Chapter Text
The cold and gloom shadowed the apartment as the 2AM moonlight shone through the window. You walk over and close the blinds over the sink and fill a cup of water, chugging it down. Slamming the cup down, you think.
The olive green eyes staring at the sweet angel in front of him in the glaring bar lights.
It used to be you.
Scoffing and suppressing all of your tears, you stood up from leaning on your arms which pressed onto the edge of the counter. The padding of your feet on the cold floors made its way to your room and you recall some song that you have heard before.
You strip off your dress and slip on a hoodie and pants. You sit on your bed and scroll through your memories on your photos.
Old photos from the beaches in California. The UC Irvine campus. Late night photos of studying with some friends before you cut yourself off from them.
And a photo of you and Iwaizumi at an ice cream place on December 3rd.
You tap on it and ponder on it.
“I still remember the third of December, me in your sweater.”
You were standing there with an ice cream in hand and feeding it to Iwaizumi. A high school hoodie of his on your body with a puffer over it and scarf. A beanie on his head as snowflakes fell that day later in the night, as you remembered when you guys took a trip to Lake Tahoe.
He would hold you close at night in your room, at the cabin you and your friends had rented. His body warmth was better than anything, better than the fire, better than the hot coffee he greeted you with every time you woke up after him after a rough or a tired night.
You look at the picture and click delete.
Delete Forever?
You tap yes.
The memory is now gone.
Now your tears fell. You really liked him, no, loved him. Though it was hard to keep up with him with schooling and his work, you tried all the time.
Sending him messages every morning, every night, even at 3AM when you missed him so much. He replied of course, but you understood that his short responses back were because of his busy life, just like yours.
Eventually he called you out of the blue at 1 AM 2 years ago as you studied away for an exam. You were excited because you have not heard his voice for 2 weeks. Accepting the call you greeted him excitedly despite the fact you had been studying for 3 hours.
“Hi bubs!”
“Hey,” he lowly replies.
“What’s,” you yawn, “wrong?”
“Nothing. Are you studying?”
Your attention was diverted and you replied.
“Yes, I have an exam in 2 weeks.”
“That’s so far away, why are you studying right now.”
“I need to pass Hajime. So that I can pass the semester and graduate in 2 years to come home to you!”
“Oh.”
“Hm? What do you mean? Is that something you don’t want?”
You put your pencil down and look at his uneasy expression at the thought of you coming home to
him in 2 years.
“You can come visit, you know. I miss you here in America.”
“I know that, but I do not think I will be going to America anytime soon.”
“Oh, then I can come visit this winter!”
“No.”
You were taken aback at his confrontation. Confused as well, you were scared. Could this be the end?
“What do you mean,” you hesitantly ask.
“y/n.”
“Yes?”
“You know I love you right?”
“Yes, and I love you too.”
“I.”
“You?”
“I can't do this anymore.”
Your heart dropped. A heavy weight was just pushed into place. You bit your lip and started to chip your nail.
“Are you breaking up with me?”
“Yes, because this isn’t working y/n.”
“But.”
“I can’t do this distance,” he sighed.
“I am sorry, I can call you more, I can text you more and everything.”
“y/n, you do do all of that, it’s just me. I don’t do that and I don’t want to keep hurting you like that.”
“But, you’re busy, so I understand,” your tears started to trickle out slowly as your leg furiously bounced.
“I am busy and I don’t want that to drive us away like it is starting to.”
After another 10 minutes of talking, he ends it.
Your shirt was wet with tears and the work in front of you was the last thing you cared for as you cried yourself to sleep for months.
On social media, 9 months later, he had gotten a new girlfriend, he looked at her lovingly, the gaze that used to be set on you was something you missed so dearly.
“But I watch your eyes as she walks by.”
Back to the present, you really missed him. You still loved him a lot, and the view of him at the bar made you want him more. You wanted to be wrapped in his arms and dancing under the bright lights.
But the girl was ethereal. You could not compare to her.
“What a sight for sore eyes, brighter than the blue sky, she’s got you mesmerized, while I die.”
Tears poured as you just thought of how you were not enough. You mind raced between yes and no and just the vision of him after years. He seemed so happy with her. Her smile was warm and never failed to make you feel that way too.
