Chapter Text
The next Saturday, Atsumu set the alarm as early as he ever used it on a weekend. He didn’t want to waste precious time and be late again for the meeting, so he did his best to wake up at seven and start his day.
He took a shower right after waking up. He packed his bag the night before with all the work his calculus professor left him at the previous class, and he couldn’t complete a single exercise without supervision, along with his calculator and textbooks. Atsumu took a glance at himself for the last time in the mirror, fixed his still damp locks from the short shower and half past seven he started heading to the cafeteria near the university.
He wasn’t going to lie, since he knew that he was about to meet Tsukishima’s friend again, he spent his night with a bunch of nerves on his stomach, something twisting and stirring on his insides, becoming restless. He felt like the biggest dumb; he barely spent a maximum of two and a half hours with Tobio and fell head over heels for him.
He felt dazed around him, like in a spell that only the boy’s voice and sapphire orbs could break. He could save him just by hearing the soft recitation of his monotonous but deep voice and give him a breath of fresh air with the slightest movement of his elegant hands adjusting his long raven locks, like a painter would do while creating a masterpiece with his brushes.
Atsumu was being honest. He felt a little pathetic for feeling so much so soon, but could anyone blame him?
Tobio was obviously handsome, beautiful and so damn pretty. And not only by looks, it was presented in the way he talked, in the way he expressed his interest with childlike enthusiasm and bright eyes, in the way his presence would drag attention, all focus only on him and his slender frame, even without trying, even without wanting to, Tobio could illuminate a whole room just by being there, breathing, existing.
So, yeah, Atsumu had it pretty bad, and felt like such a loser because of it. With all those thoughts blurring his mind, he walked in a hurry, arriving with enough time to spare to buy the cup of coffee and sweets his tutor asked for himself and what he recommended buying for Tobio in the cafeteria. Would it be weird if Atsumu gave the cup of coffee to the younger?
Tobio could question how Atsumu knew his usual and thought of him as a creepy stalker or Atsumu could explain it even before the younger boy questioned him saying that he actually asked Tsukishima for his preference at drinks and Tobio would found it so weird and creepy and would tag him like a stalker right away.
Shit, every step and decision felt like the wrong one, leading to a dead end.
Would it be better if he didn’t buy any beverages for the boy? Maybe it’d be better if he only brought a tall black coffee and a small portion of strawberry cake for Tsukishima like he promised and ended it there.
Yeah, that sounds like a plan.
But, wait, wouldn’t that give the wrong impression on Tobio’s eyes when Atsumu arrived with food and coffee for only him? Like he was trying to woo his calculus tutor with muffins when it was actually the opposite and Atsumu had fallen fast and deep for Tobio, and he could buy any and every beverage and dessert in a coffee shop if that meant Tobio would see his way.
Ugh, he was thinking too hard about this. It felt stupidly ridiculous, it was only coffee for fuck sakes! He was acting all weird and like a complete moron, and it wasn’t even eight in the morning yet; how was he going to act in front of Tobio around the hours of lessons if he was already a nervous wreck all alone?
He sighed and made his way inside the empty cafeteria, stopping in front of the concrete counter where a cherry woman was waiting to take his order with a very bright smile and greeting him with a ‘good morning!’ way too energetic for such an hour, but the change of atmosphere found in the place made Atsumu leave out the spiral of thoughts and doubts that until recently he had; and with resolution he listed his order, paid and waited.
He left the cozy atmosphere displayed in the cafeteria with three cups of coffee, a strawberry cake and a bag of vanilla and chocolate chip cookies.
It is just a cup of coffee; he repeated like a mantra.
Nothing more, nothing less.
This time Atsumu arrived at the library with seven minutes to spare and calm his heart. He took a seat at the corner table near the windows where Tsukishima tutored him last Saturday and waited for the others.
Time flew as he was distracted, so immersed in his thoughts that he didn’t hear anyone calling for him until the person was in front of him. The blue doe’s eyes opened wide in surprise, thin red lips slightly parted as a silent gasp.
Kageyama Tobio was calling his name.
“Uh, Miya-san? You also take Saturday’s lessons?”
Strands of black and long hair fell into his face in a way that seemed messy and unplanned and yet looked so smoothly perfect that Atsumu was sure if he tried and spent hours in front of a mirror making sure his blond hair fell into his face in just the right way to make him look like Tobio itself he wouldn’t look this effortlessly perfect.
