All Who Wander [Chapter 6 - CHERRIES]

[Chapter 5]

When Izuku woke, there were warm rays of sun gently lighting his little inflatable tent. He’d managed to reach the bottom of the mountain in the lingering sunset, and had gotten his tent inflated and a fire started before the light completely vanished for the night. It had felt like a much quicker trip this time, the days much longer than they’d been earlier in the season, and he’d fallen asleep pleasantly tired with a stomach full of potatoes.

With the new day started, he got himself dressed and outside, stretching lightly as he surveyed the surroundings. They’d had some rain while he was away, leaving everything damp and soft, but his little patches of potato plantings still looked safe and covered. His pile of firewood, too, had grown damp, so he made a mental note to stack some inside where it was dry, just in case. But that was a job for later – his first job for the day was to go catch up with Eri and Mirio, to see how they’d fared over the time he’d been back home.

“Izuku!” Mirio beamed, as soon as he got within eyeshot of the farm. “It’s so good to see you!”

“Mirio!” Izuku grinned right back, reaching over the fence to pat the big, gentle cows. “I missed you guys!”

“Eri is staying home today, she’s had a bit of a cold, so what do you say to giving me a hand with the chickens? We can have a good breakfast then head into town to see her, if you like; I’ve got some things to drop off at the general store, and I’m sure Eri would love to see that you’re back.”

“That sounds great! I’ve chatted to some of the locals, but I’ve never really been to any of the stores or anything. You’ll have to introduce me to your friends!”

“Of course! Everyone is dying to meet you!”

Mirio swung the gate open for him, just enough to let him squeeze through without the cows making a break for it, and with a last quick grin he picked up Eri’s egg basket, letting himself into the barn to greet the chickens. They hurried to his feet when they saw him coming, and he laughed as he scattered them seeds from the barrel, watching them dive in to peck at their breakfast.

“Look at you ladies go!” he praised, as he collected a nice crop of big eggs. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this many eggs before!”

He propped the doors open, letting them out to scratch in the dirt happily, and returned to Mirio excitedly with his heavy basket.

“It’s that time of year!” Mirio said cheerfully, when Izuku showed off his basket with shining eyes. “They always lay better when the days get longer and the weather gets warmer; it must be almost summer!”

“They look so good,” Izuku gushed. “Look how big and brown they are!”

“They’re gonna make a great breakfast,” Mirio agreed. “Maybe we can make something for dinner with them, too.”

“Definitely! I brought some more potatoes and mushrooms back with me, the mushrooms and eggs make such a good combination, I thought maybe we could try mushroom omelettes, like you were talking about with your cheese?”

“That sounds delicious. I have a little bit of sugar too, I thought we could make a custard for Eri while she isn’t feeling well. I’ll teach you how!”

Together they headed into the house, and when they started their cooking, Izuku knew he’d made the right decision by coming back. There was just something so exciting about mixing up eggs and milk, chopping potatoes and mushrooms and radishes, and mixing them into different little batches to experiment with the flavours and textures. Just having the facilities to do so was such a good feeling, like the days of struggling to get enough food were well and truly over, even though he knew the people back home were still suffering – he just had to put that to the back of his mind for a little while, to enjoy the moment.

When the thick, creamy custard was cooked, Mirio carefully ladled it into a jar, and the two of them sat down to eat the leftovers for their breakfast. It was sweet and warm and everything Izuku could have hoped for – he almost wanted to get sick, just to see if Mirio would make him some more because of it.

When they were ready to go, Mirio bundled up his extra eggs and a small bottle of milk, tucking them into a bag to carry along with them. He led the way up the hill beyond the farm, past the scattered buildings where Izuku had explored and chatted with the locals, and into the stone streets. Izuku had seen the town, of course, but he’d never really ventured beyond eyeshot of Mirio’s farm, was yet to dive into the throng of people working and living in the closely-packed buildings down the road.

“This is our general store,” Mirio told him, as they got close to a small wooden building on the edge of town. “I sell my extra eggs and milk here when I have a good haul, and then the other residents can buy them if they need extra food.”

“Oh, that’s neat! I’m glad people can help each other out like that.”

“Exactly! And then with the coins I get for selling them, I can buy things like feed for the animals, or clothes and shoes when I need them. There are people in town who make a lot of things, so I can get just about whatever I need, without having to wait for the trader to come by.”

“I wish we had a store back home,” Izuku lamented. “But we don’t really have enough people in the village to make it worth it.”

“Well, you can always make a trip to ours, when you need it!” Mirio reminded him with a fond smile. “It sounds like your mother and your friend make some great things, I’m sure they could sell them here with no problem!”

