Affinity

Chapter 16 - Maybe I'm Not Meant to Be Here

A/N Edit: Hey everyone, it's Hemza! Hope you're all doing well and wishing you all a lovely start to your weekend. Everyone except Darian, that is. She's the worst and is off having fun at a convention this weekend, the audacity. I swear we get along. Anyways, thanks as ever for your continued support of the story, you're all the literal best and we appreciate each and every one of you. Except Darian. She sucks.

She shouldn't be this nervous and she knew it. She had no reason to be trembling in her seat, hands clenched tightly against the scratchy fabric of her uniform skirt. She knew that her homeroom teacher would listen to her with no judgment, but that thought did nothing to placate the nervous storm brewing in her stomach.

She'd gotten to class far earlier than she needed to, an hour before any of her classmates were set to arrive, to be specific. Aizawa had only agreed to the meeting after consulting with Sakura, and Emiko had been forced to listen to her aunt's overly flirtatious giggles for the duration of the conversation.

She'd rolled her eyes and pretended she couldn't feel the lust washing over Sakura, an emotion nobody had any right feeling coming from family. She needed this meeting - needed a chance to speak with her teacher uninterrupted, and if that meant watching her aunt making goo goo eyes at her highschool crush, Emiko would grin and bear it.

"Komatsu, good morning." Aizawa called, stepping into the dimly lit classroom. She hadn't been able to turn on the lights, though she was grateful that the door was unlocked, at least. Aizawa's wild dark hair was pulled back into a bun, exposing the scars on his face from their fight with the League during the USJ training day.

"Good morning, sir. Thank you for meeting me so early!" She bowed her head, adjusting herself awkwardly in the stiff plastic chair.

Aizawa only nodded, setting a steaming mug of coffee down on the podium at the front of the classroom, before pulling a chair up to sit closer to his student. Up this close, Emiko could see the dark bags under his eyes and suddenly felt guilty that she'd taken up any of his precious sleep time. The man who already looked perpetually exhausted was showing an entirely new level of tired.

"What's going on?"

The question was simple, and the answer was so obvious.

"I-" she paused, attempting to make the words come out of her mouth. They seemed stuck in her throat, an obstructing, overwhelming ball she wanted nothing better than to dislodge, but her body wasn't cooperating. "I don't think I should be here."

Aizawa looked at her, his hooded gaze not shifting or giving away any change of emotion, but her quirk, as ever, tipped her off. Waves of confusion swirled around the classroom, dancing in Emiko's thrumming pulse.

"You called the meeting, kid. You're free to go whenever you want. I'll just take a nap, if you want to go so badly."

She sighed, pressing the palm of her hand against her forehead in exasperation at her inability to coherently express her intent. "No, not here, here. Like..." she paused again, her throat closing around the words she desperately didn't want to say.

"Like, the hero course."

She spat the words out as if they were a disgusting taste in her mouth, which they were in a sense. Her heartbeat increased, if that was even possible as a startled Aizawa stared at her, unblinking.

"What do you mean?"

Again, the question was simple enough, though the answer wasn't quite as straight forward.

"I don't think I should be in the hero course, and I want to be transferred into General Studies."

She knew he wouldn't be happy with that answer, knew he wouldn't give up on one of his students that easily.