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You are 26 and in New York, it's winter again and you look at him and think "yes."

*

You are 8 when you are called pretty for the first time. It holds no real meaning to you, but you become aware that it's not desirable when you hear your father disapproving of it. You don't understand because you think that boys can be pretty too sometimes. You learn not to say those things, but mostly you learn not to care too much about it.

*

You are 16 and your heart is beating so hard in your chest it feels like it's going to break out of your rib-cage. You are aware, dimly, that you're on a court, that there are other players around you, that there is a game and a tournament at stake. But mostly, all you can see is him, all you can hear is his harsh breath, and your body moves like a mirror of his own, and every step you take breaks something inside.

You are 16 and with every shot you take, with every bounce of the ball, you let go of the image you had of a boy your age who in your eyes was a king and out of reach.

You are 16 and you realize that every heartbeat brings you closer to him and you feel foolish for not attempting it before, for being afraid of yourself mostly.

You are 16 and you lose a game and somehow you are aware you lose something else much more important and you don't think you'll be able to get it back.

You are 16 and in love with heartbreak.

*

You remember many years later, how on a slow, lazy summer day, you had turned to him, and he was 15 back then, still all smiles and dimples. His face soft, boyish and even though barely a teen, there was an innate charm already there. You had looked at him and thought: "he's beautiful" and then spend the rest of the week wondering what that meant.

*

You are 21 and it's your last year at the University, and you meet a boy with eyes the color of summer skies and hair like a sandstorm and when he smiles it's full of mirth. He's a foreigner, an exchange student who's in Japan for just one semester, so you kiss him expecting a punch in the face and get laughter and an "ok, sure" instead. It's easy, being with him. He is a good boy from a good family, with no guile and no more ambition than to have a steady job and enjoy life and grow old, maybe with a puppy.

He's slightly more experienced than you are, and infinitely more patient, and you learn to relearn what you thought you knew about sex and men and relationships. He is kind and sweet and doesn't mind just hanging out and watch a movie, or have some burgers and cuddle on the couch, and doesn't care about tops and bottoms and what either of those roles imply.

The semester ends and he stays for the winter break, and then starts talking about how he could come back the next year and you realize that even though he should be everything you want, you don't.

You break his heart, not intentionally but firmly, because nothing is worse than false hopes and you've learned that if the cut is clean, the wound heals faster even if it's deep.

You say farewell and he doesn't even seem that surprised about any of it and you wonder when you became so, so cold.

*

You are 17, and at a party and it strikes you odd that you don't actually find it odd at all that rival school teams are all eating and talking and drinking together. You step out for a moment because it gets to be a bit too much, and are surprised to see him outside as well. You think that maybe you might be intruding, you haven’t really hung out on your own, but he gives you a lazy greeting and doesn't seem to mind your company at all.

So you lean against the veranda, and watch the city spread out in front of you. He asks something about holiday plans and you say you are working through most of it and won't be doing anything else. It's a busy summer for you but it's alright. He asks you what it's like, being a model, and you don't know what to think about that, or how to take it, because the Aomine you remember never cared about that, actively mocked you about it, but this time he is looking at you curiously, idly swinging the soda can in his hand back and forth, and you notice dumbly that this is a different Aomine. He is not your middle school idol, and he is not your high-school rival. He is something else, in between those two and somehow above.

You spend the rest of the night talking on the balcony and you don't realize until later when you are in bed, that you hadn't stopped smiling.

*

You talk, really talk, for the first time after the Winter Cup. Midorima would have quoted the horoscope, and for a second you think it was destined, because you get off the subway a stop too early by mistake and you have to walk three blocks to your appointment and you run into him on the street.

You stop opposite from each other and feel unexpectedly awkward.

"Hi," you say.

“Hey," he says back and you notice that something has changed and it feels like summer last year.

You think about things to say like "this is some coincidence, right?" and "it's been a while" and "I've missed you so much" and settle on "How are you," instead because that's really the one thing you want to know.

