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He first sees it when he plays that fateful match at the Junior High Preliminaries. When they both end up on the front line, and the mark on his forearm seems just a little familiar, less like a bruise and more like a birthmark, more like-
It can’t be. Shouyo hasn’t got time to worry about things like that, anyway. He’s got a match to win!
He loses.
But he promises, himself and then Kageyama to his face, that he will defeat him, definitely, when he gets into a high school team and trains up and gets teammates just as passionate as he is, and they’ll go to Nationals! And they’ll win, too! And Kageyama will be the one losing then, and it’ll feel great, revenge for today.
He decides on it. He does whatever he can to train, practicing with all sorts of teams, although they never really take him seriously, he doesn’t think, no matter what he does. He desperately wants to get into Karasuno, to do the same as the Little Giant, no doubt in his mind when he thinks of it, he’s going to go to Nationals and he’s going to beat Kageyama, he’s going to go to Nationals and he’s going to beat Kageyama-
A mantra that goes around and around his head ever since that day Kageyama beat him, and his mum rolls her eyes whenever he mentions it, but he has to do his best, because if he slacks off, he won’t get the chance! He has to get into Karasuno.
There is no doubt in his mind.
And he gets there, like he always said he would. And he passes by all the other clubs, doesn’t give any of them a second glance, doesn’t care that Karasuno is kinda far from his house and he has to bike for half an hour at least over a mountain to get there, because it’s good training! He has to be good at everything he can be, who knows what will help!
But he sees Kageyama a lot earlier than he imagined he would. He imagined a tension-filled rematch, probably at preliminaries, because Kageyama was in the same prefecture as him, which kind of sucks that he won’t be able to smash him at Nationals, but hey. A win is a win. He’ll take it, if it’s a fair game of volleyball he won in.
But he’s there, and Shouyo doesn’t want to believe his eyes, how can this be happening, he’s supposed to beat him, not work with him!
Kageyama turns, and Shouyo sees the mark on his arm again. Closer, for longer this time, although he’s hardly in any state to process it.
There is no doubt in his mind. It is a soulmark.
He also doesn’t care.
Fate has some weird ideas, sometimes. Like making him short, when he really really wants to play volleyball. But even if fate does or doesn’t want him to do something, he will fight with everything he has, because why should the fact that he’s small stop him? Why should some mark on Kageyama’s arm that happens to match with one on his foot make them friends? They’re not friends. They won’t be friends.
Shouyo hasn’t ever really put as much faith in soulmarks. Sure, his mum and dad have matching marks, but so do him and his sister, and they often don’t get on. He takes it more like a sign that Kageyama is going to be in his life for a lot longer than planned.
It doesn’t exactly make him excited.
So he fights.
The team, surprisingly, fight back. They make them work together, make him very familiar with the limited vocabulary of insults Kageyama uses, the tone of voice he has when he’d pissed, which is always, and ultimately lead him to working out that maybe he can only do that weird quick with Kageyama, which bites, but okay, he’ll take it.
Shouyo has always been one for the bigger picture – when it comes to volleyball, at least. Three years. Three years, he has to put up with Kageyama and his insults and his weird skills, and then they can beat each other, because Shouyo plans on playing volleyball forever.
He does not care about the mark on his foot. He does not care about the mark on Kageyama’s arm. He does not care that they match. If his little sister can be a soulmate of his, all those marks prove is that Kageyama is going to be around to piss him off a lot longer than planned.
But Shouyo thinks he can deal with that if it means he gets to play volleyball.
Somewhere between that first weird quick and beating Shiratorizawa, they become friends. Shouyo’s not actually sure if it’s the right word, but he said it to Yachi, and partner kind of fits. Somewhere along the line, he can’t quite imagine school life without his rivalry with Kageyama. It just fits into his life, in the middle of volleyball and studying with Yachi and arguing with him and Tsukishima, yelling with Noya and Tanaka, and trying not to fail any exams, because he can’t afford to do that. What if they pulled him from the volleyball club?
It would be horrific. He can’t let it happen.
And Kageyama still doesn’t know.
Shouyo still doesn’t care.
Well, maybe he’s lying just a little bit. He kind of wants to know what he’d say about it. But seeing as they, the team, have had this talk before, and he’d heard Kageyama’s response to the phenomenon, Shouyo is not exactly enthralled to share this secret.
It had been Yamaguchi discovering that Suga had his soul mark, on his ankle compared to Yamaguchi’s elbow. Tsukishima had looked annoyed, and Shouyo had wondered if he didn’t have any.
Shouyo though couldn’t help but ask. He didn’t get the big deal. His sister, Kageyama, and as it turned out, Kenma. Kuroo had gleefully pointed out that the faint mark on the web of skin between Shouyo’s thumb and forefinger matched one on the back of Kenma’s neck, and Shouyo is in turns excited and a bit disappointed. He doesn’t really believe in soulmarks and their long-lasting connotations, but he’d had some hopes it would have matched some cute girl.
