Good Stories - Blog Posts
SUMMARY: Jirou and Denki's likes are far and between. Jirou likes Denki and Denki likes Jirou anyway. A/N: I was listening to Wild Side by ALI when I thought of them and you should too. (Actual a/n: It was so fun imagining all of this! I based them off some actual events between me and my friends. The homeless one is an actual thing my best friend and I do lmao, sit outside the mall's store and eat while our gang illegally take our photos and call us beggars) WARNINGS: Some mild swearing and a lot of probable inaccuracies for the sake of the plot and because I haven't finished MHA yet
It is wonderful my life
Jirou likes the name Jamming Whey and Denki likes the name Jirou-Jack.
Obviously the both of them detest the nickname the other’s given, or so everyone thought, based on the poking from Jirou’s end and dramatic sighing from Denki’s. Not that it stopped them from calling each other that at all opportunities. It was endearing to watch to the class; it was a trifle odd for the Bakusquad, for when they tried to use it…
“Um, what?”
“Sorry bro, but that ain’t for you to use!”
Mina thinks it’s funny, how it’s like a codename for only each other. Suspiciously so.
Please could you kiss my name
This round’s exercise of heroes versus villains is different.
The villains were Todoroki and Momo, so Jirou and Denki would have to play it smart to win. Inside the building it had seemed like a good idea at that time to split up. Now, not so much, when Jirou found herself stuck in Todoroki’s ice as he handed her the device Aizawa had given them to stay in contact with each other. Momo, no doubt, was nearby to catch her partner unaware.
“Call Kaminari to come out.”
“…Denki, the bomb’s in the room down the hall. The door to the left.”
But then suddenly it’s Momo and Todoroki on the floor, shocked by Chargebolt’s electrical attack. Jirou breaks out of the rest of the partially melted ice herself and grudgingly slaps her partner’s hand when he raises it, hopeful for a high-five.
Todoroki twists his head around, surprise evident on his face. “How’d you know it was as trap? Jirou didn’t say anything suspicious.”
Denki bursts out laughing smugly. “She’d never call me Denki willingly - it’s always Jamming Whey…” his shoulders slump. “Unfortunately. But anyways, we won, Jirou-Jack!”
“Shut up.”
Momo wonders if that day was when Jirou finally accepted the nickname, because for once she didn’t object to it.
Todoroki admires how in sync they are.
When the music's over?
Jirou likes rock and Denki likes electronic.
They argue about it a lot. The usual which is better, yours make no sense, it's much more superior that whatever you call that music. Sometimes during study nights the books and work are forgotten, pushed aside, to make way for their heated debate. Their friends roll their eyes and ignore them; it's almost a ritualistic thing at this point.
Only Mina thinks there's something more to it - to the rest the noise just dies down when one of them whips out their phone and forces the other to listen to their music. So what if they were sitting really close to each other and occasionally lean their heads on the other's shoulder? They're sharing an earbud after all, and the wire required them to be close.
(They're sulking, the rest think, because they see the eyerolls and shoulder shoves.)
(They're in denial, Mina thinks, because she sees them smile at the same moment when it hits the chorus and hum together.)
Turn off light, it was such a sweet time
Momo thinks she’s come up with a solution.
Jirou and Denki stare at her blankly, bewildered by her sudden excited announcement that study night. She says she’s heard them arguing about what music to choose a lot; Jirou replies they do it all the time and Denki adds that it’s normal. Momo nods but repeats what she says. She hands them both her phone.
“Jazz? Yaomomo - what?”
“I thought you were the sort to listen to classical shit. This ain’t my type!”
“No one cares about your opinion right now, Jamming Whey.”
“No, no, I just thought that if the two of you can’t agree on either one of your genres you’d like to try a third option. A compromise, sort of.” Momo smiles, believing she’s provided a resolution to their squabbling. Jirou’s not, though she tries to - she’s going to miss -
“What’s with that face, Jirou-Jack?”
“Don’t elbow me!”
“We can still share earbuds…or you could just plug your jacks into my phone.”
Jirou smiles, but it’s with an eyeroll as Momo looks hopefully on. Denki plays Momo’s choice, holding the phone uncomfortably close to her face like a kid showing off his crayon drawing to his mom. “I’m still choosing which one though!”
They still argue over the music, unsurprisingly. They’re openly sharing the earbuds now, surprisingly.
Could you pray for me, my friend?
Jirou likes movie night and Denki likes the popcorn.
