Things had been fine.

Even with Mineta being really weird about the blood stain he'd seen, Kaminari had to say things were going pretty good for some time.

He and Shinso were currently on a grocery run for no other than Bakugo.

The angry blond had thrown a fit when he realized Mineta finished the last of the onion and garlic, and told said small freak to go get some more of what he finished, especially since Bakugo was making for the entire class.

Of course, the small bitch didn't feel like going and instead called Kaminari to do it, holding the blood stain situation over his head.

Kaminari is actually scared of him. And okay, that disgusting weirdo is small, but he got into the hero course because of his skills and grades, he's not weak and he's not dumb either.

It's intimidating, even if he's small.

So, naturally Kaminari agreed immediately, not even needing to be threatened.

Just the fact that Mineta has some idea of what happened gives him chills.

And now, having bumped into him on the way out of the campus, he has Shinso helping him. He really did need help and was sort of freaking out when he left the forms because Bakugo gave him a list of stuff he needed now that he was going to the store, and he didn't want to bother his other friends who were enjoying each other's company playing some game.

Since Shinso was there on his way, he immediately took him along.

"So you dragged me here why?" The taller asks, knocking some spices down.

Not to the floor, just so they were laying down on their shelves.

"Don't do that, the workers have to fix those," the blond scolds, slapping his hands away.

"Fine," he quickly relents.

"Bakugo wanted extra stuff and I needed help. There you were so now we're here," he says, quickly moving because Bakugo did not like to be kept waiting.

"He asked you?"

"Yes, well, not me specifically. He asked Mineta cause he was the one who finished the ingredients he needed, but Mineta didn't feel like going."

It doesn't sound weird. It just seems like Kaminari was being nice, and you know what, Kaminari would say that he is is nice. If it was anyone else asking him to go to the store for them because they didn't want to go, Kaminari would have agreed and done it for them immediately, especially with how good he's been lately.

The fact that it was Mineta, however, didn't sit right with him, and he didn't want to do it. He hated being scared of that small grape, but this is his life now.

"Wow, you're nice?"

"Shut up. Not to you."

Shinso's smirk made his heart beat too fast, but he ignored it.

"Hey, you wanna take a shortcut on the way back? You took the long way and I know you're in a rush," the taller offers.

Kaminari's speed walking comes to a stop and Shinso bumps into him, stopping too late.

The blond turns around and smiles brightly. "You know a short cut?"

He nods, looking smug.

Kaminari's smile turns into a knowing frown. "What do you want?"

"Buy me some chips?"

"Whatever."

With both of their hands full of bags, they start making their way back to the dorms, Shinso leading the way.

"Never go down that street, especially not alone. Fucking creeps live there, and even though you're strong, all it takes is being taken by surprise," Shinso warns.

The blond nods, taking note.

'Never take the short cut alone. Especially since I'm bad at directions.'

They go straight and then take a right somewhere and then a left before making another right which looked sketchy to Kaminari.

That was until he saw all the cats.

"WHAT."

Shinso was already turned around, looking at him with a smirk as he had his hands crossed over his chest.

"Cats!?"

"I think that's what they're called."

Kaminari shoots a weak glare at Shinso as he gets distracted with the cats that had gone up to him. He crouches down, putting the bags on the floor to pet the cats, obviously.

It's a rule to pet every cat you see. Well, if they let you. And if after some struggling they still don't let you pet them, then you're not the chosen one.

All of these cats seem eager for affection, though.

"That one," Shinso points on the other side of the alley, "is a pain in my ass. Never let's me pet her."

Kaminari laughs, and feels the need to try and earn that specific cat's love. Just to spite Shinso or something.

"Consider me intrigued," the blond says, grabbing the bags from the curious cats and slowly walking over to the black and white cat.

Her green eyes glare at him, testing the blond, almost challenging him to try and pet her. He sets the bags down at a good distance and crouches slightly calling from the cat slightly as he walks slower and slower towards her.

Said cat steps back with her eyes still on the blond.

"Come on," he whispers.

Well, so much for trying to hurry.

Bakugo with understand. It's for cats.

They cat slowly perks up at the sound of being called, but still so hesitant to go over to this weird human.

He calls for the cat again, holding his hand out with a limp wrist. He read or saw it somewhere that sticking your hand out like this makes the cats less nervous or something, he can't remember.