"Alright," he says with a shrug and the plastic bag in his hand rustles and draws your attention to it. At your look he shrugs again and you watch fascinated and charmed how he seems to get embarrassed. "New shoes," he says as explanation, "for training," he adds and you feel awful, like tears are trying to choke you and you end up laughing somehow.

“Oi,” he starts all indignant but you wave it away and ask him if he wants to get something eat and when he smirks and says “yeah” it does really feel like that second year in middle school and it’s as if you never really stopped.

In hindsight you realize you never really did talk that much, though it felt as if you had, like everything that needed to be said had been said and you remember thinking back then that maybe, with some luck, you might end up being friends after all.

*

He and Kuroko form a bond you can never quite comprehend and that you secretly envy. You watch, because that's what you are good at, and you try and see what it is that makes them work. They are opposite in almost every way and you wish you could have that kind of link, that kind of wordless communication that speaks of an understanding you don't even have with yourself.

You realize that it's their differences that joins them, as if they are somehow incomplete without each other, and you understand that you are not an opposite. You are not what he needs, not even what he wants and for a long time it kills you that you are, for all intent and purposes, nothing. But then he leaves and you watch Kuroko being left behind and think maybe, being nothing from the beginning is better than being turned into nothing after being something.

*

You are 18 and graduating high-school and you feel so ancient. It feels as if you've lived your life somehow on fast forward, as if you lived too much in too little time and now you are supposed to know what you want to do the rest of your life and the only thing you are certain about is that you want him.

And he doesn't even know it.

And it doesn't even matter.

You are 18 and graduating, you laugh and cry with your classmates and former classmates, with team members and opponents, and somehow your insides feel heavy like lead.

He asks, "you okay?", and you say "yes." And it occurs to you it's the first time you've ever lied to him.

*

You are still 18 when you start University and everything feels instantly different. You are a child pretending to be a grown up and you hope desperately that no one will find out. You drink too much, and party too hard, because classes are just so easy and you have all this time to fill. Before, Basketball was something that almost consumed you, something you hung on to because somehow it was the link that kept you together after middle school, but after graduation it’s the thing that will keep you apart, and standing on the court is now akin to peering down a cliff

You don't play but you go to all your friends matches and pay attention to their tryouts and hope just as hard as they do, that they'll make it. Even if it will tear you apart.

*

You are in your bed in Tokyo and it's three in the morning with your phone in your hand and you want to say "I miss you" but instead you ask something innocuous about the weather and you are glad you can at least ask him that.

*

You are 20 and you hear that he is leaving and so is Kagami and of course there is a party again, but you spend it moodily sitting on a lumpy couch next to Kuroko instead of talking to him.

"Why aren't you going with him," you ask Kuroko because you have seen the way he looks at Kagami, because everyone has known how he felt about him except, apparently, Kagami himself. The two of you've been sitting on the same couch for an hour now, staring at the far wall where the two of them are alternatively fighting and talking. They are leaving together, going to be living together, might even be playing on the same team together, and something inside you wilts.

"Same reason you aren't," he answers and when you look at Kuroko you see yourself reflected.

You don't talk about it, you don't have to, there is nothing you can say that could make that moment feel less like dying.

But in the following months you drift closer, seem to be able to find the time and will to meet every now and then. He always tells you about Kagami, about him, how it's going in America, and it takes you almost 3 months to realize that Kuroko knows you don't keep in touch with him but wish you could, and then you spend a pathetic amount of time just sitting on your bed glad to have the friends you have.

*

You watch all his games and wish you could call him, but you never got that kind of relationship established before and now you don't know how to do it when he's 12 time zones and an ocean away.

You don't go out drinking anymore, but you kind of wish you were that kind of person, because sometimes you get so lonely you feel you'll die and you try not to feel foolish for missing something you never had.

*

You are 24 when you see him again. It's a brutal winter day in the middle of the sidewalk in New York and you think, a bit hysterical, "this is fate" even as he recognizes you. He's different, tall and broad and proud and whatever softness he'd had before, has left his face leaving behind sharp angles and strong lines. In the three years you've been apart, he's grown into a man.