“That’s true,” Izuku acknowledged. “It’s definitely worth considering.”

“And then you can come by and have breakfast with me while you’re here!”

He shot Izuku a grin, and Izuku couldn’t help but smile back – Mirio was just so welcoming, his smile so infectious, and he couldn’t have asked for a better friend to have made on his first trip out of the village.

“Tamaki!” Mirio beamed, when he pushed open the door. “I didn’t expect you here!”

A man with purple hair was standing inside, sticking a piece of paper up on one of the long wooden walls, but he paused when Mirio spoke, cracking a tiny smile when he turned to look.

“This is Izuku, he lives up the mountain!” Mirio explained, pushing Izuku forward and making him stumble a little. “He brought those potatoes we ate the other day, and he brought more back with him today! I’m looking forward to some good mashed potatoes with butter again, they were so good last time. How’s the weather looking?”

“Nice to meet you,” Tamaki said simply, gesturing toward the wall of papers. “Some rain coming.”

“That’ll be good for the crops!”

“Sprinkles will be upset.”

“But she’ll have more nice grass to eat later!”

“Always the optimist.”

Mirio just laughed, and Tamaki shook his head fondly, turning his gaze back to the wall. He didn’t seem to like making eye contact, but Mei had been the same in her younger years, so Izuku found a weird sort of comfort in the avoidance, rather than being offended.

“Sometimes people leave requests up here,” Mirio explained, waving Izuku over to take a look. “People who need a babysitter, or are looking for someone to fix something, all that kind of stuff. Oh, there’s a new one here!”

Izuku walked over to take a look with him, eyes going straight to the small piece of paper that looked like it couldn’t have been there more than a day – still uncreased, uncovered, untouched by anyone other than the person who put it up.

“Oh, it’s from Kouji.”

The short note was a simple, polite request for any spare food scraps or grass people might have lying around, to help feed the wild animals in the area. Izuku knew he had a bag of scraps back at his tent, ready to plant in the farm, but suddenly he felt like there were more important things he could use them for.

“What kind of grass do they eat?” Izuku asked quietly.

“Anything, pretty much,” Mirio chuckled knowingly. “But they all live in the forest area up on the hill, near Kouji’s house, so they tend to eat it down pretty bare. At this time of year the grass hasn’t grown back yet from winter, so he always gives them what he can.”

“Are we talking about Kouji?”

Footsteps moved toward them, and a young woman with blue hair emerged from the back room, smiling warmly when she met Izuku’s gaze.

“I’m Nejire,” she offered. “You must be Izuku, it’s nice to finally meet you!”

“It’s nice to meet you too!”

“Nejire runs the store here,” Mirio explained. “Her parents used to do it, but she took over most of the work when we finished school.”

“Oh! You all went to school together?”

“Uh-huh!” Nejire grinned. “Aizawa taught pretty much everyone who’s been at school here in the past fifteen years. There aren’t many kids in town now though, and he has Eri to take care of, so our school has kind of died off in recent years.”

“Lucky kids,” Mirio chuckled. “I’d have loved to not go to school!”

“They still get taught by their parents or tutors,” Nejire reminded him. “They just don’t get a lunch break with their friends like we did.”

“Never mind!”

Chattering away, Nejire and Mirio headed over to the counter, and Mirio opened up his bag to show her his goods for the day. Izuku flashed an awkward smile at Tamaki, and Tamaki still didn’t meet his eyes, but he did manage a little nod of acknowledgement.

“Sometimes I see Kouji cut grass from the valley and take it up to the animals,” he said softly.

“Down by the old farm?”

Tamaki nodded, and Izuku’s smile stretched a little wider, nodding understandingly.

“Thank you, Tamaki. I appreciate it.”

“Not a problem.”

When Mirio finished up his trading, he returned to Izuku’s side with a handful of paper packets, grinning as always when he tucked one of them into Izuku’s hand. Izuku blinked at it, looking for some sort of label and finding nothing.

“These are radish seeds,” he explained. “We plant them every few weeks so they grow continuously, they only take a couple of weeks to be ready, though they get a bit bigger if you let them grow for longer of course. Getting seeds out of the plants is a bit of work though, so I often don’t get enough of them to keep my stock going. I thought you might like to grow some too!”

“That’s so cool,” Izuku gushed. “Did you buy them here? I should get a pack too!”

“That pack is yours, silly. It’s a gift, so you can’t turn it down!”

“You don’t need to do that!”

