It was April again.

That meant it had been about three years since he had met Izumi. Really, it was because of her that he had gotten as far as he had. It was because of her that he met Mirio, and because of Mirio that he had met Nejire. So really, he owed Izumi a lot. But, he hadn't talked to her in a while. Over a year.

It wasn't that he didn't want to talk to Izumi, just that he didn't know what to say. Last he heard from her was when he asked her if she was alright after seeing her on the news fighting that sludge villain to save Katsuki, but that conversation didn't go anywhere. It died after he said he was glad she was alright. He wanted to say more. But what else could he have said?

He couldn't just say that things were going well for him at U.A., that he was living her dream. While she struggled with being quirkless. It wasn't fair.

Besides, she hadn't tried to talk to him. So maybe she was just busy, or maybe he was being too creepy, or maybe she just didn't care about him anymore and she hadn't even thought about him. That made sense; he thought about her more than enough for both of them. Like right now, he should be paying attention to Nejire who was talking, or even Mirio who wasn't talking. What was the point of eating lunch with friends if he didn't actually talk with them?

And it looked like Nejire was actually talking to him.

"Hey hey, Tamaki, Tamaki, did you see the new first years yet? Did you? Did you?" Nejire hummed, bounced, and spoke, all while waving around a piece of her lunch delicately placed on her chopsticks. The blue-haired girl that he had somehow ended up with as a friend was smiling ear to ear as she looked between him and Mirio.

"Uhh, no. I haven't." Izumi would have been a first year. If she wasn't quirkless. He really wasn't going to see her ever again was he?

"Really? That's a shame! There's a lot of cute girls there! We could even find you a girlfriend-"

"Nejire, that's not nice. I know you want to see Tamaki happy, but we've been over this. Trying to set him up won't do any good." Mirio came to the rescue. Just like he always did. The large slice of meat held in his own chopsticks was waved threateningly at Nejire.

"I'm not! I just thought that some of the first years were cute! And some of them have interesting quirks! That's all! Like there's someone that has fire and ice, but he only uses ice, why do you think that is? And there's a loud one that can make explosions with his hands."

Oh, so Katsuki got in.

"And then there was this girl! She has green hair, and she can punch really hard but using her quirk hurts her so she's trying to figure that out."

Green hair. Izumi had green hair. But she didn't have a quirk.

"Oh! But she was super duper cute too! She had short hair."

Izumi had long hair.

"Well kinda short; she also had a yellow All Might ribbon in her hair."

Izumi had an All Might ribbon in her hair.

"Oh! And she had some super cute freckles!"

Izumi had super cute freckles.

"Nejire," Mirio said softly. "How do you know so much about this girl?"

"Well she sounds like that one girl that Tamaki used to talk about all the time! What was her name again? Hey, hey, it was Izuki? No no! It was Izumi right? Right? I'm right, right?" Nejire leaned onto the table, once again showing no understanding of personal space. Which for most of the time was fair for him considering how his personal space was often the size of a classroom or two. But this was far closer than normal.

A year and a half of Nejire being in his face should have been enough time for him to get used to it. But he couldn't.

"Wait, wait! I know!" Nejire was floating.

Again.

Bad things tended to happen to him when she floated. Like when he ended up on her and Mirio's team last year and then ended up in the tournament and then he got 3rd place and became a member of the Big Three. He should just hide whenever she floated.

"Nejire, what are you planning?" Mirio asked. Yes! Mirio would save him! He had to save him. They were best friends after all.

"We should go see the new first years right right? We're their senpais now so we should go say hi right?" Nejire grabbed onto his hand. She was floating and grabbing onto his hand. Great. This was when all the bad stuff really happened.

"Huh." Mirio crossed his arms for a moment then nodded. "That sounds like an excellent idea! Let's go see our new kouhais!"

Et tu, Mirio?

Before Tamaki could even so much as muster the courage to mount his protest, Nejire had taken off, dragging him along with her as they made their way down to the first floor of the cafeteria. Nejire moved quickly enough that he could barely stop stumbling forward. He was barely able to keep up with her bobbing and weaving while not crashing into anyone along the way. Being Nejire's friend was several times as treacherous as being a hero ever could be.

Both physically and emotionally.

Nejire came to an abrupt stop in front of a table.

He came to an abrupt stop on top of the table.

"Hi! Hi! You're the first years right? Who's your teacher? Hey, can I touch your horns? Ooh, what's your quirk? Are you cold blooded? Oh, oh! Why do you hurt yourself when you use your quirk? Oh! Before all that I'm Nejire Hado! I'm a third year and a member of the Big Three! Well, at least they say I am. But this guy." Nejire patted him on the back then pulled him up out of who's ever food he had landed in and stood him up.

