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Karasuno’s manager is ignoring him again.
Well, no, that’s not quite right. She’s not Karasuno’s manager anymore, nor any kind of manager as far as Tooru knows. And she’s not ignoring him, per se, she just doesn’t see him—that, Tooru has been telling himself, is all. And even if she was ignoring him, it’d just be because she’s busy studying and shy besides, and Tooru isn’t even a little bit bothered. At least, that’s what he’s been telling himself for about thirty minutes.
They’re sitting at separate tables in the library of their shared campus; Tooru had come here to pick up a book for one of his classes, then gotten distracted when he spotted Karasuno’s ex-manager in a corner by herself, hair in a loose side ponytail and glasses almost touching the page of her notebook. He’d meant to say something then, then probably move on and lick his wounds. Before he could, though, one of his new teammates had noticed him and waved him over to his study group. Tooru’d helped them out with a few assignments for their shared classes before they’d left, leaving him alone at this table and wondering how he’d gotten this sidetracked.
And Karasuno’s ex-manager hadn’t looked up once.
They share at least three classes, a surprising amount of overlap, but she hasn’t noticed him in any. Then again, there’s no real reason for them to be friendly with each other. Their high schools had been—and still are, if Yahaba’s cheerful monthly updates are to be believed—rivals and trounced each other on the court more than once. She’s seen her former team in the state of utter disrepair his (and chiefly Tooru himself) caused.
The thought of Tobio crushed and inconsolable makes a subconscious smirk cross Tooru’s face. Okay, all the more reason she wouldn’t like him. But to his knowledge, she doesn’t outright dislike him either, and there’s no reason for them not to be friendly or at least civil.
It’s not that Tooru will relentlessly pursue any woman in sight, as some of his teammates had suggested the first time he’d complained about her lukewarm response. He doesn’t want anything romantic out of her, anyway. He’d just like acknowledgment and—he’ll admit it—attention. He’s used to being the one pursued, and he can’t figure out why this is different; why Karasuno’s ex-manager is different enough that he’s drawn to her. The simple principle of the thing, maybe, or stubbornness alone. He won’t know until he tries.
Making his decision before he can talk himself out of it, Tooru draws himself up and approaches her table. “So, Manager-chan,” he says, because he can’t remember her actual name (which might be part of his problem, he realizes), “how have you been?”
She doesn’t respond. It’s fine. She probably didn’t hear him, given the headphones she’s wearing and the intense state of concentration she’s in. Even if she had heard him, maybe she’d chalked it up to her music or whatever else is playing and decided not to engage. Or maybe she’s seeing if he’ll go away if she doesn’t react. Tooru is still decidedly not bothered.
He stands there another moment, considering. If she ignores him again, he’ll take his pride and walk away and leave the library altogether, because he doesn’t want to bother her if she’s really busy and/or really doesn’t want to talk to him, but he’s already over here. He braces himself and taps her shoulder.
Karasuno’s ex-manager jumps, head jerking up, and turns, peering up at Tooru with an expression that can best be described as conflicted. Tooru flashes his best smile. After a moment of looking at him with wide eyes, Karasuno’s ex-manager sighs, almost inaudible—a bad sign, but nothing Tooru hasn’t heard before—and pushes her headphones down to rest around her neck.
“Um. Hello, Oikawa-san,” she says warily.
“Hi, Manager-chan.” He still feels a bit on edge, but he gestures toward the seat next to her. “Do you mind if I sit?”
She pushes her glasses up and averts her gaze, a pink flush already filling her cheeks, and Tooru is reminded of various interactions with girls over the years. Maybe he should quit while he still can. Looking back down at her notebook, though, Karasuno’s ex-manager says, “Go ahead. I’m meeting someone to study, though, so…”
“Don’t worry, I’ll only be around for a minute.” At her short nod, Tooru drops into the chair beside her and stretches out as much as he can. The chairs in this library seem to have been made for much shorter people. “So, how have you been?”
“Fine.”
“Ah, that’s good. How has school been going?”
She chews on the end of her pencil before scrawling something in her notebook. “Fine, too.”