But Kenma is nice, and he likes texting him. Kenma lets him talk, and doesn’t get too annoyed at him. Shouyo likes to think they could be friends. Hell, if he managed to become friends of any kind with Kageyama, he can become friends with anyone, given long enough.
Suga just grins when Yamaguchi asks, and shows him the other one, mostly hidden by his hair that Daichi had noticed one time when the barber had mucked up, or Suga’s mum decided the longer hair wasn’t suitable. Either way, Suga forgave them, because he’s quite happy to know that he’ll be friends with Daichi for a long time.
It turns into a long conversation of people saying about their soulmarks, or at least most of them. Tanaka gleefully strips to show the mark that’s matched on Noya’s hip, an exact mirror image in location too. Shouyo hears a few of the other members laugh, but then Noya shows off the mark he shares with Asahi, a weird looking splodge under his fingernail that he’d always assumed was some kind of infection until he’d noticed it on the back of Asahi’s calf.
Ennoshita says he’s got two, one that he hasn’t matched yet, the other connecting to his mum. The rest of the team call him a momma’s boy, and Ennoshita glares, so they ease off quickly. Shouyo eagerly shows them the ones he remembers about, Natsu’s mark on his wrist, and Kenma’s. Yamaguchi admits to two he hasn’t linked, and as it turns out, most of the group have one or two they don’t know who it matches. Tanaka and Noya both claim to have one that must match Shimizu-senpai, although she has refused to show them any of her marks.
Shouyo feels like he’s seen the mark on the inside of Yachi’s left knee before somewhere, but he doesn’t know. He doesn’t really believe in soulmarks.
The only ones who contribute nothing to the conversation until prompted are Tsukishima and Kageyama.
Tsukishima, Shouyo is not surprised about. Yamaguchi starts on about something, but Tsukishima cuts him off with such ferocity that Yamaguchi actually looks scared. They both go silent after that, changing and leaving, although not quite together.
They all turn to Kageyama, because he’s then the only one.
He makes a face that makes him look constipated – of emotions, maybe – and spits that he doesn’t believe in soulmates. He doesn’t believe in souls.
It doesn’t stop him showing them all, though. It’s not like either of them are secrets, considering, and he really doesn’t seem to care; there’s the orange mark on his upper arm, unknowingly linking him with Shouyo, and then a dark blue line on his stomach. He scowls especially at the latter, but says he doesn’t know about either of them.
Kageyama is a terrible liar. But he is stubborn, and since Shouyo knows about the one mark, and Kageyama doesn’t – he doesn’t think anyone on the team has seen the bottom of his foot, which is, to be fair, a weird place for a soulmark – he knows exactly which one he should be asking about.
The team don’t manage to worm it out of him, before he snaps and storms off. Shouyo thinks about leaving it alone, but if Kageyama doesn’t care, than he won’t care who he’s supposedly linked to, will he?
Turns out it was worth the effort of asking him alone a few days later. Kageyama gets the most brilliant pissed expression and mutters under his breath, not really seeming to realise he’d done it.
That bastard Oikawa.
Shouyo is laughing uncontrollably before he can stop. He understands, but that is too funny. Kageyama, and Oikawa? Suddenly calling them both King and Great King is more than funny, and he gets it, he gets why it pissed him off quite so much, not only because it has connotations of his time in Kitagawa Daiichi, but also reminds him of his connection to Oikawa, and knowing he’ll never get the bastard out of his life.
Kageyama turns it on him, though.
Your sister and Kenma isn’t so great, dumbass.
Shouyo has a point though when he shoots back that that isn’t nearly so bad as Oikawa Tooru, great king and rival to Kageyama, and okay, he deserves that punch, but then Kageyama turns away, looking irritated.
The other one better not be so much of a disappointment, he says. He means it. Shouyo can tell, the way he glares off into the darkness of the walk home. He can even understand why he doesn’t believe in soulmarks, considering the whole thing with Oikawa, which Shouyo knows he doesn’t know the half of.
It’s the perfect opportunity. He could take his shoe off and his sock, and show him. It’d look weird, true, and Kageyama would probably wonder why he was doing it, but it is an opportunity. To let him know that Shouyo is one of the very few to know all of his soulmarks at such a young age.
What if I’m a disappointment? rings quite suddenly through Shouyo’s mind, and he stops before he’s even started moving, pauses from his pause to step forward. Kageyama eyes him oddly.
Shouyo blithely assures him it’s fine, whoever matches that will probably be fine, some cute girl who even plays volleyball and her and Kageyama can get married and have grumpy little volleyball genius kids.
Shouyo ignores how it hurts to think about that. They’ll be friends, he reminds himself. It’s not like soulmarks are the end of everything. They don’t determine everything in a relationship, or a friendship, because at the end of the day they are just marks on the skin that happen to match certain people. There’s no real evidence that they even attach to defined other people, although an overwhelming amount of anecdotes tell of finding best friends, siblings, partners by following the marks. Like a compass, he guesses.
People don’t always get on with their soulmatches. If that’s even a thing. The news acts like it’s even more of a crime to kill a matcher, but Shouyo can sympathise. He certainly feels like Kageyama has been close to murdering him more than once, whether he knows of that bond or not.