The boy was really pretty. Like breathtakingly so. The kind of pretty that made the whole world stop for a moment to focus all the attention on him, and if this were one of those romance movies his twin — although he denies it — loved so much this would be the scene where everything happens in slow motion while music plays in the background and animated cherry blossom petals fly and play with the protagonist love interested locks across the screen.
Atsumu could feel a blush creeping onto his cheeks and — oh god no, this wasn’t really happening right now. All this time, since he woke up, waiting and waiting, served him to try and imagine a hundred different scenarios and to mentalize himself up to avoid embarrassment and unnecessary humiliating scenes, but he was really sitting here, in a public library, crushing on second sight with the friend of his calculus tutor while totally looking like a real idiot who can’t answer the most simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ question.
Absolutely fantastic.
“Miya-san?”
Tobio repeated while tilting his head slightly to the left, his voice heavy with uncertainty. Atsumu could do almost everything in his reach if that meant Tobio wouldn’t look and sound that unsure around him ever again; so he shook his doubts away and replied with an easygoing tone.
“Hey! Sorry, I’m not fully awake yet, Tobio-kun. Morning.”
And that sentence did the trick. Tobio burst into a soft laugh, half-chuckle, half-snort. A small pfft kind of sound that made him scrunch his nose in the most endearing way, and that gave Atsumu the positive sign that it was all good again.
“It’s okay, good morning,” Tobio replied with an almost teasing tone after taking a seat beside Atsumu’s left. The morning sun filling by the window was at just the right angle to glint off the boy’s gorgeous eyes and form a little halo around his dark hair.
“How do you do it,” Atsumu questioned curiously.
“Mmh?” The boy hummed as a question while pulling out the textbooks and notes for the lesson from his brown bag beside him.
“How is it that you don’t look half dead to the world, like the rest of us mortals, Tobio-kun? What’s your secret?”
Hearing that question, Tobio looked up at Atsumu, putting aside his previous rummaging and gave him a scrutinized look, searching for something.
He seemed to find what he was searching for in his face because, after a second, he scooted a bit closer to him, leaning over Atsumu’s left arm, glazing up at him from his long eyelashes, and Atsumu bit down the swell of anticipation rushing in his gut, the brief tension of the moment climbed further into his throat and any longer, it will mutate into the kind of impatience that’s kinda searing, but still, he could work with this.
Tobio started slowly, almost in a low whisper, as if he was going to reveal Atsumu the meaning of life or the best kept secret known to man, and he only trusted him to share the information with, to keep the secret, only for Atsumu to hear his words.
“Coffee.”
Immediately, the restless energy in Atsumu’s body dissolved into that weird silly thing that his heart couldn’t get enough of around Tobio. It was insane, it was ridiculous, but it was so, so nice.
Throwing his head back, a boisterous laugh escaped him, his shoulders shook with the force of it, his golden locks swaying and his brown eyes crinkled. Muffling the sound with a hand simply didn’t work and Atsumu loved every single moment of it, even if he ended up being kicked out of the library for loud noises.
He hadn’t had this kind of outburst in a long while. When it was all out of his system, Atsumu cast a wide smile at Tobio at his side.
All of a sudden, he thanked his past self for finally deciding to buy that extra cup of coffee because now he had an opening, and he wasn’t going to be that dumb and waste it. He searched blindly at the cups long forgotten on the table behind his blue denim shoulder bag and when he touched with his fingertips the one that was for Tobio, he grabbed it, turning and facing him completely.
Atsumu gave his total attention to the younger boy and carefully started swinging the we usedrink back and forth in front of Tobio’s face, only an inch within reach.
“Glad to hear we have the same method, Tobio-kun! Here, for you!”
“For me?” Tobio asked, sounding genuinely surprised and taken aback.
“Uh-huh! I need something to keep me awake and alert this morning, more if I have to brain myself out into solving those math problems and I thought you and Kei-kun could need the caffeine just like me, so I took a wild guest for your order.” He said in a light speech, casually sliding the cup in the wooden table, right into Tobio’s hands.
The boy took it, opening the lid to inspect the insides.
“A latte with an extra subbing of heavy cream and caramel syrup seems like a too personal preference taste for a wild guess, doesn’t it?”
There was a glint in Tobio’s eyes when he looked up at him and Atsumu chose to revel in that.
“I take it like I guessed it right, then.” Atsumu hummed, way too confident for someone who knew the answer beforehand.