Tooru suspects these are the only kind of answers he’s going to get, but as long as she’s not totally zoning him again, he doesn’t mind. He even smiles, his usual guarded one. “Speaking of school, I’m surprised you didn’t stay in Miyagi. Didn’t you want to keep in touch with your team?”
There’s a pause, then a cautious, “Didn’t you?”
…Damn. Tooru feels his mask falter for a second, but he covers it up with another broad smile, teeth and all. “Of course, but I had so many scholarship offers, and distance does make the heart grow fonder! So next time they see me in person and witness my true inner and outer beauty again, they’ll all feel rightfully guilty over how rude and unappreciative they were.”
Karasuno’s ex-manager almost smiles at that, he’s sure, but she lowers her head before he can confirm it. “Same here,” she says. “About the opportunities, anyway. And I am in contact with the team.”
She taps her phone, a sleek black flip phone with little flower stickers on it, and then holds it up, displaying a group chain titled Karasuno Volleyball Club. On the screen are several messages from—Tooru leans closer to make sure he’s reading the contact names right—Kageyama and Hinata. It seems fitting that Karasuno’s serious and logical would have nothing more than their last names saved in her phone. Boring, but fitting.
Tooru considers the phone. A slow smile, one that his old teammates would describe as his scheming look, spreads across his face, and he holds out his hand. “May I see that?”
“Why?” Karasuno’s ex-manager’s eyes narrow.
“So little faith in me, Manager-chan,” says Tooru, as if he isn’t about to do something terrible and petty.
With another second’s hesitation and a tiny huff, she hands it over, hand lingering for a second like she’s not sure if she really wants to pull back or not. Tooru grins. He’s not used to the keypad, but he works it out enough to type: yoohoo tobio-chan and others!!! hope you’re not slacking off, otherwise my underclassmen won’t get to beat you fair and square when the inter-highs roll around (◕‿◕) love, the wise and great oikawa-san, who is giving your lovely ex-manager her phone back now~
He waits for a second to see if any typing bubbles pop up, then remembers the time. Tobio and Chibi-chan, as well as the other former first and second years, should still be in school, and he would definitely have made a comment if they had responded. Tooru shrugs, satisfied, and hands the phone back over. “Here.”
Karasuno’s ex-manager squints at her screen and frowns. “Did you have to do that?”
“I want to lord Tobio-chan’s fear of me over him as long as I can,” says Tooru sweetly, “and I refuse to learn his number. For some reason, Iwa-chan has it, so I taunted him from his phone sometimes.” He shrugs. “Tobio-chan’s number would feel so out of place among all the cute girls’ numbers I have, right?”
“Hm,” says Karasuno’s ex-manager.
Tooru gets the feeling she’s not going to listen to him much longer. He pulls a face. He doesn’t want to be pushy in a way that upsets anyone, at least not on purpose, but something is intriguing about her indifference to his advances, and he wants to see what she’ll say if he’s more forward.
“Hey,” he says, then, in the sort of even tone he’d used for the confessions he’d accepted. He had to keep people thinking he was interested in dating girls, after all, and the disparate nature of the girls he dated made it a constant guessing game as to who he would accept, which in turn gave the girls hope. He’d always felt bad for them, even if he was the one getting publicly dumped in under two weeks. He pushes the past out of his mind and says, “Would you like to get dinner with me sometime, Manager-chan?”
Karasuno’s ex-manager stops writing, hand freezing on the paper. She pinches her lips together, visibly debating whether to even justify him with a response, and then lifts her head to fix him with a cool look. “No thank you. I’m gay,” she says, flat and quiet.
“Ah,” says Tooru, blinking, and he’s so startled he blurts, “Uh, so am I?”
He stares at Karasuno’s ex-manager. Karasuno’s ex-manager stares back. The silence hangs between them like a physical thing for a long, long moment.