“But I want to,” Mirio said firmly. “I hope you enjoy growing them. I’ll show you how to get the seeds, too, next time I have some ready to go.”

“Thank you so much!”

Together they headed onward through the city, with Mirio pointing out different little stores and houses – everything from a tool shop to a clothing store to a carpenter. People waved at them from a distance, or stopped to chat as they passed by, and everything about it just felt so warm and welcoming. Izuku’s home village was too small for that kind of little community to build up; they were all just tiny families living in a forest, occasionally handing each other potatoes.

“I might go meet Kouji,” Izuku mused as they walked. “I could cut some grass from the forest and take it up there.”

“I’m sure he’d appreciate that!” Mirio said enthusiastically. “He’s a lovely guy. Very quiet, but loves his animals to death. I can lend you a scythe to cut some grass, if you like.”

“That would be great!”

“They might like some of the radish scraps too, if you have any spare.”

“Definitely!”

Mirio stopped outside a tiny wooden house, knocking on the door, and before long it swung open on a tired-looking Aizawa, who greeted them with a simple nod and a step aside to let them in. Izuku nodded back, wondering if he should muster up some sort of a greeting or just let him have his silence, but Mirio marched on down a hallway, so Izuku hurried after him.

“Morning Eri!” he said brightly. “I heard you haven’t been eating, so I brought you some custard!”

“Thank you,” she croaked, and Izuku cringed at how painful it sounded. “My Dad has given me lots of milk, too.”

“That’s good, we’ve gotta keep your bones strong!”

Izuku peeked around the corner, and Eri’s face lit up, Mirio smiling just as wide when he turned to wave Izuku in.

“Look who came to visit,” Mirio said with a laugh. “He must have known you weren’t feeling good, he came back today to see you!”

“I missed you, Eri,” Izuku said softly. “Sorry to hear you’re not well, I hope you get better soon.”

“I missed you too. Thank you for coming.”

Mirio sat down on the rug beside Eri’s bed, so Izuku joined him, reaching over to squeeze her hand briefly.

“When my best friend Mei gets sick, she always wants me to tell her stories,” Izuku said. “Do you like stories, Eri?”

“I love stories.”

“She’s heard all our local stories a thousand times,” Mirio told him. “She keeps asking us to find new ones.”

“I can tell you my stories from home,” Izuku offered. “I don’t know if they’re different, so you’ll have to tell me if you’ve heard them before.”

“When I get better, I’ll teach you my stories, too,” Eri promised, sucking on a spoonful of custard.

“That sounds great, Eri.”

—

With his shirt drenched in sweat, Izuku dragged himself the last few metres to Kouji’s house – or at least, what he assumed was Kouji’s house, based on the directions he’d been given. He dropped his armfuls of grass beside the front steps, letting his aching arms relax for a minute before he bent down to stack them up more neatly, forming a tidy pile that he hoped no one would accidentally trip over. Taking a deep breath, he climbed the three steps to the door, knocking lightly and waiting as the footsteps came closer. The door opened, and a massive man stood before him, a look of alarm filling his face when he saw a stranger standing there.

“Hello!” Izuku said brightly. “Are you Kouji? My name is Izuku, I saw your message at the general store!”

Kouji blinked at him, but nodded.

“Great! I brought you some grass from the next hill over, I hope it’s the right kind for the animals to eat. Oh, and some radish scraps, too! I had more but I buried them to see if they’d grow, like potatoes do. But now I know you need seeds to grow them from, so I’m doing that instead, and I don’t need these ones anymore. If you’re desperate, I can go try to dig up some older ones, if they haven’t broken down into the soil yet! Anyway, how long will this grass last you? I can bring you some more, I just need to give my arms a little break first.”

He gestured toward the pile, and Kouji’s mouth fell open when he saw, eyes darting between Izuku and the grass.

“Thank you,” he said, his voice so soft that Izuku could barely understand him. “This is amazing.”

“I’m glad! Is it enough for today? Oh, and the scraps too.” He dug the parcel out of his bag, offering it to Kouji happily. “The blanket is actually Mirio’s but he lent it to me for bundling stuff in, do you have somewhere to store the radishes? If not I’ll come get the blanket back another time, if that’s okay.”

“I’ll take it back to him when I go to town,” Kouji assured him. “Thank you very much, this is plenty of grass. Let me go get my wallet, so I can pay you for this.”

“What? No! Don’t be silly! It’s the least I could do, after everyone here has been so welcoming to me. And it’s for the animals, right? I don’t need payment to help animals!”

“You worked so hard, and came so far.”

