charts opening in a few short weeks, what good were a potential couple dozen kids from a small, coastal town for their numbers?

Why he had thought a hero might come through for him was a mystery, but thankfully, he had plenty of experience fending for himself.

“Alright, kids, let’s talk about life cycle.” Touya herded the class away from his butterfly’s favorite patch of milkweed and towards one of the small, round tables he’d pulled out of storage to set up in the middle of the house. Bright afternoon sunlight filtered in through the glass walls, glinting off the front of his shadowbox stories of a monarch’s lifecycle, bringing the fiery orange of their wings to life once more as he simplified the idea of a complete metamorphosis for eight- and nine-year-old minds and fielded questions about the monarchs he’d imported from America.

Six sets of wide eyes and eager ears clung to his every word. It was a small mercy that the few kids who’d shown up had at least come interested to learn. Or it was, until Kirara – a self-proclaimed chatterbox - raised her hand to ask the question he’d been hoping to avoid.

“Isn’t Ms. Monarch coming?”

He swallowed a sigh; this kid’s family must have seen his first version of the event advertisement – the one that had teased a potential hero appearance before Ms. Monarch’s agency had crushed his hopes with their response. It wasn’t Touya’s fault they hadn’t seen the updated version, but still, he tried for sympathy. “She couldn’t make it.”

“Will any heroes be coming?” Aki – the little boy – asked as he raised his hands to protect his fox-like ears from the Blue Moons fluttering around them.

“No, not this year, but tomorrow we’ll have a new, endangered species out in the house!” Touya’s attempt at enthusiasm was met with slumped shoulders and averted eyes, but he pushed on, spurred by a spark of stubborn will. “They came all the way from California, and-“

A flash of light from the entrance – the vestibule door opening – cut Touya off. Another flash followed, too soon to be the soft-close of the outer door, too close to be anything but the inner door. A prickle of heat nipped at his nerves; someone had just waltzed in without waiting for the vestibule door to close! How many butterflies had Touya just lost?

“I’ll be right back. Everyone take one” — he set a stack of identification cards on the table — “and work together to find me an Apollo Butterfly.”

Storming down the winding paths of the house, Touya dug his nails into his palms and searched for calm to combat his heat. Who the hell had ignored four – four – very clearly posted warning signs about waiting for the outer door to close before entering? Who the hell thought they were more important than the house’s helpless inhabitants who didn’t understand the danger beyond those doors?

Touya rounded a buddleja bush, verbal lashing ready at the tip of his tongue, but stopped dead in his tracks by the sight of wings - bold, beautiful, larger-than-life wings the same shade as the scarlet sage he’d planted by the entrance - in his Butterfly House.

And the man who wielded them…

No way. There was absolutely no way. Touya’s heart ricocheted against his ribs. This was a mirage, a heat-induced illusion thanks to his own rising temperature and the heavy, humid air of the house, a bedtime-fantasy-become-vivid daydream.

“Hey, you!”

Oh fuck. Not a mirage. Not a mirage!

Hawks stepped closer, wings twitching at a cloud of curious butterflies fluttering around them. “Remember me?”

Touya gaped like a goddamn fish, tongue too tied to do anything useful.

“This is definitely not where I expected to find you, but, well, the feather never lies.” Something small wiggled in Touya’s back pocket; a streak of red zipped past him and disappeared in Hawks’ wings. “What exactly do you do here? The lady up front didn’t say.” He slipped his hands in his pockets, attention bouncing from one colorful bloom to the next. A grin played at his lips. “Something with… flowers?”

The concept of conversation remained just out of Touya’s reach.

“Not much of a talker, eh?” Another twitch. Hawks’ wings folded tighter against his back. “That’s okay. I know I’m probably getting in the way of your work, but I really wanted to ask for your- ack!” His wings spasmed and extended, far too quickly for Touya’s fragile butterflies to get out of the way.

And Touya, the Todoroki he was, finally found his voice in a flash of white-hot temper. “Knock it the fuck off, you’re going to hurt them!”

Brow furrowing, Hawks blinked. “Hurt… oh, the butterflies?”

“Yes, the butterflies. You just smacked them all with your damn wings!” Touya dropped to his knees to carefully pick up a Chinese Peacock dragging its now-limp wing behind as it tried to crawl to safety. “Speaking of” — he stood, glaring at the hero and cradling the poor butterfly in hand — “how many got out when you ignored my house rules.”

Hawks tipped his head. “Huh?”

Wasn’t Hawks supposed to be intelligent? Youngest to break top ten, quickest to catch on and all that. Was there nothing but air in that pretty head?

“The signs.” Touya jabbed a finger towards the door. “You walked past fourwarnings not to enter until the outside door closed and still blitzed right in! In case you didn’t notice, butterflies don’t exactly have a decent sense of where they should and shouldn’t be.” With his free hand, he gestured to the swarm still hovering near Hawks’ wings.