Tooru’s brain catches up to his mouth, and he jumps back as his eyes widen and his palms start clamming up. “Ah, uh,” he hears himself say, uncharacteristically flustered and hurrying to cover it up. What the fuck, he asks himself, mouth opening and closing at a rapid pace with no sound managing to escape. Why did he say that? Why did he phrase it as a question? Why is he still sitting here? “I mean—”
“I see,” interrupts Karasuno’s ex-manager. He doesn’t recall any girl being this bold before—then again, there are so many extenuating circumstances here he doesn’t know where to begin. Her eyebrows pinch together. “Then why are you, um…”
Tooru laughs unconvincingly and drums his nails on the table. He glances around—there doesn’t seem to be anyone in eyeshot save for the librarian, who’s been shelving books the entire time Tooru’s been here.
“You know, I’m not entirely sure,” he admits. He’s almost surprised at himself for doing so, but he’s already basically bared his soul to Karasuno’s ex-manager, so he might as well air it all out. He rubs a hand over the side of his neck. “In high school, I got a lot of confessions and accepted some, but people are so busy here. And more mature than first years who think shoving a letter in their crush who they’ve never spoken to’s face will end in marriage.”
She presses her eyebrows together, reminding him of someone. “People are busy,” she agrees after a moment, and he’s about to ask where she’s going with it when she adds, quieter, “Including you. So no one would notice or care if you weren’t dating anyone.”
“…Oh.” Somehow, he hadn’t let himself get to that conclusion. “Thanks, um—” He falls quiet, remembering that he doesn’t know her name and too embarrassed to admit it.
She sighs again, this time less oh no and more amused (okay, maybe he’s projecting). “Shimizu Kiyoko.”
“Shimizu-chan,” he finishes. He thinks he’s as surprised by his lack of an immediate nickname as she is—it’ll give him room to come up with a good one later, though. If he ever talks to Shimizu again, that is. Tooru scratches the back of his neck. “I’m sorry for trying to hit on you.”
“Um. I’m sorry you felt like you had to,” says Shimizu, something like sympathy in her face.
“Ah, well, that’s not your fault,” says Tooru breezily, waving a hand. “It’s mine for caring so much what people think.” He’s silent for a beat, studying Shimizu. She seems startled, and he’s not sure if it’s because of his uncharacteristic honesty and display of insecurity, his admission in the first place, or the fact that he’s still around—maybe a combination of the three, or something else altogether. He can’t deny his curiosity, so he says, “How long have you—”
“Last year of primary school.” They’re back to the blunt answers, then, but Tooru still doesn’t mind—they’re answers, and there’s not the pressure of Tooru’s plausible romantic interest. Shimizu clutches her pencil tighter. “I, um, had my first crush. A girl on the middle school track and field team. I joined it the next year.”
Tooru sits up straighter. “You played sports?” Now that he’s looking over her again, he can see it—though out of practice, she’s lean and athletic, and she’d always seemed very in-tune with the volleyball team.
“Yes.” Shimizu bites her lip, toying with her ponytail, and reaches down to tap her knee. “It was fun, but I injured my leg in third year, so I managed the volleyball team in high school instead.”
“Sorry about that. ACL?”
Shimizu’s eyes widen. “Yes. How—”
Tooru smiles grimly and pats his own knee—if she was a track player and knew enough about volleyball to be a team manager for three years, she would have recognized his leg brace. “One of the most common sports injuries. I tore mine in the first year of high school and had to have surgery.” He sighs, resting his chin in his hands. “Still hurts sometimes.”
“Oh,” she says, sympathy crossing her face again. “Sorry.”
“Again, mostly my fault. Iwa-chan always bugged me to go to the doctor more often and not push it as much, but he can’t nag me every minute of every day if he’s basically halfway across the country, can he?” Okay, so maybe he’s exaggerating a little, but an hour or two of driving distance feels like the other side of the country when someone can’t drive and has lived two doors down from the person in question for all of his life up to this point. He laughs, even though it’s not even a little funny.
Shimizu twists her pencil in consideration—as he’s been talking, something has sparked in her gaze, something he recognizes but won’t acknowledge until she does. Her mouth opens and then shuts. Carefully, she starts, “Do you—”
He’s sniffing and turning his head before she can even get it out. “Honestly, Shimizu-chan, you make me out to be such a cliche. Do you think I, who could get any girl or guy I wanted—if I wanted girls, that is—would settle for the one person who’s known me all my life and knows how shitty I really am?”
A beat of silence. They stare at each other again, regret and discomfort written all over Shimizu’s flushed face.