Kageyama snorts, tells him to shut up, but it’s in that tone that means he’s not really annoyed why does he know that (too much time around him, time he doesn’t regret why doesn’t he regret it (volleyball, it’s all been volleyball)) and holds his fist out at the intersection where they go different directions.
Shouyo meets it with his own, and wonders why he never says anything. Wonders, really, if he ever will.
After that it becomes something of an obsession. Does he show Kageyama? That seems weirdly private though, and Kageyama made such a fuss of not caring, maybe his later words are overshadowed by that? Shouyo doesn’t want to be a disappointment, and he doesn’t think he is, but what if? Kageyama has such different standards to him, and it’s only then that he thinks about the fact that the two remaining eligible soulmates of his are both male.
Not that it matters! Plenty of soulmates are only friends, it’s not that common – except it really is, most long-lasting relationships are between matchers, he knows that he knows that, but he still holds out hope, maybe, just maybe, Yachi’s nice, he searches his skin for maybe another mark that he’s missed.
Nothing.
Natsu, Kenma, and Kageyama.
He likes Kenma, but he’s pretty sure it’s nothing like that. Not that he’s ever liked anyone like that. He was always so focused on volleyball.
He wouldn’t know.
He spends an hour on the phone to Kenma trying to work it out, and Kenma eventually gets the information out of him.
To be fair, he doesn’t laugh. He does, however, stay silent for a long time while Shouyo blathers about it, and he knows he’s being nonsensical.
He says he's glad that Shouyo doesn't like him like that, because he's not convinced he likes anyone like that. In a way, it makes the whole thing easier, because neither of them expect anything more from it – not that Shouyo was expecting anything anyway! – and he feels a bit closer to Kenma after that.
But Kenma isn't exactly great at words and comfort and all that, so he's not the greatest soulmate from that point of view. Shouyo is alone on this one.
But then, does it really matter? He's got Nationals to focus on. He's got training to do, things to improve on, volleyball to play and he's only sixteen, and who bloody cares if Kageyama's his last soulmate, and how that works? He's just there. He's got another two years before they go elsewhere, and it really, really doesn't matter that much. He doesn't have to worry about it. If Kageyama sees it, he'll deal with it then. He'll also ask why Kageyama is looking at the bottom of his foot.
As though he blinked, those two years pass by though, a blur of frantic studying and hours and hours and hours of volleyball, perfecting all his skills, and he just wants to play more and more, wants to win more and more. He hasn’t forgotten about beating Kageyama, because he’s still an annoying idiot, but they are friends, and at some point, they will definitely meet each other on opposite sides of the court and he will win this time.
It’s only as they graduate that he realises he never actually said anything. As far as Kageyama knows, Shouyo only has two soulmates, his sister and Kenma. As far as Kageyama thinks, he hasn’t found his second soulmate. He doesn’t know about it, at all, and when everything is done and Tsukishima and Yamaguchi have waltzed off (but he’ll keep in touch, he likes to think) and the second years have finished cooing and the first years stopped worshipping, they stand at their intersection.
Shouyo doesn’t know where Kageyama is going to college.
It had been some kind of taboo subject between them, neither wanting to follow the other, and neither wanting to admit they might even want to, so they’d both kept it quiet. Shouyo had had generic meltdowns about finals and studying to him, as had Kageyama, but he still doesn’t know where they’ll both be. Kageyama could be going abroad for all he knows (he hopes not, he hopes not, because-).
Shouyo is going to Tohoku. They offered him a scholarship, and sports science, and he leapt at the chance, and he wanted to tell Kageyama, but then, he wasn’t really sure if he wanted to know that Kageyama was going, or that he wasn’t.
Shouyo has felt kind of weird around Kageyama of late. Like his eyes are drawn to him, some kind of force acting on him, some ability to find Kageyama in any crowd, and make a beeline for him. Like he always wants to. Like he’d rather be around Kageyama than anyone else…
But it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter, but the fact that they are soulmates does, and Shouyo knows he will regret it if he lets Kageyama go on in his ignorance, knows it isn’t fair-
I have to tell you something, he blurts out, louder than necessary and his hands shake where they grip the handlebars of his bike, and he so, so doesn’t want to do this, but he also does, and he’s fed up of waiting, Kenma is fed up of him going on about it, he’s fed up of himself thinking about it.
Kageyama levels him a look, but it’s not angry. Just puzzled. Perhaps maybe melancholic. Shouyo thinks that Kageyama is going to miss Karasuno more than he’d ever like to admit.
Miss Karasuno, or Shouyo? Is he being conceited?
Like what, idiot. There’s no heat in the insult. They never quite made any kind of transition with regards to names, so although they would probably be on a first-name basis if they were normal, they are not. Shouyo is idiot to Kageyama, but he’s known since about mid-way through first year when he actually means it and when it’s just. A term for him.
He laughs to himself, earning him an odd look, and a comment about how he’s acting weird. He knows he is, but he has to do this, and he has to do this now, else he’ll just chicken out like every other time before. He leans his bike against the railing and leans down.