“Oh, I didn’t see any signs I guess.” Hawks rubbed his neck. “I think a few may have slipped out, but in my defense, I didn’t know this place was full of butterflies.”

“W-well, go get them back,” Touya huffed and tapped his foot. Hot or not, someone needed to hold Hawks accountable for his stupidity, even if it was futile; a hero as high-ranking as Hawks wouldn’t be caught dead rounding up something as insignificant as-

“Okay.”

“O…kay?”

Hawks nodded. A small army of feathers detached from his wings to hover near the doors. “Of course.” He leaned in and flashed a winning smile, and Touya found himself wondering if his missing butterflies might have sought refuge in his stomach. “But only if you promise to tell me your name once I’ve brought them all back.”

“Mine?” Touya’s voice cracked. He cleared his throat. “Name? Mine… my name?”

“That’s the deal, hot stuff. Your name for the safe return of your butterflies.”

Heat surged through Touya’s body; hot stuff… him? It was a small miracle he didn’t combust right then and there, turning himself into literal hot stuff.

“It’s… I’m-“ Touya stopped himself, pressed his lips together and considered.

Surely Hawks was only here to cite Touya for his illegal quirk-use this morning, why else would he have wasted time tracking Touya down?

So, give his name, get his butterflies back… and probably wind up with a hefty fine, or refuse and at best get slapped with a charge for obstructing justice.

This was a lose-lose situation for him, but - he looked down at the Chinese Peacock in his palm and sighed – he could give his butterflies a chance. “It’s To-“

“Mr. Touya!”

Touya startled; that should have taken them much longer.

The class barreled around the corner, brandishing the card for the Apollo. “Hey, Mr. Touya, we found it! We found the…” They stopped, small bodies colliding, and six ear-piercing shrieks of excitement shattered the calm of the house, scattering the butterflies to the far corners. With stars in their eyes, the kids looked from Hawks to Touya to Hawks, jaws dropping lower with every pass.

And Touya, well, he felt a little better about his own reaction.

“You said… you said there wouldn’t be any heroes,” Aki breathed, rocking up on his tiptoes to see over the girls. “But- but you got us one. You got us Hawks!”

“That’s right! I’m here for…” Hawks looked at Touya expectantly.

Touya’s stomach crested and dropped on a rollercoaster of emotions; what the hell was Hawks doing?

“Little Explorers!” Kazu – the quietest of the bunch, until now – piped up.

“Exactly! I’m here for Little Explorers.” Hawks beamed. “Mr. Touya wanted to make sure you guys had the best hero appearance for your” — Hawks looked around the house — “butter…fly… class?”

The kids giggled. “But you’re not a butterfly like Ms. Monarch.”

“No, no I’m not.” Hawks cast a curious look Touya’s way. “But, just like butterflies, I do have…” Slowly, he spread his wings until the tips brushed the peonies bordering the path, earning a round of applause from the impressionable youth and an eye roll from the one who could spot a spectacle from a mile away (endearing or otherwise).

“I’m sorry I’m late, there was an incident in the city this morning that I needed to help with.” Hawks winked at Touya, again testing the limit of Touya’s quirk-control, and then offered both gloved hands to the class. “Why don’t you show me what I missed.”

The kids surged forward. Grasping any bit of the hero they could reach, they recited facts about the foliage that had, apparently, stuck somewhere in their little brains, and pulled Hawks down the path to the makeshift learning space.

Touya swore under his breath. Quickly, but carefully, he deposited his injured butterfly on the closest leaf and ran to catch up.

“Wait, just wait a second!” Touya grabbed Hawks’ arm. “I need to talk to…” Under the baggy hero jacket, Touya swore he felt Hawks flex. The rest of his sentence scattered like his startled butterflies.

“Mr. Touya?”

Touya yanked his hand back. Fingers flexing to commit that muscle to memory, he addressed his very confused class. “I need to talk to Hawks. Just for a second, logistics about his appearance and all that boring adult stuff, ya know?” A tittering sound Touya had never once made in his life bubbled up. “You all go find that Apollo again so you can show it to me when I get back.”

The kids looked up at Hawks, who gave them an encouraging nod, and reluctantly continued down the path.

The second Touya was sure the class was out of earshot he rounded on Hawks. “What the heck are you doing?”

“Filling in for Ms. Monarch?” Hawks guessed.

“She was never coming,” Touya said bluntly. “Her agency turned the event down. And we- the Center can’t pay your fee.” He wrung his hands together. “I only had the approval to ask for a pro bono appearance.”

“They didn’t give you funding to bring a hero in?”

Touya shook his head. “They never do. This place runs on donations.” Donations that would never cover the fee to bring someone from the top ten in. Hell, if Hawks decided to bill them for his ten minutes here, Touya would need to sell every bit of hero merchandise he’d collected over the years just to help the Center break even. “Low traffic exhibits like mine get enough to run advertisements and that’s it.”