Tooru drops his head into his hands and makes a pathetic sound. “Is it that obvious?”
“Only because I already know,” says Shimizu, who is quickly shaping up to be the new voice of reason in Tooru’s head. Her phone dings, followed by the sounds of clicking keys. Tooru lifts his head hopefully. “It isn’t Kageyama.”
His head drops again. “The one thing that could cheer me up,” he says with a pout. “Why do you have to dash all my hopes and dreams, Shimizu-chan?”
With every passing second, she must be more and more ready to locate a time machine and give her past self a stern talking to for letting him sit with her; he certainly would be. When Shimizu doesn’t reply but the typing has faded, Tooru lifts her head. She’s staring at the phone in her hands—and blushing, he realizes, much more so than she had been a moment earlier. Oh. Tooru’s mouth curves into a smirk.
“Who are you texting, Shimizu-chan?” he asks, all innocent, and she lifts her gaze with a glare that she can’t maintain for long before her eyes drift back to her phone. “C’mon, let’s talk about something other than me. Please.”
“A friend from high school,” she says instead of the less kind you, Oikawa Tooru, don’t want to talk about yourself? Are you feeling okay? any of his teammates would’ve said. “She, um, lives near here too.”
“A friend, hm?”
Shimizu’s blush deepens, if possible, and she clears her throat and reaches up to fix her glasses. “She was on the girls’ volleyball team.”
“So athletes are your type.” Tooru hums, tapping his temple.
“I don’t have a type,” says Shimizu weakly. “And wouldn’t that be your type too?”
“Well.” Tooru really, really doesn’t want to say that he also doesn’t have a type—or that he does, but in the form of one person. He’s looked at other men, of course, but there’s a difference between appreciation and full-fledged attraction. He unbuttons the top of his shirt to have a reasonable explanation for the heat spreading through his face. “I told you I was changing the subject, Shimizu-chan! What’s your girlfriend’s name?”
“She’s—she’s not my—” Shimizu shakes her head, biting her lip, and says, little more than a whisper, “Yui. But we aren’t dating. She, um—we’ve been talking for a bit now, because we only really became friends after graduation, but I know she liked Sawamura in high school.”
Tooru feels the intense urge to pour out two drinks for them to toast with, even though neither of them is of legal drinking age. He settles for bumping Shimizu’s knuckles with his own, making her jump. “It seems we’re each other’s confidants, Shimizu-chan,” he says, then laughs. “I have to admit, I wanted your phone number, but I wasn’t expecting this to be the reason why.”
Shimizu considers him for a moment before sighing again, this time definitely more amused than irritated—she’s smiling, however small. “Fine, Oikawa-san,” she says, tapping her phone and then handing it over to him. “I don’t want you to text me first.”
“How rude!” he says, mock-hurt, like he’s not already typing his number in. “Here you go! Ah, it’s so rare for me to give my number out and not the other way around. I hope my fan club doesn’t get jealous.” He shoots a glance either way as though a girl with a confession letter or five in hand might pop out from behind a shelf. Predictably, none does.
“I’ll tell them they have nothing to worry about.” Shimizu’s phone dings again, and she regards the new message with wide eyes before shutting her notebook and slipping her headphones off her neck and into her bag. Tooru watches, alarmed, as she gathers her things. “Sorry, Oikawa-san,” she says, “but I have to go. Good luck.”
“Oh—thank you.” He doesn’t need to ask what with, and he flashes her a bright smile that he’s pretty sure she really is ignoring this time. He hums, genuinely unbothered. “Good luck to you too, Shimizu-chan.” Something occurs to him, and he pauses. “Wait, I thought you were waiting for your friend.”
“Oh, that.” Shimizu smiles, a little devious, and reaches up to tuck a lock of hair behind her ear. “She asked if I wanted to meet for lunch instead. See you later, Oikawa-san.”
Tooru blinks, then returns her little grin. “Have fun on your not-date, Shimizu-chan,” he chirps, just to watch her redden and nod.
Tooru had been expecting to not get what he wanted out of that conversation, but he thinks, watching Shimizu’s disappearing shape, that he got exactly what he’d needed.