Most of Class 1-A is already gathered in front of the TV, sprawled on the sofas or lying on the ground. She’s a little way from him, squashed between Momo and Mina. Denki pretends he’s not staring at her when his neighbor Kirishima points it out and Bakugo explodes telling them to just pick a movie already. Most of them vote for horror.
Jirou gets up. Strange, because he knows she likes movie nights. Then he remembers, she doesn’t like horror, but her pride wouldn’t allow others to know. Denki himself wouldn’t have known if he hadn’t deduced it by her actions over time and gotten her to admit it. Her friends attempt to persuade her to stay, but she feigns tiredness.
“Why don’t we watch something else? We’ve already watched this movie like what, three times already? Boo, we literally all know what’s going to happen!”
Of course he gets pummeled by the pillows but after a little more convincing they agree to change it. He claims he needs to use the bathroom and runs out.
It's starting over time
Jirou’s not yet to her room.
He catches up and makes her turn around, ask why she left, tries to wheedle her to stay. Denki already knows her so well, so Jirou says she doesn’t like the movie. But he’s convinced them to change it, something he think she’ll like, so reluctantly she follows him back. It’s really hard to say no to Denki sometimes, Jirou thinks, then sighs as she remembers that no, it’s actually ALL the time.
They get back and find their seats been taken. No matter, he shoos a few legs away from the ground near the couch and practically forces Jirou to sit next to him. The movie’s a murder mystery; Denki worries the gory parts might affect Jirou. Unconsciously an arm slips around her shoulders and maybe he shifts a little closer. But Jirou feels it. An eyebrow is raised and Denki jerks his head back to avoid the earphone jack, tilting his head back with a protesting look.
“Get your arm off me.”
“If you get scared-”
“If you try anything, Kaminari, I'll poke your eyeballs.”
“I wasn't!”
But they end up cuddling anyway; Sero helpfully throws a blanket over them because that’s what happens every movie night, somehow.
Taking overnight
Jirou likes to sleep and Denki likes distracting himself.
It takes his mind off the fact it’s nearly 1 a.m. and if he lies down on his bed he’ll just overthink everything and probably count down how much hours of sleep he’s losing and he’s going to be so sleep deprived and tired tomorrow and then he’ll get scolded by Aizawa for not paying attention in class and be stupider than he already is and he wishes he could close his eyes and why is it so cold in the room, all his senses feel waaay too alert and man does he want some ramen-
He tries a few other things like finishing some homework or reading but his eyes don’t feel like they’re working right. Or rather they are, but everything is blurring together. Denki leans back, listens to some music and scrolls on his phone. A bad distraction but a distraction nonetheless.
But now he can’t keep his mind off wondering if he could text Jirou and just…dunno, talk? Gossip? Ask her if she wanted to get instant ramen with him? Probably because one of her songs somehow crawled their way into his playlist right now.
She’d probably yell at him for waking her up and order him to go make ramen himself. The thought seems funny to him, but then again everything is funny at night. He opens up her chat because insomniac + a-need-for-company = no self control.
(Somewhere in the back of his mind he wonders why Jirou is the first one he thinks of.)
>>hey you up?????
>>can’t sleep 💀💀
>>would anyone be mad at me if i got up right now to make ramen
>>kinda want a juicebox or something lmaoo
>>CANNOT MATH RIGHT NOW 😩😭🥴
>>sorry to wake you
Denki throws the phone to his bed after deleting everything but the last message.
Taking over blue time
He’s in the midst of actually going out to get that juicebox when there’s knocking at the door.
Denki throws open the door, electricity at the ready in case a ghost really existed and was paying a visit to all those naughty little boys who aren’t abiding by bedtime.
It's Jirou, actually, who's paying a visit.
“…hi?” His brain and mouth feels numb but he attempts to be normal. “What, couldn't sleep until you saw my handsome face?”
Jirou's face gets more annoyed and disbelieving that she was even here in the first place. “A face that's about to be punched.”
“Aw, you do miss me~” Denki yanks her inside, unable to stop his grinning. He slams the door shut. “But seriously, why’re you here?”
“Just because you deleted the text doesn’t mean I didn’t see it.”
“…oh, yeah…about that.” Denki awkwardly scratches his neck. “We don’t gotta get the ramen or anything. I’m just having trouble sleeping then.”
Perhaps not so much now, when he suddenly found his eyes about to close themselves while his head was tucked under Jirou’s and his arms looped around hers, both somewhere in the stacks of blankets and pillows and plushies lying on Denki’s bed.
“Not a word, Kaminari.”
Not that he could manage one, finally dozing off with her.