Hawks was silent for a moment, watching a few brave butterflies return to check out the newest winged creature in their home. “Would it help your exhibit if I stayed?”

“Would it help my…” Touya snorted. “Of course it would. But like I said, we can’t-“

“Then I’ll do it.”

“-pay your-“

“For free.”

“-appearance…”  Touya trailed off. Was he dreaming? There was no way he’d heard that right. “For free? Why?”

“I’ve got some time to spare.” Hawks shrugged, smiling softer than Touya had ever seen in the hero’s photos. “And I’d like to help you.”

That settled it; Touya was dreaming.

Heroes didn’t do… this. They didn’t stick around cities too small for chain restaurants or proper sized hospitals, and too underdeveloped to boast more than the Nature Center and a bridge of vague historical significance, they never had time to spare, and they definitely didn’t offer free appearances just because.

“It’s the least I can do for you after your heroics this morning.”

Shit. Hawks washere to cite him.

Touya’s stomach sank; the dream shifted into nightmare territory.

“I’m sorry,” he blurted, “I know we’re not supposed to use our quirks on others, but didn’t know your feathers were mixed in with the debris. I didn’t even realize you were there until it was too late. I swear I’d never hurt anyone on purpose.” He clasped his hands together. “My quirk was under control the entire time. I only acted because the dumbass with the shield fainted.”

Hawks held up his hands. “Woah, woah, slow down, hot stuff.”

“Please, please give me a pass this once,” Touya begged, barreling through his embarrassment to grovel like a petty criminal to his favorite Pro because that was somehow still better than having his dad find out what had happened. “I won’t do it again, promise, just please don’t cite me.”

“You think that’s why I’m here?”

Touya blinked. “Uh… yes?”

“I couldn’t care less about that.” Hawks’ expression shifted; the airbrushed quality he must have been trained to maintain smoothed into something more human (and somehow, more handsome). “And I’d never punish someone for being brave.”

“Brave?” Touya’s voice came out an octave too high.

“Mhmm.” Hawks smiled. “I mighta lost a few feathers this morning, but I know you were just trying to protect those ladies.” He leaned closer, and gently added, “and I thought that was very brave of you.”

Touya blushed all the way down to his toes.

“So, the reason I’m here,” Hawks said, closer now.

Oh my god, what is this?

“ -is because I wanted to ask- “

Holy… no way. Was Hawks going to-

Hawks’ breath fanned Touya’s skin. “ -if you’re s-“

“Are you gonna kiss!?” the kids shouted, popping out of the bushes around them.

Touya startled and sparked; a flicker of blue raced down his arms to fizzle out at his fingers.

Mortification was quick to follow; so much for the quirk-control he’d touted a minute ago.

“I was uh…” Hawks glanced at Touya (whose sole focus in that moment was on not catching fire), and then crouched in front of the kids. “I was thanking him. Yeah! Mr. Touya did something really heroic this morning, and I want to make sure that he’s properly rewarded for it.”

“With a kiss?” The girls asked, hands fisted and flailing with excitement in front of them. “Cause it totally looked like you were about to kiss him.”

“Yeah, Mr. Touya was all red!”

“And Hawks was looking at his lips!”

“I was brave this morning, do I get a kiss?”

Kirara grabbed on to Aki’s arm, shaking him and bellowing, “they looked like my daddies when they’re being lovey dovey!”

His lips? Lovey dovey?

“Well” — Hawks dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper that Touya had to scoot closer to hear — “first- “

FIRST!? Hand over his racing heart, Touya spiraled.

“ -I need to get all his butterflies back. I didn’t follow the rules when I came in, and some of them got out. Mr. Touya cares a lot about his butterflies” – the kids nodded vigorously – “so he’s very sad that some of them are lost. I need to fix that.”

“But while my feathers are out looking for them” — Hawks stood and took the class under his wings, tactfully turning their attention to safer topics as he steered them back to the learning area — “why don’t you guys show me that Apollo you found before.”

Touya took a slow breath in, held it to ten, and let it out in a steamy sigh before he followed his class - and their unexpected guest – berating himself the whole way.

Way to go, Touya. First you roast him, then you scold him, then you lose control of your quirk and clam up in front of a bunch of kids. The guy probably thinks you’re an absolute weirdo now and regrets ever following you here to ask…

Touya sighed, what the hell had Hawks wanted to ask?

“I wanted to ask if you’re ssssssore?” Touya tried filling in the rest of Hawks’ sentence out loud. He rolled his stiff neck, pretty sure that was the least of a hero’s worry. “If you’re ssssafe?” Safe from who, six kids half his size? No, that wasn’t it either. “If you’re… satisfied?”