Promise not to punch me, he remarks as he slides his shoe off. There are waves of confusion rolling off Kageyama, and Shouyo doesn’t want to show him but telling him isn’t going to work, he doesn’t think.
Kageyama does not promise. He makes a remark about whether it’ll be worth it, but it’s subdued, and Shouyo doesn’t look at him. He removes his sock, shoves it in his gym bag, and leans on the barrier, and practically shoves his foot in Kageyama’s face.
There is the start of a comment. Probably something like yeah, and it stinks or it’s your foot, idiot, but Shouyo can tell he notices.
Kageyama stares.
He stares for an uncomfortably long time, the light going dusky around them. It’s kind of cold, and Shouyo goes to retract his foot.
Kageyama grabs it, hauls his leg into a better position to see, which has Shouyo go sprawling; he yells, and complains, and eventually wins when he kicks in rebuttal. Kageyama steps back, eyes flitting to Shouyo, following as he jumps up into a defensive stance, and shoves his foot in his shoe. His heart feels weird, like it might be fluttering, but that’s dumb. It can’t be.
Kageyama is still staring at him when he rebalances. Still staring when Shouyo breaks the glare, huffing. He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t move, until he does, yanking the sleeve of his jacket up until that familiar mark appears, but he doesn’t look at it. He’s still looking at Shouyo.
Kageyama asks him how long. Shouyo doesn’t want to piss him off, but he wants to lie even less; since the Kitagawa Daiichi match, but I didn’t really notice until high school, and then- he says, and steps back when Kageyama steps forward.
He’s scared.
He’s scared because he doesn’t know. If he misses a point or a set-up in volleyball, he knows the reaction. He knows Kageyama pretty well by now, knows what will agitate him, knows what will make him focus, and what will really, really annoy him and not to say.
All that time and you never once- Kageyama starts, and Shouyo thinks he’s angry. Really angry. Like, about to explode angry, more than that time he’d served into the back of his head, more than when he’d said he’d keep his eyes open during the weird quick.
Shouyo does the only sensible thing, and escapes. With his speed, and on his bike, there is no way Kageyama will catch him, and he pedals furiously away for as long as his legs let him, and he doesn’t like to admit it, but he does cry because he probably was a disappointment. Kageyama was probably hoping for a good match, not an orange-haired loudmouth and the most arrogant setter alive as his soulmates.
Shouyo wonders, for the first time, if Oikawa knows about that connection.
He must do, surely. It’s easier to think about that than what he’s just done, and the fact that he’s finished high school forever and he won’t ever be going back to Karasuno, won’t be able to see Kageyama every day whether he wants to or not-
But he’s never heard Oikawa mention it. The way he is, he feels like it’d be something else he’d lord over Kageyama, but maybe not saying anything is another form of torture, like the information wasn’t worth knowing-
Did Shouyo just imply he didn’t want Kageyama as a soulmate?
The frantic pedalling slows down, and he falls back to sitting on the saddle while he thinks about it.
In retrospect, he should have said something. He’s known for closer to four years now, and never once mentioned it, never even hinted, which is stupid. It’s just a mark, he’d told Kenma, he’d always known with his sister, and Kageyama?
Kageyama is not a disappointment.
Kageyama made life interesting. His ridiculous setting skills and the way they just worked together weirdly well. The fact that Shouyo had been able to trust him enough to spike with his eyes closed for several months. They’d helped the team beat Shiratorizawa. They’d gone a decent way in Nationals once and won Nationals once, even! The volleyball club had grown epically in size, and they’d helped teach the new members, amazed them with their skills and made volleyball at Karasuno a thing again.
Shouyo had been disappointed on that first day, he remembered. Stunned, and disappointed. After that point, Kageyama had pissed him off so much, he’d not stopped to think about it, but Shouyo wouldn’t change a single thing about his time at Karasuno.
He stops pedalling totally, and rests his foot on the ground, so he doesn’t fall over. He’s at the top of the mountain; he can see his house, the lights on. One soulmate probably drawing, or doing her homework; never as stupid as him. His mum cooking dinner. It’s escape. Kageyama has never been to his house, although Shouyo has been to Kageyama’s.
Kageyama wouldn’t know where he was. Wouldn’t know where to find him; would he even bother to? Or would they be one of the soul matches that fell apart? It’s not like it’s that uncommon, and it’s only a mark of his skin but- but maybe he should give it a chance.
Glancing the other way, he can’t see that intersection; the road wraps around, leaving Karasuno and everything surrounding it out of sight until further down. Somewhere down there is Kageyama. Maybe walking home. Maybe breaking into the gym to practice serves, like he always does when he needs to think.
More frustrating than having no answer is not being able to answer.
He’s been through a lot with Kageyama. They’ve fought and made up and had numerous scrapes on their way to being friends, and to be honest, part of what’s scaring him about Tohoku and the future in general is that Kageyama might not be in it in any significant way.