(It’s a little hard to explain to Kirishima the next morning why Jirou’s plushy is on his bed.)
If you heard that screaming, shout in your mind
Jirou likes fries and Denki likes hamburgers.
There’s not really anything to argue about for this one but they do anyway, comparing which fast food chain was better. Usually it winds up with Denki defending his honor while Jirou pokes fun at how his big mouth came about by having to stretch it to fit all his beloved burgers. Nothing different this time round as Class 1-A heads out to another shopping trip together.
Denki doesn’t want to go into the stupid store. He’s hungry. Jirou snorts and says he won’t die of starvation like he says. He whines about craving a greasy, fat hamburger. Jirou elbows him; he lingers outside the store, at the window, declaring he was going to stay outside until they could eat and if they find his corpse lying out there it was because they wouldn’t let him have lunch. Tokoyami helpfully points out that it’s still morning.
He stays out there regardless, ignoring the scoffs and snickers from a certain someone that he looked like a homeless tramp.
A very hungry tramp, Denki argues. I want a hamburger. Maybe a soda.
Taking over the shine
“Hey.”
“What…aw, hey, you got me a burger! I’m saved!” Denki eagerly peels back the wrappings, taking a huge bite and beaming at Jirou, who’s plopped down next to him. She points out the lettuce in his teeth and sips her drink, holding her own burger.
“I didn’t see you come out of the store?”
“There’s another exit at the back. Passed by a restaurant and well, you said you were hungry and I didn’t want you complaining anymore.”
“Didn’t you say I looked like a homeless tramp sitting out here?”
“…now there’s two homeless tramps.”
Denki bursts out laughing and Jirou scolds him for spraying out hamburger. You never heard me say that, she says, and Denki stores it away in his memory as he takes the drink from her proffered hand. Jirou unwraps her burger and makes a face. “This better be as good as you say.”
(Later the Bakusquad catch them feeding each other fries; Jirou complains Denki opened the wrong packet of sauce.)
Taking over the shooting star
Jirou likes the solitude and Denki likes socialising.
Which is why despite the numerous asks from her friends if she needed them Jirou declined, preferring to spend her quarantine from the flu in her own room by herself. It wasn’t too bad - she could just do whatever she wanted in bed: scroll on her phone, practice a little music, catch up on assignments…if it weren’t so damned COLD.
She’s already sneezed about a bajillion times already and the bin’s full from tissues. No matter how many layers of blankets she was trying to burrow under she just wouldn’t heat up. Maybe her tolerance for the freeze had just lowered after hanging out with Kaminari - the man was quite literally a walking electrical heater.
Speaking of Kaminari, Jirou just might have to borrow Bakugo’s nickname of Dunceface for him, because who the hell gave him permission to barge into her room like that?!
Jirou throws a plushy at him. “Get out.”
“I’m not here to pass you your homework though…you know I don’t even understand any of it myself.” Nobody asked but he plops down next to her. “I heard you were sick!”
“Less sick and more of in danger in getting frostbite,” Jirou grumbles, hugging herself and shivering.
So of course he just hauls her ass to the door and basically kidnaps her to the kotatsu.
All I was talking about was music
“Better?”
“Maybe.”
Denki smirks and pulls her closer. She doesn’t even bother fighting it, finally warming up from the combination of the kotatsu and him. Probably the stifling three thousand blankets Denki piled on them as well. At least he had the decency to kidnap her rabbit plushy as well; he paired it up with his worn, dumb Pikachu one. The one where she had won for him at an arcade to get him to stop his sulking. Hah.
“Let’s play music! My turn to pick!”
“I’m the sick one, Jamming Whey.”
“It’s my phone!”
“You’re literally borrowing-”
They both rolled around for a while before someone’s elbow, finger, knee, something touched the screen sufficiently for the phone to recognize the command and start playing. Start playing Momo’s music choice, specifically. Jirou sighs and Denki shrugs. They let it play and huddle under Mount Blanket. The plushies are kidnapped inside.
“Warm enough yet?”
“Yeah.”
(And that's called jazz!)
A doctor discovers an important question patients should be asked
This patient isn’t usually mine, but today I’m covering for my partner in our family-practice office, so he has been slipped into my schedule.
Reading his chart, I have an ominous feeling that this visit won’t be simple.
A tall, lanky man with an air of quiet dignity, he is 88. His legs are swollen, and merely talking makes him short of breath.
He suffers from both congestive heart failure and renal failure. It’s a medical Catch-22: When one condition is treated and gets better, the other condition gets worse. His past year has been an endless cycle of medication adjustments carried out by dueling specialists and punctuated by emergency-room visits and hospitalizations.