But satisfied with what, Hawks’ hero work this morning? Stepping around stalks of deep purple blazing star starting to lean over the path, he shook his head; heroes didn’t poll individual citizens, especially when the charts were…

Touya stopped at the edge of the learning space, gaze landing on his class, and like the slow-moving clouds in the sky his questions drifted away.

Gathered around the same table as before, his Litte Explorers – led by Kirara – had seated Hawks in a chair that made him look comically large to show off one of Touya’s shadow box displays. Hawks was a rapt participant, despite his inability to sit still, nodding along with the kids’ every word and asking questions while his foot bounced under the table. Kazu took over the lecture, tapping the glass and warning Hawks about the powder on a butterfly’s wings and how it wasn’t to be touched, only to be interrupted mid-sentence when a Tailed Jay landed on the back of her hand. The class – Hawks included - ooh’d and aah’d as the butterfly spread it’s wings to show off spots that matched Kazu’s lime green nails, and a warmth entirely unlike his quirk bloomed from the center of Touya’s chest.

Since Hawks’ debut at just seventeen, plenty of videos of him had circulated: flyby shoutouts to fans on the street, meet-and-greet events for merch launches and brand partnerships, talk show appearances, Hero Gala interviews where other heroes had the audacity to use Hawks as little more than eye candy, but none of them had ever captured a moment like this (Touya would know, he’d watched them all).

With his wings draped over the chair, his gloves and visor tossed aside, the animated way he engaged with every kid at the table, Hawks seemed so at ease. This wasn’t Hawks the hero, or Hawks the prop, it was... whoever Hawks was under his hero name (a mystery Touya, and all of Japan, had been puzzling over for years).

How Touya knew that he couldn’t really say. Aside from endless hours spent following the hero’s career online, he hardly knew him. But the feeling that he was right had taken root in his gut and was amplified by a childhood’s worth of time spent watching another hero return home to slip off their mask.

Except… with this hero, they were getting a peek at something special, something truly worth memorializing.

So, as he joined his class to finish their day, hyper-aware of the amber eyes following his every move, Touya vowed to worry a little less about the why and the what and cherish his time with the very unexpected who.

🦋🦋🦋

“Mr. Touya! Hawks needs help with his butterfly again.”

Touya looked up from his own colorful pile of origami butterflies, their last activity for the day, and raised a brow. “Is that so?”

“Mhmm, look” – Kirara pointed to Hawks’ papers, partially folded in what looked to be all the right places – “he’s stuck, and he- I mean, I really think you should come show him how to do it again.”

So that’swhat the other half of the table had been whispering about for the last few minutes.

“Well, if you think he needs help” – Touya pushed his chair back – “then I guess I can’t say no.”

“I’ll do it!” Aki offered, springing to his feet. “Mr. Touya already helped Hawks a bunch.”

“No” — Kirara smacked her forehead — “he needs Mr. Touya to help.”

“But-“

“No buts!” Kirara shot up, fists tight at her sides. “Hawks is super stuck and it has to be Mr. Touya.”

Aki’s ears drooped. Slowly, he sank back down into his chair, eyes on his sneakers.

“I-I mean…” Kirara looked around the room for help, mouth opening and closing without finding the right words.

Touya was not paid enough for this.

 “It’s not...” she tried again, “you’re just-“

Hawks motioned to Kirara to come closer and whispered in her ear. Her face lit up, diamond-like eyes sparkling. “I want you to help me, Aki!”

“Really?” His ears perked up, shifting from sullen to surprised faster than Touya could blink.

Touya leaned back, convinced there was nothing Hawks couldn’t do.

Kirara nodded. “Oh yeah, I’m…” She looked at her own pile of near-perfect butterflies, and then to Aki’s mangled attempts. “Yours look so cool! I want you to show me how you do it.” She scooped up her papers and blew her bangs out of her face. “I’ll swap seats with Mr. Touya so he can sit next to Hawks.”

Coughing to hide a laugh, Touya stood; Kirara’s matchmaking attempts were as heavy handed as they were cute.

With a sheepish smile, Hawks asked, “think you could help me out since Aki’s busy?”

Touya’s legs turned to jelly; it was seriously unfair how easily Hawks could rile a man... or woman. Or anyone with a pulse, really.

But since this was the fourth – fourth – time Kirara had conspired with the other kids (and Hawks, Touya was pretty sure) to get them together during their activities (once during plant identification, once to use Hawks’ wings as a visual representation when Touya explained butterfly anatomy, and twice now for origami), Touya did at least manage not to ignite.

A small victory.

He took a seat between Hawks and Kazu and tried for something smoother than his star-struck silence and fiery temper from earlier. “Only if you promise to listen this time.”

Hawks butted his chair right up to Touya’s, let their arms oh-so-innocently brush together, and batted his lashes. “I promise,” he said, and under his breath, added, “hot stuff.”

Touya craned his neck away to blow out a steamy breath; this man might be the death of them all.

