He Brought Sake to My Dorm During a Blizzard, But Gave Me So Much More

The silence of the U.A. faculty lounge was a rare, precious thing. Shota Aizawa savored it, letting the quiet settle deep into his bones. Outside, the winter sky was a uniform, heavy grey, threatening snow that had yet to fall. Inside, there was only the soft scratch of his pen across a student evaluation and the neat, satisfying rustle of paper as he sorted files into meticulously labeled stacks. Midoriya. Bakugo. Uraraka. Each file represented a life he was responsible for, a future he was tasked with protecting. The weight of it was a familiar comfort. Here, in the ordered solitude of his work, he felt grounded.

He preferred the school this way: empty, hushed, devoid of the chaotic energy of teenagers. Most of the other teachers had eagerly fled for the holidays, leaving only him and a handful of other dedicated, or perhaps just lonely, staff. He knew which category he fell into. He ran a hand through his dark hair, the motion doing little to tame it, and leaned back in his chair, his eyes scanning the report in his hand. He was so absorbed, he didn't hear the footsteps until the door to the lounge was thrown open with a force that made the frame shudder.

"Shooooota! My man! Burning the midnight oil a little early, aren't we?"

Hizashi Yamada stood silhouetted in the doorway, a vibrant slash of blond hair and green leather against the dim hallway. His grin was wide enough to power the entire building, and his voice, even at a conversational level, echoed in the cavernous room, shattering the peace Aizawa had been cultivating.

Aizawa didn't look up from his papers. "What do you want, Hizashi?"

"Tough crowd," Hizashi laughed, striding into the room. His boots clicked loudly on the polished floor. "The coffee machine in my wing is on the fritz. Figured I'd raid the good stuff in here. You want one?"

"No."

"C'mon, man. It's break! Live a little." Hizashi leaned against the edge of Aizawa's temporary workstation, his hip brushing against a stack of graded essays. He gestured vaguely toward the windows. "We could take a walk before the snow hits. Get some fresh air. You look like you haven't seen the sun in a week."

Aizawa finally lifted his gaze, his dark eyes flat and unimpressed. "I have work to do."

The refusal was absolute, the tone leaving no room for argument. It was the same dismissal Aizawa gave him every time. Hizashi’s smile faltered for a fraction of a second, just long enough for Aizawa to notice. In that brief moment, the boisterous radio host persona fell away, and Aizawa saw only his friend. He saw the genuine concern in Hizashi's green eyes, the way they scanned his face, cataloging the dark circles beneath his own eyes, the tired set of his mouth. Hizashi saw the exhaustion he tried so hard to hide behind stacks of paperwork and a perpetual scowl.

"Alright, alright. I get it. A hero's work is never done," Hizashi said, his voice regaining its usual booming cheer. He pushed himself off the desk and headed for the coffee maker. "But don't be surprised if I come back later to drag your sorry butt out of this chair."

Aizawa grunted in response, his attention already returning to the file in front of him. But as Hizashi bustled around the kitchenette, the silence he left behind felt heavier than before, no longer peaceful, but empty.

By the time Hizashi returned to his own dorm room, mug of now-lukewarm coffee in hand, the sky had darkened from a flat grey to a deep, bruised purple. He stood at his window, watching the grounds of U.A. disappear under a rapidly thickening blanket of white. The forecast had called for a light dusting, a picturesque holiday coating. This was something else entirely. The flakes were huge and wet, falling not in a gentle drift but in a thick, determined curtain that swirled and danced in the rising wind.

His room, usually a comfortable chaos of records, sound equipment, and brightly colored clothes, felt strangely confining. The silence that had bothered him in the lounge was amplified here, broken only by the faint, mournful whistle of the wind as it found the cracks in his window frame. He took a sip of his coffee, the taste bitter on his tongue. He couldn't shake the image of Aizawa, hunched over his desk, looking as grey and weary as the winter sky. He knew Shota’s habits. He’d work until he couldn't keep his eyes open, fueled by cheap coffee and sheer stubbornness, and then retreat to a dorm room that was probably as spartan and empty as his office. The thought settled like a stone in Hizashi’s stomach.

He pulled out his phone, his thumb hovering over their message history. It was mostly one-sided. Links to funny cat videos he’d sent, questions about patrols, invitations to get food—all met with one-word answers or, more often, nothing at all. Still, he typed.

Hizashi: Hey. Snow’s getting pretty bad. Looks like a real blizzard out there.

He hit send, his gaze fixed on the screen, watching the three little dots appear and disappear. He imagined Aizawa glancing at his phone, his expression unchanging, before dismissing the message. The solitude was one thing; Shota chose that. But this felt different. The storm was isolating them, trapping them. The idea of Aizawa being truly, physically stuck by himself gnawed at him with an urgency that surprised him.

His phone buzzed in his hand.

Aizawa: I have eyes, Hizashi.

The response was so predictable it was almost funny. Hizashi let out a short, humorless laugh. Of course. But the terse reply didn't soothe the knot of anxiety in his chest. He looked back out the window. The individual flakes were gone, replaced by a solid, churning wall of white. The lights on the path below were already fuzzy, their glow struggling against the onslaught. He couldn't even see the main school building anymore. The world was shrinking, closing in on their small dormitory, and the thought of Aizawa facing it alone in the quiet dark was more than he could stand.

Aizawa finally placed the last graded paper into its corresponding folder. The sound of the wind had escalated from a mournful whistle to a deep, guttural howl that seemed to shake the very foundations of the building. He pushed his chair back and stood, stretching his stiff limbs. The work was done. There was nothing left to distract him from the oppressive emptiness of the school. He gathered his files into a neat stack, his movements precise and economical, a stark contrast to the chaos raging just beyond the windowpanes.

As he switched off the lamp at his desk, the overhead fluorescent lights in the lounge flickered violently, once, twice, before returning to their steady, sterile hum. Aizawa paused, his hand still on the switch. The building groaned around him, a beast settling under the weight of the storm. He wasn't easily rattled, but the sheer force of the blizzard was unnerving. The walk back to his dorm room felt longer than usual. His footsteps were the only sound in the long, dark corridor, each one echoing loudly in the profound silence. Every empty classroom door he passed seemed to amplify his solitude.

He let himself into his room, the space feeling colder and more barren than when he’d left it that morning. He didn’t bother turning on more than a single lamp, leaving the corners of the room steeped in shadow. He stood in the middle of the floor, the stack of files still in his hands, and listened to the storm. It was a relentless, roaring void. For the first time all day—maybe all week—he felt a sharp, unwelcome pang of loneliness. It was a hollow ache in his chest, a feeling he was usually adept at burying under layers of work and exhaustion. But now, with nothing to do and nowhere to go, it surfaced with a vengeance. The quiet was no longer peaceful; it was a physical presence, pressing in on him.

A sudden, sharp knock on his door made him jolt, the sound brutally loud against the backdrop of the wind. He frowned. No one ever came to his door. He moved to open it, his guard instantly up, his mind cycling through a dozen logical and illogical possibilities.

He pulled the door open to find Hizashi standing there, his bright blond hair dusted with snowflakes. He was bundled in a thick jacket, but he wasn’t smiling his usual blinding, confident grin. Instead, his expression was hesitant, almost nervous. In his hands, he held a dark green bottle of sake and two small, ceramic cups, presenting them like a peace offering.

"Hey," Hizashi said, his voice softer than usual, barely rising above the howl of the storm. "Figured the power might not last. Thought we could use some... internal heating." His grin was small, uncertain, but his eyes were fixed on Aizawa’s, full of a desperate, earnest hope.