“I don’t mind at all! It was fun to see more of the town!”

Kouji smiled softly, but conceded a nod, pausing before he spoke again.

“Okay. Thank you. But wait here a moment, okay?”

He ducked back into his little house, and within a minute he was back with a paper envelope, pressing it into Izuku’s hands with determination.

“Seeds,” he explained. “I got them from a traveller once, but no one knows how to grow them. He said you need a trellis, but I’m not sure what that is. Maybe you can figure it out.”

“Really!? Thank you so much! I promise when I figure out how to grow them, you’ll be the first one I bring them to! I can’t wait to try!”

With a last beaming smile, Izuku waved goodbye, hurrying off down the hill with his aching arms and legs all but forgotten. He ran all the way back to his tent with the packet still clutched in his hands, digging his old book out of his bag and settling in to read. The word trellis didn’t sound familiar, but he knew it had to be in the book somewhere, if he just looked hard enough.

He’d been working through the book again anyway, in the past few days. He’d always skimmed over things as a kid, been fascinated more by the pictures and descriptions than all the tiny technical notes, but as he’d gotten older, he’d dug deeper into everything written there. Most of it hadn’t made sense, back then, but in the past few days he’d had revelations, figured out how it all pieced together with the things he’d learned from Mirio and Aizawa and his mother. Like the word fertilising, which made total sense now, with his understanding of potato water and sour milk. There was another fertiliser talked about frequently, and Izuku had a hunch about what it might mean, but he needed to do a lot more testing before he could know for sure – and he wasn’t looking forward to that part, if he was entirely honest.

The sky was getting dark by the time he found the word, his face lighting up with delight over it, staring at the little picture with criss-crossed sticks. That had to be it. A trellis. Some kind of frame that the plant grew up, to help support it as it got tall. He could build one out of sticks long before the plants grew, it looked easy enough!

He opened the door of his tent, sighing when he saw the dark sky beyond it, and quickly retreated back to his bed. It was going to have to wait for the morning, when he could see what he was looking for without wasting the charge in his little lantern. He needed a good bath, too, but the little stream in the forest that he drank from was too shallow and slow-moving to really be of use for that. He was gonna have to fall on Mirio’s mercy again and hope he didn’t mind if Izuku sneaked in a bath before breakfast.

—

“I brought the pooooop!” Eri sang, as she ran toward Izuku’s little farm.

She held a bucket in each hand, filled with the stinky remnants of cleaning out the barn, and it always made her giggle to see Izuku get excited about it, when she arrived. It had taken almost two weeks for him to get everything set up – his seeds planted, his soil fertilised, and his trellis tied together and stuck deep in the ground – but it was starting to look like a real farm, if he did say so himself. With Eri feeling better, she’d been his best little helper with it all, always happy to run over with fertiliser and scraps, or help him water his plants. She’d even helped him build a little dam in his stream, to pool up some deeper water, and make it easier to fill his buckets. He had the makings of a real little home, and as much as he adored it, his feet were starting to itch.

“Are we doing the cherries today?” Eri asked eagerly.

“Yeah, I think we should!”

He took the buckets of fertiliser from her, and she gathered up an armful of dried-out grass, in their place. Izuku had taken to cutting any long grass he found, since he and Kouji had met, and while most of it got delivered to Kouji’s doorstep, he also kept some to scatter around his farm to dry out. It made great padding for his bed, and he’d been using it to surround the cherry trees, too; with the fertiliser spread around them, he didn’t like the idea of people wandering through and eating fallen cherries, so he figured the grass was a little cleaner.

“What are we gonna make for dinner today?” Eri asked, as they walked deep into the trees. “Potato salad?”

“That was really good, wasn’t it?” Izuku said with a smile. She’d been asking every day since they’d first made it, with their combo of boiled potatoes and mayonnaise and boiled eggs. “Mirio and I were thinking about trying something with cream, this time. Maybe soaking the potatoes in it and baking them, to see how the texture changes.”

“Oooo that sounds yummy!”

“Right? It’s been so much fun experimenting with you guys!”

Izuku carefully dug out the grass around the roots of a tree, stepping back to let Eri tip the fertiliser out. He raked it around with a bundle of stiff twigs he’d tied together days ago, making sure it was all mixed in nicely, then together they covered it up again with the clean grass. Izuku wasn’t sure if it would make any difference, but considering how much the cows pooped anyway, it seemed like it was worth the effort in the hopes of getting more cherries out of the trees.