He wanted to die.

"This guy is amazing he's part of the Big Three too and he's-"

"Tamaki?"

He knew that voice. That pleasant raspy voice that had haunted his dreams for years. A thousand times he had dreamed about that voice calling out to him, sometimes in joy, sometimes for fun, more often out of desperation. Those were the worst. Those nightmares where he couldn't save her in time.

But this time it was real.

He looked at her. At Izumi Midoriya. Her sparkling green eyes were the same as they had ever been, so filled with hope, aspiration, curiosity, joy, and just so so so much magic that he couldn't help but feel his heart leap for her. He had found her. He had seen her again. He had gotten to speak to her again.

She was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her hair was short now, maybe even shorter than his, with that yellow All Might ribbon tied in her hair so that it stood out like bunny ears. While she was still Izumi, it felt like Izumi Plus. She had grown. In so many ways. Her exposed forearms showed off her now developed muscles, the tightness of her shirt showed off her other areas of growth. But beyond that, just looking at her it felt like she had been growing as a person since he last spoke to her.

She didn't even stutter.

No wonder she hadn't spoken to him in so long. She outgrew him. She had grown into someone so amazing, but he had stayed the same. He really was a failure.

"Hey, hey, Tamaki, say something," Nejire whispered loudly in his ear and nudged his side.

Right, he was still staring at Izumi. There was so much he wanted to say to her, instead he just looked down at her now ruined lunch and said, "Izumi, what are you doing here?"

"Tamaki! Don't be rude." Nejire swatted him. "She can eat here too."

"I didn't mean it like that," Tamaki muttered now scratching the back of his head. "I meant, here. At U.A. I mean. I well, I."

"Oh! You mean about how I used to be quirkless right?" Izumi smacked the underside of her fist into her palm and her face lit up. "Well it turns out I actually had a quirk, it just hadn't really developed yet."

"Oh is it because you didn't have boobs back then?" Nejire asked.

Tamaki, chose to ignore that comment and pushed Nejire out of his mind. Though Izumi's blush was really cute. "So, umm, you have a quirk now?"

"Yep, I was even able to train hard enough that I was able to get into U.A. and-" Izumi stood suddenly. Her face bright red as she bowed. "Oh no! I didn't get a chance to tell you! I was so busy with training and then my phone ended up in the ocean and I lost your number! I'm so sorry Tamaki I wanted to tell you but I completely flubbed that up! Ahh you must hate me now. Oh no! I know!"

She grabbed her jacket off the chair and began to rummage through one of the pockets. She bowed again, both hands stretched out towards him, a green phone with the All Might charm he gave her three years ago rested on her palms. "Can you please give me your number again?"

"Sure." Tamaki swallowed, his hand shaking as he took that phone. She hadn't forgotten about him. She just lost her phone. That. That made him feel so much better.

"Woah Izumi, you work fast," A pink-haired girl with pink skin snickered from the table. "Already going after a third year."

Well now he was too nervous to even hit a button.

"It's not like that!" Izumi turned to her friends, her cheeks nearly matching that other girl's skin tone. "Tamaki is just a friend from middle school! He helped me out a bunch and I helped him out a lot too!"

"Ahh! How romantic."

Well now he couldn't breathe. Why couldn't he breathe?

At least Izumi looked about the same. "Mina!"

Nejire reached over and yoinked the phone out of his hand. "Yoink. Let me just see this for a second. And there we go! Here you go Izumi!" Nejire handed over the phone back to Izumi. "I put in mine and Tamaki's number into your phone. If you left it to him it might take a couple of days for his chicken heart to work up the courage."

"Oh." Izumi looked at her phone, and then looked back up towards him.

Their eyes met.

He held that gaze for far longer than he would have normally, watching as Izumi's spirit clashed in her eyes and tried to beckon him to come out and be more open. She had changed so much. But, it wasn't bad in the slightest. That shy, awkward girl had become so cheerful, so happy, and now, she was even training to be a hero.

"I," he began. "I'm happy you're here Izumi."

"Me too." She held her phone over her heart and smiled at him. "Let's do our best alright?"

"Yeah."

"Woah, is that actual motivation in your voice Tamaki?"

"Nejire! You're ruining the mood," Izumi's pink friend Mina said, smacking the table.

AN: I wanted to write a cute Izumi so I updated this.