But then he says "Kise," and a smile blossoms on his face and suddenly you don't see a 24 year old NBA player called "the rising star" of their generation. Suddenly you are back to that summer day when you were 15 and he's the Japanese boy with eyes too deep and skin too dark and dimples in his cheeks and you realize you are still irrevocably, desperately, hopelessly in love.

*

During University you think that love is something that will never happen to you. You meet men and women, charming and beautiful, fun and witty and smart, and they are all sorts of attractive. Sometimes you kiss them, sometimes you fuck them, sometimes you know their names and sometimes you don't. And it comes and goes and it feels satisfying in a way, like a good hard run on a cold morning does, but it never amounts to anything.

You think love is something you lost when you were too young to know you had it, and you spend three years mourning it.

*

You are in your bed in Tokyo and it's three in the morning. You are wide awake and you would like to blame jet lag but it's not true. You are wide awake because you just saw him after three years. You talked to him, face to face, just hours ago, when he went and dropped you off at the airport and you miss him.

You went out once for dinner, and the next day he'd shown up at your Hotel to pick you up and get you to JFK and you miss him.

You don't cry because somehow you are too old and jaded for it, but you wish you could because perhaps then then the weight lodged in your chest could move and slide away and because perhaps, tears could wash away a love that is of no use.

*

You are in your bed in Tokyo and it's three in the morning when your phone buzzes and wakes you from uneasy sleep.

"Let me know when you are back in NY," it says from an unknown number and you know it's him even without reading the signature and this time you do cry and don't feel pathetic at all because maybe, just maybe, there is a chance.

*

You are 14 when you get your first kiss, from a girl too bold for her age. It's quick and tastes like candy and you think it's weird mostly, and kinda sticky and it's over so quick you are not really sure it even happened and you don't get what the big fuzz is all about.

*

You are 15 and a boy kisses you and then you get it.

*

You spent middle-school falling in love with a boy without knowing that's what you were doing. He has dark skin and darker eyes and a smile that seems like a sunrise and the analogies are ridiculous, you know, but you can't help that that's the way you feel.

You spend two years falling in love with him, and then three years trying to fall out of it.

You spend the next three years convinced you succeeded.

You spend five seconds realizing that you were fooling yourself.

*

Kuroko tells you one time, after you've watched one of their games, where bitter rivals had played as allies, that you would have to tell him clearly what you want, because he won't get it otherwise and it’s a conversation you don’t want to have at all because you’ve made peace with the fact that this was all you were going to get.

You avoid him instead and ask teasingly "personal experience?" and he looks at you, serious as he's ever been and says "yes." You find it strange to hear that from him, because Kuroko has always been the kind of man to go after what he wants, no matter the odds, the hurdles and heartache.

"You should have told him, he feels the same, you know?" You say instead and Kuroko nods.

"I know, that's why I didn't," he says and you don't understand. "I'm what he wants, not what he needs," he explains and turns back to the television where they are showing replays of the match and you feel suddenly like a child, because you are sure that if you'd thought for a second that you might have been what he wanted, you wouldn't have stopped yourself for his sake. You curl your hands into fists and wish you weren't so selfish, wish you weren't such a coward, wish you were anything other than what you are.

"You are wrong," you say at last. "He needs you too," you add because it's true.

Kuroko smiles then, soft and pleased and maybe a bit embarrassed and his look grows distant as he watches the screen. "Maybe, some day," he answers and you understand that Kuroko hasn't really changed at all. He still knows exactly what he wants, and he is going after it as relentless as he's been in all of his pursuits, but he has grown up along the way, and has learned that sometimes it's time to act and sometimes it's time to wait. He's waiting, you realize, until it's right for both of them, and you admire his patience and perseverance, and compared to you, he's so much further ahead.

You wish you had the certainty that you will get there too, one day.