They headed down to the stream next, washing their buckets and hands thoroughly, before they lined the buckets with rags and headed back into the trees. It was Eri’s favourite part, other than laughing at Izuku for being excited for poop. They filled their buckets to the brim with ripe cherries, Eri eating half of them along the way, then carted them up to the general store to see Nejire. By the time they arrived, Eri’s hands and mouth were always stained blood-red, and Nejire always had a little chuckle at her for it as she proudly hauled her bucket up onto the counter.

“I’m surprised you’re still here,” Nejire said this time, when they headed up to the counter. “You didn’t come in yesterday.”

“Mirio and I got busy cooking and I ran out of time to go cherry picking,” Izuku explained. “Why are you surprised?”

She pointed at the wall, and Izuku’s eyes widened when he saw the weather forecast, calling for three days of rain.

“I didn’t know!” Izuku whined. “I wonder if I could get home before it starts.”

“I think you could, if you left right away,” she suggested. “Is the farm in good shape to leave?”

“I think so! I’d just need to pack up my tent and everything, that’s all. And find some food to take with me, at least enough to not starve on the way home!”

“I can help with that!” Nejire offered. “We just got a huge stock of oil and vinegar in, along with a bunch of butter, if you don’t want to make it yourself. And the radishes are flourishing, people have been in every day to sell their extras, so if you want to wait a little bit, I could get some together for you.”

“Would you really? That would be amazing!”

He dug out his little bag of coins, dumping it on the counter, and she laughed at him, shaking her head. She took a few coins from his pile, giving back the rest, and he blinked at her in confusion.

“You’ve gotten yourself a good little stock there,” she said, grinning. “You’ve become quite the businessman! It won’t cost you all that, don’t worry. I’ll add this to what I owe you for the cherries and that’ll be plenty.”

“Are you sure?”

“Very sure.”

He put the rest away obediently, and she put the coins in her locked box, giving him a thumbs-up.

“Thanks again, the cherries have been selling insanely fast. No one in town gets out that far unless they make a special trip of it and spend all day there, so everyone has been super excited to be able to buy them instead!”

“I’m glad I could help!”

“I’m coming by Mirio’s for dinner tonight, so why don’t you head home and pack up your stuff, do anything you need to do at the farm, then come say goodbye to him, and I’ll bring your parcel with me? I’ll make sure it’s bundled up nice and safe for the trip.”

“You’re amazing, Nejire! Thank you so much! I’ve just gotta walk Eri home and drop off some grass to Kouji, so that should be perfect.”

“I’ll see you there, then!”

She took the buckets of cherries off the counter, handing back the emptied and cleaned ones from the last trip, and with a last wave they parted ways again, heading for Eri’s house.

“Is it fun sleeping in a tent?” she asked as they walked. “You can take your house anywhere, that seems cool.”

“It’s pretty neat!” he said. “You can sleep over with me if you want, some time. I wish i had a proper bed, sometimes, though. My sleeping bag is nice and cozy, but it’s not very thick, so I end up mostly sleeping on hard ground and sometimes a rock or something, so then my back hurts. When it’s been in the same place a while it’s okay, but when I’m moving around there are always rocks!”

“You can share my bed, if you want,” Eri offered. “I have a nice bed.”

“That’s sweet of you,” Izuku grinned. “Thank you. I’m okay most of the time, though!”

Eri let herself into her house without knocking, calling out a hello, and soon Aizawa was coming out to see them, thanking Izuku for bringing her home safely. He was never sure it really made a difference, considering she ran to and from Mirio’s on her own all the time, but he supposed it was a little different, being off in the forest.

“I’m heading home for a bit,” Izuku warned him. “Sorry!”

“Oh, you saw the weather report? I wondered. Here, let me give you something for your mother.”

“You don’t need to do that!”

“I want to,” he said simply, disappearing into the kitchen. “Just make sure you take it home to her, don’t go eating it on your way.”

“I would never!”

Aizawa returned with a couple of jars for him, and Eri gasped when she saw, her eyes shining.

“You made cheese!”

“Yes, I thought I’d give it a go,” Aizawa said. “The only people making it right now are an older couple, so I thought it was time someone else learned.”

“This is so exciting! I can’t wait to show Mom!”

“Thank you for all your help with Eri. Go have a good time with your family again, I’ll take Eri down to the farm if the weather clears up and we’ll make sure everything is in order.”

“Yeah!” Eri agreed. “I’m an expert now, I can take care of the farm! But don’t forget to come back eventually.”

“I could never forget!” Izuku assured her. “I won’t be too long, probably a week again.”

“Say hi to your Mom for us!”

“I will.”

[Chapter 7]