Shouyo looks towards his house again, then back towards Karasuno. It’s getting dark, and the wind is picking up, his mum is going to kill him if he’s late home again, she knows there wasn’t practice on today, but… but he has a soulmate to fight for. Possibly with, he won’t lie, but he will fight for. He likes Kageyama, all things be damned. His ridiculous ability, the face he makes when a new move works, when they win a game, when a toss goes just perfectly and Shouyo can hit it so easily and there’s a shine in his eyes…
He’s turning the bike around before he realises it, and free-wheeling down the road. All the nerves and anticipation muddle in his heart and he suddenly really doesn’t care if he gets punched, or yelled at, because going back means he tried. He doesn’t care if he has to knock on Kageyama’s door for hours, or try and find him, because it will have meant he tried. It means he didn’t give up on his soulmate, which is probably the most important thing.
Shouyo is only half surprised to find Kageyama still at the intersection. He’s not left, but he’s moved to sit against the crash barrier and staring into space with that indeterminable expression of his. Shouyo wishes he hadn’t run off.
At the squeal of his breaks, Kageyama looks up. His heart feels like it’s going too fast, like he might throw up, but he’s doing this.
Dropping the bike to rest on the ground, he sits down a metre or so from Kageyama, facing him. All the while, he is constantly stared at. His face must be totally red, not only from the wind biting into his cheeks on the way up and down again.
So you’re the other one, Kageyama utters. Shouyo can’t even start to detect what he’s feeling, the whole sentence is numb, but he’s here now and he’s not running away. He won’t run.
He will say a lot, though; he apologises, and he doesn’t even know what for, really, whether it is running away, taking so long to say something, or being his soulmate in the first place. Tells him he never said because Kageyama always seemed against soulmates, although he guesses with the Great King as a soulmate, that’s understandable. He doesn’t quite know what he rambles about in the end there, it gets nonsensical to his own ears, and they’re his words.
Hinata.
Kageyama interrupts him, no louder than necessary. He shuts up immediately.
Kageyama’s face twitches, and then crumples. He presses his face into his hand, and for one awful moment, Shouyo thinks he’s made him cry, is he that bad? But then it splits into snorts, then peals of laughter; all too soon, Kageyama is laughing himself stupid next to a road in front of a bewildered Shouyo. Shouyo can’t even laugh, because he doesn’t know what’s funny, or why Kageyama is laughing. Is it because he’s even worse than Oikawa? That would be bad. Is it because he’s had it wrong the entire time, and they’re not the same? He gets the urge to check it again, although he’s done that countless times and he knows it matches.
What the hell have you been doing these last three years?
And Shouyo snorts because yeah, that was pretty stupid, and he tells it all from the start, even if his fingers are going cold and his legs numb. Kageyama listens with the same focus he does to a coach giving him good advice, an odd but not bad experience; Shouyo could preen with the idea that he is worthy enough to take up that focus, even not playing volleyball.
Once he’s finished, the words stopped from tumbling out of his mouth through nothing more than a mental block on anything else he could say, Kageyama smirks at him.
To think the stupid optimist might consider himself a disappointment.
Okay, he probably hadn’t meant to say that, but he says a lot of things when he’s nervous, and it was in his brain! He blushes, because yeah, that’s kind of weird of him, but he’s confident when it comes to volleyball and getting on with people, but Kageyama is different, and what if it all went wrong? What if they couldn’t do their weird quick that freaks people out and delights both of them in the stunned faces of points taken?
Kageyama holds his fist out again, like so many times before; Shouyo lights up, and bumps it enthusiastically with his own hand.
Even you’re better than Oikawa, dumbass, Kageyama says, but it’s in that tone of voice that means the insult isn’t an insult and he means it, and in his own Kageyama-world, it’s a compliment. Shouyo beams, and throws himself forwards to hug him, although that’s something they’ve never really done before; Kageyama gets knocked back and hits his head on the crash barrier. It’s not too hard, and besides; Kageyama’s skull is thick enough to withstand a lot.
That hurt you moron! he shouts, but again, it’s in that tone that’s irritated but not angry, and Shouyo just grins, and hugs him as tight as he can just to hear him grumble in complaint. Kageyama tells him to get off, because he’s not that light despite his size and it’s uncomfortable, but when he does, Kageyama is smiling just a bit, and is finding it hard to look at him.
Tohoku. Kageyama looks at him then, though. Tohoku. I’m going to Tohoku. We never said.
There is a long moment of silence. A car drives past, headlights illuminating them both, before it disappears back into the night.
How the hell did you get into Tohoku?! is the first comment he makes, and Shouyo puffs his cheeks out, because is it really that hard to-
Yes, is the answer. Tohoku is prestigious and to be honest, Shouyo doesn't know how he got in, but they wanted him as a volleyball player and he wasn't that bad at exams when he wanted to be and sport was kind of interesting. He doesn't know. But he's not looking past the opportunity.
Before he can actually answer though, Kageyama looks away, thinking. Shouyo can hear his muttering, about how Sendai isn't that far and there's a bullet train, and smiles, because all is not lost.