In response, Tobio’s lip curled upward. “You did. Thank you, Miya-san.”
“You’re very welcome, Tobio-kun.”
It is just a cup of coffee, his brain reasons very quickly.
Nothing more, nothing less; it repeated.
But it could be more if you tried; his heart reasoned.
They were having such a nice time, chatting while drinking coffee and munching on very sugary cookies that the actual reason for being there for study slipped completely off Atsumu’s mind. It wasn’t after about fifteen minutes that Tobio started grumbling about how Tsukishima was so late and that he still couldn’t solve his latest calc texts alone; that was when Atsumu thought of the brightest idea yet.
He could help the boy with it and spend more time with him! He could totally solve those calculus problems and explained them to Tobio without difficulty. He was a year above after all.
Yeah, it sounds like a good plan.
It seemed he couldn’t do those exercises and explained them to Tobio if his life depended on it. What the actual fuck were all those letters? Atsumu wasn’t that dumb but put a calculus textbook in front of him and he couldn’t even read it.
Ugh, it wasn’t a good plan.
“Fancy seeing you here,” Tsukishima greeted Atsumu and went straight to the seat across from Tobio where books were open, and calculus sheets were scribbled poorly.
“Tutor!! You’re pretty late, we had to start the party without you —”
“Please, don’t scream. We’re in the library Miya-san,” the blond interrupted him, sneaking a glance at the textbooks while blowing his nose with a handkerchief.
“Eww, are you sick?” Tobio inquired, and now that the younger one pointed it out, Atsumu could see Tsukishima’s prominent rosy cheeks and bloodshot eyes showing behind his glasses. "You should have texted us if you were feeling this bad.”
“I’m not sick, it’s just a cold.”
“That’s the same,” Atsumu concluded. For someone like Tsukishima, who is basically primp and neat every time, an academical God, straight A student, an intelligent cocky nerd, to hear him say something that is stupidly dumb, it surely had to be induced by a delusional fever.
It had to be.
“How stupid. Did you go to Hinata’s house, and he plagued you with his germs?” Tobio accused, but with a slightly hinted mocking tone underneath his words, blue eyes shining bright with mischief. “He’s going to be the death of you.”
“Shut up,” Tsukishima answered reproachfully, turning his head to the right, and completely blocking his face from Tobio’s inquiring eyes.
“So, it was Hinata,” Tobio said with finality.
Atsumu didn’t know who this Hinata person was or what he meant to Tobio and his tutor, but if the dude’s name made Tsukishima this flustered and Tobio this sassy and mischievous, he could pay him big money for more moments like this.
Before Tsukishima could reply with his usual bickering insight, a cough interrupted him, shaking his entire tall frame.
“Don’t spread your germs all over, I have practice to attend. If I happen to fall sick and infect my team because of you, Sakusa-san will kill me. And hence, I’ll kill you.”
“Shut. Up.” The blond sounded out, recharging on his seat, turning Atsumu and Tobio’s way fully. “First: you’re Sakusa-san’s favorite. Second: it’s your moronic best friend’s fault I fell sick. Killed him.”
“Oh? I thought it was just a cold?” Tobio asked with false innocence. His lips upwards in a pretty smirk.
Holy crap, Atsumu is infatuated with him and his sharp tongue.
“Kageyama, would you like to fail Calculus? No? Then shut your ugly mouth for once. I'm here because I’m nice, and you have that stupid exam on Tuesday. Don’t mess with me.”
Automatically, Tobio shut his mouth. His handsome face scrunching up, throwing a tantrum like a child.
How adorable.
“Tobio-kun you’re so cute!” Atsumu told him. At the same time, he laughed without measuring his words and poking Tobio’s cheeks with his fingers.
On the other side of the table, he heard Tsukishima gagging at the scene. “You are not going to do this in front of me! Where are your books even? All I see are the ones of Kageyama’s.”
Oh, right. This was a meeting to study after all.
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll take them out now. Here, this one’s for you”. He handed him the black coffee along with the slice of cake that he bought more than thirty minutes ago and was once warm and steaming now were cold; the few minutes he was alone with Tobio felt like an eternity.
“A cold coffee?” Tsukishima still grabbed it, and started munching on the strawberries of the cake with the little plastic fork it had, while wiping his dripping nose with a new tissue.
It sure sucked to be sick.