He reached over to grab Hawks’ paper - a cerulean blue he seemed to favor, since all his attempts had been in the same color - and tried to ignore the fact that Hawks’ chin was practically resting on his shoulder. “Fold it in half both ways first, and then fold it in half diagonally both ways.” He demonstrated, following already-perfect folds and a well-exercised muscle memory.

“Collapse the sides in and down, so you’ve got this triangle shape” — feathers brushed the back of his other arm; his breath hitched — “and then fold up the bottom corners of just the top layer.”

Hawks leaned closer. “You’re good at this.”

“Or maybe you’re just really bad,” Touya quipped to distract himself from the heat Hawks’ praise ignited. “Flip it,” he continued, “and fold the bottom up so the tip of your triangle is above the edge.”

“How’d you learn to make these?” Hawks asked, fully leaning against Touya now.

Heat pooled at every point of contact, tempered only by the answer to Hawks’ question.

“My mom,” Touya said quietly, folding the tip behind the top edge, and flipping the paper. “Her and I used to make them together on rainy days.” And days when she was trying to keep his hands busy with something other than fire and his mind focused on what he could do, rather than what he couldn’t.

He flexed his fingers, hiding their tremor as he was swept away in a flood of memories of smiles and laughter, of fragrant blooms and sun-dried dirt, of anger and fire and fear and-

A leg pressed against his under the table, a steady point of focus to pull him back.

Touya rolled the tension from his wrists and lined up the top tips on either side of his paper. “So then, you fold it in half along the cen-“

“Is that why you like butterflies so much?” Kirara asked, “cause of your mom?”

He flattened along the doubled edge of his paper and let it fall open to the shape of a butterfly. “It is.” Grounding himself through Hawks’ touch, he looked at his class and found his smile easier than normal. “My mom had a really big flower garden, and when I was about your age, I used to help her care for it. Do you want to know what she said about the butterflies that came to visit us while we were gardening?”

The kids nodded eagerly, papers partially folded and entirely forgotten.

“She said that when they land on you, it’s the spirit of a loved one stopping by to say hello.”

Like dominoes, six small heads tilted left.

“Kind of like reincarnation,” Touya explained. “Butterflies often symbolize death and rebirth.”

The class ‘oh’d’ in understanding and swiveled in their chairs to look at the butterflies hovering around them. Holding out their arms, they challenged one another to see who could get a butterfly to land on them first – a near-impossible feat when they could hardly sit still this close to the end of class.

“Reincarnated loved ones, huh?” Hawks held his finger out to a Gray Hairstreak that had been floating around him since they’d sat down for origami. “I wonder who this little one is then.”

Touya started on another perfectly folded (and then unfolded) sheet of blue paper. “A favorite grandparent maybe?” he asked, hoping to learn a little about the hero.

“Nah, I didn’t have any of those.”

“Aunt or uncle?”

“Nope.”

“Parents?”

Hawks’ wings lowered. It was a subtle dip, but noticeable with so little space between them and the brush of feathers on skin.

Touya could have (should have) smacked himself; a flimsy verbal filter was no excuse to be so damn rude. “I’m sorry,” he said quickly, crushing his paper in half, “I shouldn’t have asked, it’s none of my business.”

“No, no it’s okay. I don’t really” — Hawks looked at the kids, all of them too preoccupied with trying to sweet talk the butterflies into landing on them to pay the adults any attention, and dropped his voice — “I don’t really know my family.”

Touya’s hands stilled. Hawks’ lineage was one of the best kept secrets in Japan, but Touya hadn’t imagined it was because there was no one to speak of. The words tugged at his heart; as far from perfect as Touya’s family was, he at least knew them.

The butterfly landed on Hawks’ finger and slowly spread it’s wings until they lay flat. “I doubt any of these little guys care about me, but it’s a nice thought.” Hawks’ tone was disturbingly cheerful, considering the subject, but Touya supposed that was all part of a hero’s training – show no weakness, harbor no flaws.

It was bullshit.

Touya reached out, praying he wasn’t about to make a bigger fool of himself than he already had today. Hawks had sought Touya out for reasons still unknown, he’d stayed because he wanted to help, he seemed happy to be spending time with the class (and maybe with me, Touya’s delusion added), surely he wouldn’t mind a little gentle reassurance.

Nudging Hawks’ hand into a ray of warm afternoon sunlight a few inches to the right, he said in barely more than a whisper, “he wants to soak up some sun.”

His pulse pounded in his ears. “And” - he gathered his courage with a breath – “even if they don’t care, I do.”

Hawks’ head whipped toward Touya, a movement too jarring for the Hairstreak’s liking. Gray wings fluttered out of sight. “You do?”

Touya swallowed, as terrified of his own feelings as he was exhilarated, and nodded; no taking it back now. Seeds sown by simple attraction had sprouted into something so much more significant in their short time together, and Touya found himself, quite frankly, smitten.