Kageyama's not going to actually leave his life here, although he thinks that might have been a close one.
Kageyama grumbles when Shouyo hugs him again then escapes on his bike.
He's still kind of afraid of being hit. But maybe that's okay, because if he's at Tohoku when it happens, Kageyama is there. He likes that thought.
He thinks his favourite moments these days are cycling with Kageyama. They go to the out of town sports centre, twenty minutes biking or so, and Kageyama always complains and acts like he just had nothing better to do than turn up at Shouyo's apartment, but he'll always hop on the back of the bike and cling to Shouyo as he weaves through the lazy Saturday morning traffic.
He likes getting there, and starting a competition. He likes the looks of awe from the team there, as he practices with one of the members of the National Team. He likes the way Kageyama entirely loosens up, doesn't have to think about anything other than volleyball, and he likes that he's able to make him do that outside of training, where it matters but nothing is on the line except pride. He likes it when things match up and they can pull off another of their weird quicks and everyone's jaws drop and it feels so good, and he feels like he's totally in sync with Kageyama again. He likes playing volleyball, but he likes playing with Kageyama, it makes it better, and they bicker and they don't always get on, but they know where the lines are.
He likes it when Kageyama holds him to keep himself steady on the way back, Shouyo always pedalling just a little bit slower to make it last, and he doesn't know why and he doesn't want to dwell on it, but he thinks his Saturdays are pretty blissful, all told, when Kageyama does visit.
When he doesn't…
Shouyo isn't upset. He has friends, and he still plays volleyball; he goes to his university team practice and then to his study group, and it's great, it's really nice-
But he keeps turning to Kageyama. But he's not there.
It feels weird, that he's not there. During high school they'd gradually sunk into a routine of just almost always being together, and Shouyo's days are just that little bit more empty when he's not there to snark at Shouyo and be grumpy and make comments and do weird stuff. He keeps thinking Oh, Kageyama would like- and then realises that he's not there to share it with.
It's so weird. He knows it's not a soulmate thing, because he doesn't miss Kenma's or Natsu's presence as much as this, and maybe it's just that he spent many many of his high school hours practically as part of a team, Hinata&Kageyama, the weird duo, the god-like quick couple, and he hasn't adjusted to the absence yet.
It's probably just that.
Besides, he sees Kageyama quite a lot. He seems to like escaping Tokyo, and maybe he's adjusting to Shouyo's absence too. Maybe that's why he visits as much as he seemingly can; he's not very attached to his family, and doesn't seem to go to see them much. Shouyo thinks he wandered off when Shouyo dragged the both of them back to Karasuno and checked on the volleyball practice. Shouyo had split off to embarrass Natsu by picking her up from elementary school, and he assumes Kageyama went to see them then, but he'd found him under the kotatsu at his house when he and Natsu had returned, his mum plying him with tea and Kageyama making odd faces and weirder small talk.
Shouyo had laughed, but later, he'd wondered why. It felt natural to return back, and hear an off-hand welcome back to him announcing he's home. It felt natural to see Kageyama sat there, as much at home as he ever looked, and for Natsu to start questioning him about everything and anything. It had been without thought that he'd sat next to him, despite there being more room on the other vacant sides of the table; it had seemed to be without thought that Kageyama had shifted over to accommodate that.
He was just adjusting to the absence. They both were.
That's all it is. Even when his mum tells him she's set up the extra futon in Shouyo's room, and they both nod like that's a given. Even when he realises Kageyama probably could have spent the night at his own house, in his own bed. They could have met up the next day to return home, met up at the local station and gotten the train, Shouyo leaving Kageyama on the train when they got to Sendai with little else but the feeling of Kageyama's knuckles brushing against his, and a sense of absence as the train rolls out the station and they return to their separate lives.
But they don't. And Shouyo finds that it makes him happy. He feels a little less absent, a little less like he's lost something when Kageyama is there, and they can bicker and chat about anything and nothing.
It's stupid really, because he hasn't lost anything. His flatmates are nice and fun and his course mates are great, he's on the team and improving with every day, and he loves travelling with them to different tournaments. He's got friends, and close ones too. It's not like Kageyama is his only friend (although he's not convinced the same could be said the other way around), so it shouldn't feel different with him but- but it does.
He can't explain it. It just feels totally natural with Kageyama. He doesn't have to be anything else. Even the insults carry a little less bite, the glares less sharp than they should look. It's just that he's known him for so long.
He doesn't really think about the fact that he's got other friends he's had longer that he does not feel as close to.
He just knows that he likes waking up in his room, and seeing Kageyama on the futon right there, and that being the first thing he sees. It feels natural, somehow.
It's not that Shouyo staunchly avoids thinking about these things. He just doesn't question it. He feels better around Kageyama, so he spends more time around Kageyama. It just makes sense, doesn't it?
For what it's worth, he doesn't hear any evidence of Kageyama complaining, so he guesses it must be mutual. Kageyama seems to spend most of his free time in Sendai with Shouyo, such that he's become enough of a normal weekend sight in the flat that his flatmates don't even blink twice to find the two of them at the table eating breakfast, arguing about who'd won in their early morning run, and then who's going to use the shower first.