Hemodialysis would break the medical stalemate, but my patient flatly refuses it. Given his frail health, and the discomfort and inconvenience involved, I can’t blame him.
Now his cardiologist has referred him back to us, his primary-care providers. Why send him here and not to the ER? I wonder fleetingly.
With us is his daughter, who has driven from Philadelphia, an hour away. She seems dutiful but wary, awaiting the clinical wisdom of yet another doctor.
After 30 years of practice, I know that I can’t possibly solve this man’s medical conundrum.
A cardiologist and a nephrologist haven’t been able to help him, I reflect,so how can I? I’m a family doctor, not a magician. I can send him back to the ER, and they’ll admit him to the hospital. But that will just continue the cycle… .
Still, my first instinct is to do something to improve the functioning of his heart and kidneys. I start mulling over the possibilities, knowing all the while that it’s useless to try.
Then I remember a visiting palliative-care physician’s words about caring for the fragile elderly: “We forget to ask patients what they want from their care. What are their goals?”
I pause, then look this frail, dignified man in the eye.
“What are your goals for your care?” I ask. “How can I help you?”
The patient’s desire
My intuition tells me that he, like many patients in their 80s, harbors a fund of hard-won wisdom.
He won’t ask me to fix his kidneys or his heart, I think. He’ll say something noble and poignant: “I’d like to see my great-granddaughter get married next spring,” or “Help me to live long enough so that my wife and I can celebrate our 60th wedding anniversary.”
His daughter, looking tense, also faces her father and waits.
“I would like to be able to walk without falling,” he says. “Falling is horrible.”
This catches me off guard.
That’s all?
But it makes perfect sense. With challenging medical conditions commanding his caregivers’ attention, something as simple as walking is easily overlooked.
A wonderful geriatric nurse practitioner’s words come to mind: “Our goal for younger people is to help them live long and healthy lives; our goal for older patients should be to maximize their function.”
Suddenly I feel that I may be able to help, after all.
“We can order physical therapy — and there’s no need to admit you to the hospital for that,” I suggest, unsure of how this will go over.
He smiles. His daughter sighs with relief.
“He really wants to stay at home,” she says matter-of-factly.
As new as our doctor-patient relationship is, I feel emboldened to tackle the big, unspoken question looming over us.
“I know that you’ve decided against dialysis, and I can understand your decision,” I say. “And with your heart failure getting worse, your health is unlikely to improve.”
He nods.
“We have services designed to help keep you comfortable for whatever time you have left,” I venture. “And you could stay at home.”
Again, his daughter looks relieved. And he seems … well … surprisingly fine with the plan.
I call our hospice service, arranging for a nurse to visit him later today to set up physical therapy and to begin plans to help him to stay comfortable — at home.
Back home
Although I never see him again, over the next few months I sign the order forms faxed by his hospice nurses. I speak once with his granddaughter. It’s somewhat hard on his wife to have him die at home, she says, but he’s adamant that he wants to stay there.
A faxed request for sublingual morphine (used in the terminal stages of dying) prompts me to call to check up on him.
The nurse confirms that he is near death.
I feel a twinge of misgiving: Is his family happy with the process that I set in place? Does our one brief encounter qualify me to be his primary-care provider? Should I visit them all at home?
Two days later, and two months after we first met, I fill out his death certificate.
Looking back, I reflect: He didn’t go back to the hospital, he had no more falls, and he died at home, which is what he wanted. But I wonder if his wife felt the same.
Several months later, a new name appears on my patient schedule: It’s his wife.
“My family all thought I should see you,” she explains.
She, too, is in her late 80s and frail, but independent and mentally sharp. Yes, she is grieving the loss of her husband, and she’s lost some weight. No, she isn’t depressed. Her husband died peacefully at home, and it felt like the right thing for everyone.
“He liked you,” she says.She’s suffering from fatigue and anemia. About a year ago, a hematologist diagnosed her with myelodysplasia (a bone marrow failure, often terminal). But six months back, she stopped going for medical care.
I ask why.
“They were just doing more and more tests,” she says. “And I wasn’t getting any better.”
Now I know what to do. I look her in the eye and ask:
“What are your goals for your care, and how can I help you?”
-Mitch Kaminski
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Have you ever found a diamond in the rough kind of comic? You know the comic that's been totally forgotten but has an awesome story and you enjoy it a lot. Those are the best. Me looking at my pile of ancient forgotten comics.