His therapist would not be happy to hear he’d formed another unhealthy attachment to an emotionally unavailable Pro Hero (her words, not his), but was it really that unhealthy if he thought the other party might be a little interested too?

“Well in that case” - Hawks scooted impossibly closer, wings once again perky and grin back in place  – “earlier, I was going to ask if you’d maybe like to go on-“

The shrill ring of a phone cut Hawks off. He sat back, glowering as he dug into his cargo pants pocket, and when he saw who was calling, his expression turned downright fierce – something that probably shouldn’t have excited Touya as much as it did… but who could blame him. He was but a man.

Hawks swore under his breath and shot Touya an apologetic look. “I need to take this. Will you be around for awhile?”

Touya blinked. “I- well, class is over in” — he pulled his own phone out to check — “a few minutes. We need to start packing up, actually.”

“But what about you,” Hawks pressed, ignoring his still-ringing phone. “Will you be here after?”

“I… yeah. I’ll be here for awhile.”

“Perfect.” Hawks stood swiftly and addressed the class. “Sorry kids, I’ve got an important hero call to take” — he wiggled his phone — “and need to head out.”

 A chorus of disappointment responded.

“I’ll be back tomorrow,” he promised, “so make sure you behave for Mr. Touya for the rest of class.”

Wings tucked tightly at his back, shoulders stiff, Hawks took the call and headed for the exit.

And the house, for the first time in Touya’s career, felt a little dimmer than usual, like Hawks had taken a bit of the sunshine with him.

“Alright, guys,” Touya sighed and pushed his half-finished butterfly aside, “let’s pack up and go meet your parents up front.”

🦋🦋🦋

It took Touya nearly an hour to return to the house.

Word of Hawks’ appearance had spread through the Nature Center like wildfire. Stopped by every coworker as he led his class to the lobby, and then bombarded with questions from every parent, he had confirmed – several dozen times – that yes, Hawks was their guest hero, yes, he would be back tomorrow, and yes, Touya would take last minute additions to Little Explorers (his need for a successful class outweighed his desire to be petty). And when one of the directors overheard the news, he was forced to confirm another dozen times that Hawks was indeed doing the appearance for free.

Back at the tables in the house, Touya pushed aside a pile of paper butterflies to set down his thermos of lukewarm coffee and box of Palos. Careful not to let his limited-edition keychain catch on his pants, he tugged his keys from his pocket and broke through the tape sealing his box. A handful of Ruby Swallowtails (the only red wings left in the house) hovered around his head, watching as he gently pulled out the paper envelope inside and propped it open.

Now, to wait.

He sank down in a chair, legs aching as his adrenaline wore off, and gathered a warm breath behind his lips. Eyes on the visor and gloves Hawks left behind, Touya blew into his coffee to warm it up (so what if it was only an hour away from dinner time, it’s not like he’d sleep tonight anyways).

He’d been so wrong about Hawks.

Not the physical part. Up close and without a filter, Hawks was strikingly handsome - a perfect dichotomy of sharp and soft with his wide smiles and high cheekbones, with those malar-like stripes framing joy-crinkled eyes, with his feathers fluffed to help the kids forget exactly what they were capable of.

No, Touya had been wrong about who Hawks was; there wasn’t an arrogant bone in his body. Unlike Chameleon: The Camouflage Hero Iguchi had brought in for his Reptile Rangers event last month, Hawks had actually participated in Touya’s event. Happily, even. Nothing, and more importantly, no one here was beneath him. And this morning, when another hero would have seen a tally to add to their citation quota, Hawks had only seen bravery.

Hawks was the kind of hero - the kind of man Touya had never met before – genuine, unselfish, supportive.

God he would make a good boyfriend.

Touya jolted upright; what the hell was he thinking? This was Hawks he was talking about. Hawks. The man voted Most Eligible Bachelor for five years in a row, the model for every major brand lucky enough to secure a contract with him, winner of the Hero Billboard Chart’s popularity vote by massive margins since his debut. Flirty nicknames and a tendency to prefer Touya’s personal space to his own aside, Hawks could do so much better than a butterfly keeper with an unreliable quirk.

Hell, Touya couldn’t even say for sure if Hawks was into guys, the few rumors he’d heard were shakier than his relationship with his dad.

It was probably better for his head (and his heart) to stay in his own league. There was that IT guy the Center contracted with. He’d mentioned going for coffee a few times while he helped Touya make a page for his event. Though — Touya slouched back down in his chair — that guy (Tomo? Teno?) was no Hawks.

 A silvery-blue wing caught his eye, and Touya tossed aside all thoughts of his love-life (or lack of) to sip his coffee and watch his Palos emerge.  

Maybe staying single was best. Just a man and his butterflies.