“
Why would you ever kiss me?”
His lips used to be captured by yours. His smile created by you, his frown sometimes too. Dating him was the best time of your life. His everyday walks on campus to you and the sall study dates at the library and local cafe. The trips to the beach in the summer and Disneyland if you guys had spare money and time.
A Mickey Mouse headband hung on the wall. A matching one that Iwaizumi also had.
You were not sure why you still had it. Of course you could pass it off as being pretty expensive, but you knew you just wanted to remember the fun you had. The excessive money you both blew in the park. The dole whip and the characters you met. The fun rides and shows you saw. The tired feet you had going home where he had to carry you. The fireworks show.
You lost your first kiss to him under those fireworks the first 3 months in after starting to date him.
You turn to your social media and find his profile yet again. He had unfollowed you long ago and you did the same, but you still watched his account.
“Put your arm 'round her shoulder, now I'm getting colder.”
The photo of the new couple at a festival this past spring and his arm was around her shoulder.
“
But how could I hate her, she's such an angel.”
You wanted to hate him, hate HER .
But you couldn’t.
She made him look so happy, maybe even sound happy through the photo that glowed on the screen of the phone. That smile did not appear that day when you picked up at 1 AM studying. A look of stress was wiped on his face that night, and you believed you had caused it. You wanted to be back at his side though.
“But then again, kinda wish she were dead...”
Humming a small tune to yourself you just recall the happiest of old memories with Iwaizumi before that dreaded night.
“I wish I were Heather.”
“Iwa-chan, your girlfriend has come looking for you,” Oikawa pointed to Iwa over the phone as you stood in the door frame of his dorm.
“ Hi, Oikawa,” you chirp, immediately taking Iwaizumi’s phone from his hand and ignoring him as you chatted with his best friend.
“
Are you going to ignore your boyfriend?” Iwaizumi asked, annoyed.
You continued to chat with Oikawa about what he was doing in Argentina. Iwaizumi moves from his desk chair and heads to your figure that laid stomach down on the bed. He plops his chest onto your back, crushing you under his weight. His face finds your neck as he kisses it and whispers.
"Are you ignoring your boyfriend?”
Oikawa laughs on the other end.
“
Iwa-chan? I didn't know you were so needy.”
"Shut it Shittykawa, at least I have a girlfriend.”
“You- How rude Iwa. I am not the shitty one here, you are.”
You giggled as you said goodbye to Oikawa and rolled over onto your back while Iwa still laid on you with no motive to move. You wrap your arms around his shoulders and play with his hair as he settles on your chest.
“
Hello,” you say out to him.
“Hello.”
A peaceful silence started to form as you kept playing with his hair.
“Wanna know something?”
“What?’
“I love you.”
You smiled happily, it was your yellow, your sunshine that loved you back like you did him.
“I love you too.”
I still love you.
You thought to yourself as you kept crying. The nightlights of the street shine through the blinds of your room. It was so cold, though it was practically the end of the summer.
You did not have that sunshine any more.
Gone, melted away with the spring the months after than end, clouded by thunderstorms and rain.
While he was back steadily on his feet, you built yourself up using tape and glue that would fall apart in any second. And you could never blame him for it.
Because it wasn't his fault, neither was it yours but you thought differently.
She was beautiful, everything you were not, which made you not enough for the wonderful person Iwaizumi was.
His kisses and hugs and cuddles you stole relentlessly from him and you gave it back to him, but you felt as if it was not enough. You have always felt this, and he always made you think otherwise. But now, it was different.
You sit up and look at yourself in the large mirror of your room.
Looking at all the things you had of you. Your hair, body, face, nose and lastly lips. The lips he used to call his, the lips that captured his or he captured.
The comparisons of you and her were unmatched. It threw you into shambles. Shambles of denial, confusion, utter hatred of yourself and her, but never him.
You wanted to punch the wall but you shouldn’t at such an ungodly hour so you ended with a blurred vision by tears of your lap. Your fists gripping madly at the end of the hoodie you wore as you wet it with tears.
And you hated it all. Hated the world, hated her, hated fate.
Hated yourself.
Because in the end, you aren't her. And that was what hurt you most.
“I wish I were.”