The cat takes a step towards him.

Then another.

By this time, he'd stopped moving forward, but he was still crouching down.

He calls for her one more time and the  she finally goes up to him, sniffing his hand curiously. Kaminari's eyes light up, and he waits for her to rub her head against him or something, but she just taps her nose with his pointer finger and then runs away.

"Agh."

The blond stands up in defeat and frown at Shinso.

"Wow," Shinso comments.

"San Francisco?"

"What?"

The blond stares at him. "Do you not know that reference?" Kaminari asks.

"Should I?"

They grab the bags and start heading back, walking quite fast.

"Yes, you should. It's- nevermind. Just remind me to show you some movies later. I'm ashamed to be your friend knowing you're uncultured," Kaminari says dramatically.

Shinso huffs a laugh. "Whatever, dork."

They walk closer than they need to, bags constantly bumping into each other, but it's a comfortable walk back.

"Is that the alley you always talk about?"

"Yup. Found it once like two months ago and I come here every week or so with food for them. Don't tell anyone, but Aizawa comes here often, too. Saw him a couple of times also feeding them," Shinso says.

"No way," the blond laughs.

"Yeah. I've seen him at least five times since I found it. I don't know if he knows that I know that he goes."

"Pfft," Kaminari laughs.

The taller looks at him, confused.

"Aizawa surrounded by a whole bunch of stray cats. Imagine that," be laughs.

"I don't have to," Shinso reminds him.

"Damn. I gotta come here every day now to see that at least once."

As they near the gates of UA, Shinso laughs. "He's really got a soft spot for them. He looks really happy and too soft for an emo-looking man like himself."

The blond smiles at the thought. It's nice knowing his teacher enjoys being around animals.

"Oh, I wanted to ask something," Shinso says.

Kaminari turns his head slightly in Shinso's direction, motioning for him to continue.

"What's up with Mineta?"

Fuck. Act normal.

"What about Mineta?"

"You see, that," Shinso says, "your whole like voice changed and now you seem mad."

"He's just a small selfish asshole who has no respect for women, and okay, I've said some dumb stuff, too, but I've apologized to all the girls already, and chilled out. It's uncomfortable to be around him, and honestly, I thought it would help me fit in. Thankfully, though, almost all the guys in our class don't treat women like that, and it's stupid that I even resorted to that to fit in. I should've just acted like me from the beginning instead of treating women like they were objects," Kaminari rants.

It's silent for a while. Just the wind blowing, moving the branches on the trees and the constant bumping of the bags.

"Ah, sorry. Don't tell anyone I said that."

"Alright, so you don't like being around him. Why?" Shinso asks.

"He's gross and thinks he's so cool when all he says is disgusting, perverted, or cocky shit. And okay, so does Bakugo and half of the class, but they're actually confident and do something. When it comes down to it, Mineta just runs or cries. Sometimes both."

Shinso nods in acknowledgement. "So I'll take it you don't want to be alone with him?"

The blond nods. "Yup."

"Understandable," he says as they walk into the dorms and head straight to the kitchen to an angry Bakugo.

"Where the fuck were you?"

"There were cats," Kaminari says happily.

The angry blond just huffs. "Give me the bag with the spices, onion, and garlic."

Kaminari does that quickly.

"So where'd you pick up that stray?" Bakugo asks, motioning to Shinso.

Said boy stares at him with an unamused look.

"Found him on my way to the store," Kaminari answers, digging through the bags to give Shinso his chips.

He smiles victoriously when he finds them, getting them out to give to his friend who's waiting patiently for them as Bakugo cuts up the vegetables and looks up every now and then.

"Here yo-" he gasps and jumps when a hand smacks his bottom and anxiety shoots through his body.

He turns quickly turns around looking for who did that. Of course, there is Mineta with a smirk on his face.

"What the fuck," Bakugo yells.

Kaminari turns to see the angry blond, well, angry. Kaminari was worried he'd cut his finger, but his hand was fine. He looked beyond mad, though.

"Whatcha guys cooking?" Mineta asks.

"No, what the fuck was that?" Shinso butts in, asking the grape boy.

Oh god. Why now? If he lets them yell at him, Mineta might tell them about the blood.