So he doesn't feel the same need to be close to Kenma, not in the same way. So he misses him and Natsu only half as much as he misses Kageyama when he's gone. It's not really anything much. They are soul mates, after all. It'd probably be weirder if they didn't get on.
He remembers the existence of Kageyama's other soulmate one late spring day, when Shouyo is trying to revise and also trying to find any reason not to. Kageyama saunters in and collapses onto Shouyo's bed, right next to the desk. His shirt rides up with the motion; he doesn't automatically fix it, and that dark blue line stands out.
Shouyo tells him to shower before he lies on his bed; Kageyama ignores him like they both know he will, and closes his eyes, catching his breath. Shouyo's eyes are drawn to that line.
He wonders where the matching mark is on Oikawa. He wonders, again, if Oikawa knows about that connection.
They don't talk. Oikawa is on some regional team, and they have matches sometimes, and Shouyo is kind of glad they don't really talk, but he can't work out why. Something about Oikawa never sat right with him, and every time he remembers that soul link, he gets this burning feeling, and he doesn't like it.
Shouyo thinks if he could free Kageyama from that particular link, he probably would.
He's reaching forwards on instinct, Kageyama so close and at ease, the way he always is here. He knows that there is nothing there to feel; all the times he's run his fingers over his own soul marks, he’s found them deeper than the skin, unchangeable except via surgery. But the link annoys him, the idea of Oikawa on the other end, maybe knowing, maybe ignorant of it, and Shouyo has always promised that he'd be a hundred times better as a soulmate than Oikawa, because Kageyama deserves that.
His fingers trail across that line.
Kageyama's eyes snap open to focus on him, but Shouyo's are stuck on that line, that solid line like a healing cut but blue, dark blue, always the same shade-
It's changed.
Where Shouyo's fingers have touched it, it's gotten lighter, and Shouyo turns his hand over to look at his fingertips, expecting them to be smudged with blue. There is no proof; no feeling except the prickling feeling of Kageyama's sweat evaporating off them, and nothing to indicate that he just changed a soulmark.
It can't be real.
Kageyama complains at him, but Shouyo doesn't respond.
He doesn't care about soulmarks, he doesn't care about soulmates, they mean something but not everything, it doesn't matter-
Kageyama sits up. Shouyo withdraws his hand like it's been burned, staring as Kageyama lifts his shirt up again to look at it, and frowns.
Do that again, he demands, but Shouyo is frozen. What is it? What does it mean? He knows Kageyama doesn't like the existence of that bond, and that it faded probably means nothing, but what if it does? What if Shouyo is eliminating that bond?
It's stupid. He's stupid for thinking it. The marks are pretty random and arbitrary anyway, and so when Kageyama repeats his demand, Shouyo sweeps his thumb over it again, from one side to the other.
It fades a little further, dappled and more translucent. Kageyama's breath stops for a long moment, and he's thinking while Shouyo isn't, so confused he can't.
Kageyama grabs his hand and presses his finger to Kenma's mark between his thumb and forefinger, and Shouyo wants to complain, but when he sees it again, it hasn't changed at all. He's glad, but he doesn't understand-
Kageyama grabs his other hand, turns it over to press his palm to Natsu's mark on his wrist, his skin hot against Shouyo's, and again, he removes it and the mark is still there, unchanged.
Shouyo is relived. Shouyo is confused. Kageyama drags his hand back to press on his stomach again, and they both wait with anticipation when he removes it, and the colour seems just a little lighter again. He looks from Natsu's mark to Kenma's to Oikawa's, not nearly quite so there as it had been.
Finally, Kageyama released his hand, and changes his gaze to Shouyo's mark on him, and it doesn't look different.
Their gazes meet for a moment, just a moment, and Shouyo is working on instinct when he leans forwards again, drags his thumb over his mark, an intricately patterned square mark that looks like nothing much until he's up close enough to see the web of lines, as familiar as anything.
He removes it, and they both start.
Where it had been an orange, it has darkened. Not hugely, but enough to see.
Neither of them have to say anything. Shouyo takes his left shoe off and twists it so he can see-
The way it's darkened.
Kageyama has something on his mind when he excuses himself. Shouyo is in no state to question it, thoughts full of unchangeable changing marks.
Shouyo had lightened Oikawa's mark. Not only that, Kageyama tells him, late at night over the phone, Shouyo had lightened Kageyama's mark on Oikawa.
After a long moment of silence to try and process it, and failing, Shouyo asks how Oikawa knows about it.
He knows, crackles over the line, hesitation thick. Shouyo swallows, nervous for no reason. Because I told him. So he'd show me.
And he did, goes unsaid. He doesn't ask whether Oikawa knew before. Whether he was surprised. What he said. What Kageyama said. Whether he'd noticed it lightening. He can't speak through a strange feeling in his chest, freeing and trapping at once. He doesn't know what it is, or why. It scares him, as much as Kageyama's next words.