“You were late,” Atsumu shrugged after rummaging in his bag for pen and paper and his not-touched homework. After he straightened up a bit, the blond boy gave him a glance over, narrowing his golden eyes at the empty cup of coffee that was near the notebook of Tobio, long forgotten. Atsumu decided to ignore him completely. “Shall we start?”
Tsukishima hummed in agreement and let him be.
Atsumu felt grateful.
“In the expression of the imaginary unit 's', you can put together the similar coefficient and so on—” If you ask Atsumu what Tsukishima was talking about this time, he wouldn’t have the mere idea of what was actually going on.
The tall blond patiently solves calc practical problem after problem, teaching them how to resolve it, again and again. Atsumu still didn’t know how to get the same answer as his tutor. If Tsukishima said that the solution of this particular calculus was -3, Atsumu would solve it as the answer was: red. That’s how lost he was. Even if he had the rope that would save him from drowning, his hands couldn’t reach for it.
Still, Tsukishima kept going, ignorant of the tumult of doubts in Atsumu’s mind. “Because we can calculate the sum and the difference quotient here—”
After an hour and a half of studying without learning, Atsumu found a new hobby, keeping track of Tobio’s concentrated face. Tobio’s pretty, Atsumu already knew that. The raven boy gave his full attention to Tsukishima, sapphire eyes focusing on the numbers flashing on Atsumu’s calculator, ears open, taking every advice the tall boy gave him, writing little notes in the corners of his calculus sheets in rather messy handwriting, that surely only he could understand his hidden message.
“By the way, if it is μ, replace it with -1 and use—” Oh god. Atsumu is going to fail this subject so much. “Understood?” Tsukishima finished asking after his lengthy rambling.
“Yes, I think I get it,” Tobio answered, feeling proud, eyes shining with understanding and excitement.
Atsumu didn’t have the same luck.
From the beginning of the lesson, he felt lost in a sea of numbers and weird signs and found refuge in long raven hair and deep sea-blue eyes that served as a beacon to guide him through a different path that wasn’t numbers and letters, but emotions and feelings.
“Right, I understand it too.” He ended up saying, hoping his voice sounded confident enough, it wouldn’t do any good to tell him that he actually didn’t understand because if his tutor explained it back again, Atsumu would still not understand it.
“Are you sure?” Tsukishima had the nerve to doubt him! He wasn’t actually wrong with his assumptions, but still, Atsumu was feeling indignant at being the object of suspicion.
“Jeez, I’m not that dumb, Tsukishima.”
“Really? You could have fooled me.”
The actual nerve.
Atsumu was going to give Tsukishima a piece of his mind when he was interrupted by a soft pfft that he had already become very familiar with. Tobio let a soft cackle escape his lips effortlessly, without any care. Atsumu just gasped, feeling betrayed but a garden of roses started blooming on his chest at the majestic sound.
“Tobio-kun! We’re on this together! Don’t laugh at me!” he reproached with a pout.
Tobio apologized quickly, and reassured him he wasn’t laughing at his expense, but the carefree and big smile painting his face, adorning his usual blank canvas with more soft details, almost childlike, was so pretty and breathtaking it so, that Atsumu almost forgot his petulant acting he was putting off earlier.
Tobio started putting his books and pencils away. His practice time was approaching, so he made a line to the library’s door and left after saying his farewell with a soft 'goodbye, until next Saturday'.
And just that last sentence left a big smile on Atsumu’s face.
“Wow, you are disgusting,” Tsukishima made his presence noticed again. Right, he was still there.
“You are the one who literally has snot all over his face.”
“But at least I’m not the one pining for that.”
'That' he called Tobio. Tsukishima was on fucking thin ice.
“Uh, right. Thank God you’re pining after Hinata.”
And the face Tsukishima made after that was hilarious. His ears and neck changed so abruptly to different shades of red that if Atsumu hadn’t been talking in front of him he would have missed it. After composing himself, he got up from the chair, leaving all the trash on the table for Atsumu to pick up. That jerk.
“You are insufferable, I hate you.”
Atsumu felt a laugh bubbling out of him. “You would never! We’re like best friends!”
“I would never best-friend you. Goodbye loser.” Tsukishima waved and walked off.
“Bye nerd.”
And after collecting all the garbage that was left on the table they were using, throwing it in the trash and arranging his books to go home, Atsumu thought about how he had started his morning and finished his evening thinking all the same about Tobio and how much he would rant about him to Osamu that night.