i have no proof for this but i feel like jirou and todoroki have a really quiet friendship in which they hang out in silence like once a week. like, jirou will just be plucking away on her bass or smthn and todoroki will enter her room, announced, and sit down on her floor to read a book and listen to her play
they've said about 10 words to each other in the times they've been friends.
first time it happened jirou was meaning to knock on sero's door to ask if she could chill in his room because "hagakure is in a funk and she's playing caramel dansen at full volume down the hall again, can i hang out in here for a while-" but she accidentally knocks on todoroki's instead and walks in to see him drawing something in a notebook that vaguely resembles a comic of endeavour being beat up by deku. he looks up and just stares at her ominously, so she starts to be like "uhhh sorry dude, wrong room" and she's about to leave, but todoroki, who is severely starved for human contact is just like "you can stay here."
jirou pauses, thinking it's gotta be a joke- todoroki makes jokes now?- but he doesn't seem to indicate anything to that idea. he just goes back to drawing in his notebook
so jirou just sort of... awkwardly puts her own notebook down on the floor and sits, bass in her lap, and spreads her notes out in front of her. todoroki doesn't even glance at her the whole time.
she goes to plug her headphones in, but todoroki interrupts her saying "don't bother. none of my floormates are here right now."
so jirou takes off her headphones, frowning, and instead takes out her pocket amp, albeit a little confused as to how he knows no one's here when as far as she knows he hasn't left his room since friday. she puts the volume down low anyway, self conscious to be practicing in front of someone.
at first she's really uncomfortable- she keeps fumbling and blushing, and can't seem to play right- but todoroki doesn't say anything. he doesn't laugh, or smirk, like kaminari and sero do when she messes up. he doesn't give her the reassuring grins momo does either, but still... it's nice.
eventually, she's playing at her usual standard, and pretty much forgets he's there- until she glances up, and sees him nodding along to the tune of the song, still penciling away at whatever it is he's sketching. she makes a mental note to ask him about it later.
she doesn't.
that's just how they work. they don't talk. they don't even say "hello" usually. they never knock; they've both made a silent agreement that when they put a purple sticky note on the door that's the equivalent of a "do not disturb" for the other. it gets less and less uncommon, though, to see one on the others door. there's little they're not comfortable with the other being there for.
jirou even experiences the strange phenomenon of todoroki crying; it's a quiet cry, almost... almost like he's practiced it. made it as silent and unnoticeable as possible. there's only the barest shake to his shoulders, and the tears stream from his eyes silently.
todoroki, in turn, gets to see jirou mad; sees her throw her math textbook at the wall, watch as her fists clench around her bass when she messes up too many times. sees her scream into a pillow after she had accidentally, foolishly, texted momo that she was cute.
it's weird, to be so comfortable with another person, without even knowing what kind of movies they like, or their favourite colour (todoroki has a sneaking suspicion jirou's is purple. he's wrong. it's red.)
but it's them- and they're already weird enough as it is, so what's this silent friendship compared to, say, facial scars inflicted by loved ones, or a level of insecurity that only comes from many years of feeling alone, and misunderstood.
outside of their rooms, they barely even acknowledge one another, save for the occasional hall nod, or lifted hand in greeting. no one would ever guess they even know each other behind just classmates.
but you can't really hide from your closest friend, and for both of them, that would be momo. observant as she is, she'd certainly picked up on the way jirou always made a show of stabbing kaminari in the eye whenever he mentioned todoroki's scar, or how todoroki had coldly corrected ojiro when he called jirou "agressive". she noticed, the quiet solidarity that had formed slowly, but surely, between them.
she puts it down to them seeing something in one another- again, as both of their closest friend, she knew better than anyone than the pair were quite alike in many ways. she figured they'd realised it too, and that's why they were so quick to defend the other. she couldn't be farther from the truth.
the best word for their relationship, jirou decides, is comrades.