Help me get rid of it.
He's sure.
It only goes a few shades at a time. Sometimes more, sometimes less, and sometimes it doesn't change at all. They're both silent when it happens, no matter the result, any conversation between them falling dead when Shouyo's hand sweeps over that line that loses opacity with most weekends. They don't talk about it, every word about it said in glances, and Shouyo is uncomfortable and pleased in turns, but he tries to forget. He finds it oddly easy when he's cycling to the sports centre, Kageyama's arms wrapped around his middle and his face pressed against Shouyo's back.
He doesn't know if he's erasing the existence of a bond between Kageyama and Oikawa, or just the proof of it.
Oikawa has noticed. He thinks Kageyama denied all accusations of any action against the mark, and it's not like it's usual; he doesn't know about anyone else, anyone else's hand that acts as an eraser when dragged over those permanent marks, or at least, over one used-to-be-permanent mark, a blight on Kageyama's skin he could never stand.
He doesn't know who could stand it the least.
Kageyama gets impatient with the speed at which it fades. Sometimes he'll just grab Shouyo's hand and make them touch, and Shouyo's heart always thrashes wildly in response, and he'll splutter and Kageyama won't say sorry, absorbed in checking whether the mark has actually faded any further.
After practice one day, they go and watch some action film.
It's decent, Shouyo guesses, giant robots and stuff, but then the hero and the heroine realise they match, and it's all getting a bit too romantic and smushy for Shouyo, and he glances away as they kiss on screen, heart thumping uncomfortably.
Kageyama catches his eye, and his expression as unreadable as ever, even to Shouyo, holds his hand out.
It's familiar.
He offers his hand. Offers to further erase that bond, offers to give himself up to the pursuit of making Kageyama happier, gives himself up to the weird feeling he gets when they do touch, and the way his mind gets stuck on how warm Kageyama is, his hand wrapped around Shouyo's and guiding his hand to that familiar spot, pulling Shouyo over towards him, closer, and he doesn't have to look to know it got lighter again. Maybe soon it'll look like an old scar. Maybe one day, they'll get rid of it.
He goes to say that, turning his eyes up from the darkness to Kageyama's shadowed face, mixed feelings about this as always, kind of sorry for Oikawa (but he's got about four marks at least, he boasted about it to Kageyama) and kind of unrepentant about the way his hands are removing a fate defined link.
He doesn't quite know how, and it's over before it begins, but their lips brush.
He thinks it's an accident more than anything else. Shouyo is leant over Kageyama because he's sitting on Kageyama's right, and his left hand is all disgusting from eating popcorn, so he'd offered his right hand instead, pulling him even further across. Kageyama had been going to say something too, and the movement of their heads had made their noses brush, then their lips, for less than a second. They both lean back, but they don't separate per say. Shouyo's hand is still pressed to Oikawa's mark, and he feels strangely like he can feel the blue draining from it, but he doesn't know what it means. Doesn't know if he's ready to know.
An explosion on screen jolts them out of it. Kageyama pulls Shouyo's hand away from his stomach, but he doesn't let go; he doesn't necessarily hold on, but their hands end up in close proximity on the armrest, and Shouyo takes in absolutely nothing of the last half an hour of the film.
He doesn't want to move. They're not holding hands, but Shouyo's hand is achingly close to Kageyama's, and neither of them tried to pull back. He's caught up on the closeness, caught up on the familiar feeling of Kageyama's hand on his and the unfamiliar feeling of their faces so close.
They do separate when the cleaners come in during the credits and glare. They both shove their hands in their pockets, and are both silent on the walk home, thick air of lingering summer in the space between them, but neither of them question the fact that Kageyama is not going to a hotel, but following Shouyo home. Like always.
Shouyo couldn't stand to be apart. But he doesn't know what to do. His heart feels heavy, like the moment just before a match point gets called and he's unsure, the call is going to change things, but he doesn't know which way it's going to go.
They stand in his small room silently for a long second. Shouyo doesn't know what to do, what to say. Doesn't know if he should brush it off, ignore it, or ask. He can't read Kageyama, either, doesn't get any hints from there, and he's nervous, opens his mouth to ask if Kageyama wants anything to eat or drink (stupid they'd had food before the film, but it feels like so long ago).
Would you object if I k-kissed you. Kageyama states it as much as asks, and his face is gloriously red, but his eyes are clear and on Shouyo.
Shouyo shakes his head.
Neither of them move.
And then they both do, stepping closer to remove the space between them, and Shouyo has no idea what to do he's never done this before at all, but his hands land on Kageyama's hips and pull him forward, closer, and Kageyama goes straight in to kiss him.
Their teeth clack painfully. They both wince.
Dumbass-
Idiot-
Ow haven't you-
I never-
Not even Kenma-
Not even Oikawa?
Kageyama shuts him up, and it goes better. Shouyo's body feels like it's on fire, in a weirdly pleasant way, and he forgets about everything single other thing in the world except the feel of Kageyama pressed against him.
He thinks he's waited a very long time for this.
It's been worth it.