🦋🦋🦋

An hour later, when all of his Palos Verdes had left the envelope and he was sure they were all healthy enough to fly and eat, Touya had thrown an apron over his gray v-neck and moved on to one of his least favorite housekeeping jobs – garden maintenance. With a gloved hand, he wiped the sweat running down his brow and cursed the west-facing windows of the house. In the summer, the dying sunlight always turned the room into a sauna, and while Touya’s butterflies loved it, his body was not as appreciative of the spike in temperature.

On his hands and knees, he reached under lavender Azalea clusters to prune a few dead branches, grumbling once again about his sore glutes to no one in particular, when-

“Well, hello.”

Touya rocked back to crouch, over-balanced, and landed flat on his butt. “Christ, give a man some…” his eyes trailed up tan cargo pants framed by red wings, up the lethal fit of a black and yellow compression shirt, up until they met the last person he expected (or wanted) to see when his ass was sticking out of a bush and his hands were elbow deep in plants and fertilizer.

He scrambled to his feet and tried to brush clumps of what he hoped were just dirt from his apron.

“Sorry.” Hawks offered the same sheepish smile as before. “I meant to come back sooner, but… well…” Hawks rubbed his neck with one hand, leaving the other behind his back. “I got a little sidetracked.”

“That’s…”

Okay? Fine? Unimportant because you did come back and that’s all that really matters since I was beginning to think that you’d either gotten in trouble or maybe were a very vivid hallucination from a stress-filled day.

“You don’t need to apologize,” Touya said, settling for simplicity. “I’m guessing someone wasn’t happy you decided to stick around here?”

“No, they weren’t but that doesn’t matter. I told them I’m staying for the week.” He shrugged, both hands behind his back now. “That’s not what took me so long though. I got you something.”

Touya’s pulse perked up.

“I… I um-“

Was… was Hawks blushing?

“I really don’t want to get interrupted again, so…” Hawks pulled his hands out from behind his back. With them came the most beautiful bouquet of flowers Touya had ever seen - blue roses that matched his eyes, vibrant yellow cornflowers, a few forget-me-nots that brought heat to his eyes, heart-shaped anthurium sticking up from the back. “This is why it took me so long to get back. I went to every florist in a fifty-mile radius to find out wh-“

Flowers. Those are flowers. In a bouquet. For…

“ – they really got tired of my questions. But well, these are for you… I, uh, I tried to pick ones that your butterflies would like, too.”

For me!?

Static sounded between Touya’s ears.

Hawks rubbed his neck again, cheeks a vibrant red to match his wings now. “You’re quieter than usual.”

Holy shit. Holy Shit. Holy-

“Did I mess up?”

Holy shit. Holy Shit. Holy Shit. Holy Shit. Holy Sh-

“Touya?” Hawks stepped closer, brows furrowed. “You good?”

Touya saw, rather than felt, his hands pull off his gloves, his arms lift to take the bouquet. Heat flooded his body as he eyed the flowers, all of them so perfectly picked and arranged, blooms at the peak of their beauty.

“So, what do you think?” Hawks asked, his voice a touch high. “Do you like-“

Touya turned Hawks back toward the door. He needed time to find his voice. Time to process what was happening here. Time to snuff out rapidly rising flames of affection. Time to get his swarming thoughts and thundering heart back together in the same body.

He gave Hawks a gentle shove.

“Oh, okay?” Hawks played along.

Pushing Hawks all the way back into the vestibule, Touya stepped away to let the doors between them close and turned his back.

“Fuck that’s cute,” he whispered to the flowers.

That he’d just kicked Hawks out was a very distant worry for Touya right now. He had flowers. Flowers from Hawks. Had anyone ever gotten flowers from Hawks? Touya didn’t think so. He held the bouquet a little tighter.

“You know,” Hawks said, his amusement muffled as he spoke from the other side of the glass door, “I can still see you.”

Touya’s control broke. His quirk flared to life, a beautiful blue end to the first flowers he’d ever received.

The doors slid open again and Hawks’ laughter, bright as a bell, snapped Touya out of his stupor. “I… I’m so sorry.” Touya looked at the ashes falling through his fingers. “I didn’t mean to. You got those for me, and it was so sweet, and I just… I torched them. Fuck I’m such an idiot.”

“I thought it was kinda cute.”

Touya’s head snapped up. “Cute?” Was Hawks not well? Had he taken too many hits to the head?

“Cute,” Hawks confirmed, pulling the remains of the paper wrapping from Touya’s hands and sliding his own into them. “It’s like you wear your heart on your sleeve. Or, in your quirk, I guess. It’s cute.”

Alright, Hawks was definitely unwell, but – Touya let his fingers close around Hawks’ – not unwelcome. Not at all.

“I guess I should have told you why I was here before I handed you something flammable,” Hawks mused. “That’s on me.”