"It was nothing. Here are your chips," Kaminari tries.

Shinso grabs the bag and puts them down on the counter.

"It wasn't nothing. He slapped your ass," Bakugo yells.

Mineta looks more nervous by the second and Kaminari wonders how noticeable his anxiety is.

"It's fine, he likes it," Mineta says.

He doesn't.

Kaminari feels something in him twist and then there's a heavy feeling.

As Kaminari opens his mouth, Shinso talks again. "He obviously didn't. What the fuck was that for?"

"Guys it's fine. Leave it alone," Kaminari finally yells.

It gets quiet so Kaminari bites the inside of his cheek before turning around and leaving. He sees Mineta's smirking face and his gut squeezes in disgust.

Here he goes again, letting people do whatever they want with his body.

He's gross.

He clicks the elevator button as he still hears nothing from behind him. They're probably looking at him like a freak.

He feels nothing but anxiety as the elevator takes too long, so he takes the stairs, running up to his floor as his eyes start to burn.

Stupid Mineta, he thinks as tears form.

Fuck, and he's being so obvious. His friends probably already know about what his dad does to him.

The thought of that makes the tears finally fall.

He feels a small amount of joy, though. His friends were sticking up for him.

They would do something.

He could tell them?

His heart starts to beat faster.

Nope.

Never mind.

There are tears falling, so he wipes them angrily. Stupid. He's so stupid. Why did he just leave like that? Fuck.

Maybe he can pretend he came to get something?

He looks around his room.

There's a small blanket on his bed. Not his favorite, but he does take it around a lot since it's smaller.

Grabbing it and throwing it around himself, he makes his way to his restroom quickly to make sure his face isn't red before deciding he looks fine and heading back down stairs.

All he feels is anxiety. He left at a tense time. He'll have to apologize to his friends for yelling only because they were sticking up for him.

Fuck.

Okay, it's fine.

Hopefully Mineta left already.

Once the elevator doors open, his face drops when he sees Bakugo and Shinso around Mineta, Shinso gripping the front of the smaller one's shirt.

The two had looked up when the doors opened.

Shinso drops the scared boy on the ground and Mineta scrambles to his feet, running with tears in his eyes, passing Kaminari.

"This is your fault," he cries at Kaminari who had stepped out of the elevator.

The small boy's foot steps are heard running up the stairs and Kaminari looks and Shinso and Bakugo.

They look guilty, obviously.

"I said to leave it alone."

He doesn't sound mad, he realizes, but he doesn't sound happy or anything of the sort either.

"No, that fucking creep scared the shit out of you. I've never seen your face look li-"

"It doesn't matter what my fricking face looked like. He- he just caught me off guard. He just scared me, but," he pauses to come up with something, "it's not like," god, he hates himself, "it's unwelcome."

"Don't lie," Shinso says sternly.

"I'm no-"

"You are. What you just told me outside? That's how I know," Shinso interrupts.

"You guys are blowing this out of proportion. He just scared me."

"If he did that to one of the girls, you would act the same," Bakugo says.

"Well, yeah, because they're always being treated as objects, it's different for guys," Kaminari reasons.

"Did he touch your ass with your consent?" Shinso asks.

What is this?

"Yes. He did. I'm telling you guys to leave it alone, though. So leave it alone. Stop it. I just wanna hang out with you guys. Leave me alone," he repeats.

He sits down at the counter, motioning for Bakugo to continue what he was doing.

Said blond looks angry, and when Kaminari turns to look at Shinso, he also looks mad as he sits down next to him, too.

"Thanks, but just leave it alone."

The other two huff in annoyance as Kaminari tries to fall into a peaceful state.

He finds it hard to do that when he worries about what the hell Mineta is going to do about this.

Dammit. Why is that annoying piece of shit the one who saw the blood?

***
Word Count: 2,486
I WAS AT A FRIEND'S HOUSE AND COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT POSTING I JUST GOT HOME OOPS. Hope y'all liked this chapter. I have senior week and literally only gonna dress up one day and ima look ridiculous but there's free food so 😋😋 OKAY next chapter will go up next Sunday at 8 pm central time. I can't believe I forgot oml I even remember turning off an alarm but I thought it was for my melatonin. I love you all and tysm for reading<3