Touya could only blink. Breathe. Feel the callouses on Hawks’ thumb as it absentmindedly brushed his knuckles.

“I followed you here earlier because, well I wanted to ask if you were single.” That blush was back, and oh was red a beautiful color on Hawks. “And if you said yes,” he carried on, “I wanted to ask if you’d like to go get coffee. Well, dinner now, I guess.”

“That’s what you followed me here for?” Touya whispered in disbelief. “But… why? You hardly know me.”

Mentally, Touya smacked himself. What the hell is wrong with you, Touya? Just say yes!

Hawks seemed ready for the question, though.

“I know enough.” Hawks looked Touya in the eye and held his hands tighter. “I know this morning, you acted like more of a hero than most of the Pros I know. I know that you’re strong and capable and feisty. I know you’re downright adorable with kids and devoted to protecting some of the most fragile creatures on this world when most would turn a blind eye.”

Touya was pretty sure his jaw was holding on by a single hinge. He worked it closed again.

“But I want to know more. Everything.” Hawks’ chest rose and fell with a deep breath. “So, are you single?”

Touya managed a nod; Hawks’ wings fluttered ever-so-slightly.

“Then… can I take you out to dinner?”

“I’m not dressed for dinner.”

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

“It doesn’t matter to me what you wear.”

“I’m covered in fertilizer.”

Hawks chuckled. “It’s hot.”

“It definitely is not.” The side of Touya that had fallen hard and fast for Hawks warred with the side that still – even after years of therapy - didn’t think he was good enough for a hero. “A-and what about my butterflies?”

“Oh!” Hawks cocked his head to the door, and for a minute they stood in silence. “One second.”

Hawks stepped through the inner door, made a show of making sure it was fully closed first, and then pulled the outer door open to let in a cloud of red. “I think I got them all,” he said proudly when he stepped back into the house with several dozen feathers in tow, each one gently curled around a butterfly. “I brought back a few that slipped out with me earlier too.”

One by one, the feathers released their captives. Most of the butterflies darted into the nearby bushes seeking safety.

“I think they’re okay. Their heart beats are a little fast.” His feathers zipped back to rejoin his wings. “I’m no expert on butterfly physiology though, so maybe that’s normal.”

Touya held out a hand to the Painted Lady flying in circles around him and stood still as stone. Landing in his palm, the butterfly closed its wings to rest.

“So… dinner?” The hope in Hawks’ voice hung between them. Hawks wasn’t giving up, and Touya would be lying if he said that didn’t start the first stitch on some torn part of him that even therapy couldn’t mend.

“Alright.” A smile slowly spread across his lips; enough self-sabotage. “I’ll go.” He set the butterfly down on the nearest leaf, and decided not to tell Hawks the house didn’t have any Painted Ladies before now. “Let me ditch my work stuff and grab my keys.”

Quickly, but not so quick as to look overly eager (even if he was), Touya hung his apron near the door, washed up in the sink at the back of the house, swiped his keys and Hawks’ left-behind things from the table, and swapped the worn leather work boots for his good ones.

“Where do you want to go?” He asked, trying, for the second time, to get the damn key in the outer door to lock the house up. “There’s only one place in town.” His stomach (now gnawing on itself at the mention of food and the memory of every meal skipped today), growled very loud, and very embarrassingly. 

”I hope you don’t mind” — Hawks cleared his throat — “but I already booked it for a private dinner.”

“Booked…” The lock, and Hawks’ meaning, clicked into place. Touya turned. “You booked the entire restaurant? What if I had said no?”

“Well, I guess I would have eaten by myself. But I was pretty sure…” he trailed off, and when Touya noticed where Hawks’ gaze had landed, he immediately shoved his keys into his pocket.

“I know that keychain. There were only-“

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He breezed past Hawks toward the lobby, steaming.

“I didn’t see you at the signing though.” Hawks trailed him with irritating ease. “I knowI would remember you if you’d been there.”

“Shut it, or you’ll be eating alone.” Touya walked faster, trying to get outside before he combusted. The rest of his coworkers might have gone home for the night, but the fire alarm worked perfectly fine after hours, and he did not want to cause that kind of scene in front of Hawks.  

Hawks beat him to the door, holding it open with a heart-stopping smirk. “Don’t worry, if you accidentally melt that one,” he pulled his own keys out and jangled them to show off a matching keychain, “I’ve got a few spares. I’ll even sign the hoodie.”

Arm cocked, Touya was about to elbow Hawks as he stepped out, but…

“You’ll sign my hoodie?”

“I’ll sign anything you want, hot stuff, as long as you promise to give me a chance.”

Touya pretended to think it over as they walked to the parking lot, trying (and failing) to play it cool. “Alright, hero,” his words came out in a steamy cloud, “I’ll give you a chance.”

(As if he could say no).

🦋🦋🦋

The following day, every seat in Touya’s Little Explorers Class was filled.