And you fear, that you won't.

*

You don't go to New York again, partially because you have no actual reason like you had that first time, mostly because you are actively avoiding it. You have early nights and spend the dawn texting instead.

One day you complain teasingly, telling him he could be less of an asshole and wait three hours to call because the time difference isn't that bad and he calls you out and says that you don't actually mind. You don't tell him that he’s right.

*

You are in your bed in Tokyo and it's six in the morning when your phone rings and: "You said I should call," he says on the other side. You are smiling, grinning like an idiot, like it means anything, like it means everything and you don’t know the words to tell him just that, nothing has ever meant more to you than that call, so instead you say something dumb but he laughs on the other line and then asks you what he should have for dinner.

You get out of bed late and miss your first appointment but you don't care, because you got woken up by him and it's like a dream come true.

*

Last year of high-school you are sitting on a bench in a park after a pickup game because you can't seem to be able to get enough of basketball, no matter how much you train and play.

He is sitting next to you, sweaty and hot and rubbing his face with his own shirt because that's the kind of boys they are while the rest of their friends keep on playing.

Suddenly you are filled with an unbearable melancholy, watching your friends get bathed in golden light as the sun sets., and you realize that the end of this life is only months away. He says something but you aren’t really listening because you are filled with a yearning you can’t quite comprehend because really the past two year have been great and still there is something you seem to be missing.

"Aren't you tired?" You ask abruptly and he huffs out a laugh.

"Nah," he answers and you want to explain that you don't mean tired about the game, that you were talking about something else, because University is really just a couple of months away and everyone's been busy with the Winter Cup and all that, but there is a life you are supposed to have after it all and you don't even know how to start thinking about it.

You turn to him to tell him just that but he’s looking right back at you with a smirk and you understand that he did get it after all.

"Not one bit," he adds with a grin that's equal parts boyish and feral before going back to the court, shirtless this time, and your heartbeat goes haywire and you blush and feel it creep down your neck and think "oh".

Years after you will think about that day and realize that you figured out you couldn’t keep him before you figured out you wanted him.

*

He calls you one day in the evening and says: “I don’t know what to do.” He tells you about how he’s gotten another offer for another team and that the money is good and so is the team, but management and coaches have recently changed, so it could go either way.

“What do you think?” He asks and your throat is tight because he genuinely wants your take on it. You talk for an hour that day, and in the end you ask him, “what does your gut tell you?”

In the end, he turns down the offer and he and Kagami take the title that season.

You get a picture of them holding the championship trophy and a text.

Thank you.

*

You turn 25 and get tricked into a party. You are genuinely surprised and pleased by it and you do get a bit weepy because all your friends are there and they expect that sort of thing from you so it's all alright. You see the former Seirin and Kaijou Team and half of Shutoku and some Touhou and Yosen and it's still so strange to have them all together in one place after so many years. It's a fun evening all in all, and you haven't seen most of them since graduation anyway.

It's an odd moment when you realize that you were still boys the last time you talked, and that now you are all grown, men with jobs and careers and in some rather surprising cases, spouses.

Kuroko is missing and when you ask about him Satsuki explains that he's running late, so you are not surprised to see him walk in close to the end of it all, a bit harried and all apologetic and says: "I had to get something first," and then Kagami is standing behind him.

"Yo," he says stoically and it lasts for about 2 seconds before the place explodes into noise and everyone is rushing forward and you are very alright with being relegated to second place.

You step away to get something to drink when you hear: "what's with all this noise?" and you turn around because you know that voice, you hear it almost every day over the phone and sure enough it's him, all towering height and bored look and the noise level increases but you just stand there, frozen because he's really there, on your birthday, and it's so cheesy but you kind of want to cry all over again.

He looks around then and you realize he's looking for you and when he finds you he gives you that smirk that you know is his way of smiling. You spend most of the night talking and you can’t even recall what about, but you will remember that night for the rest of your life.

There is too much alcohol and food and the group gets too rowdy and eventually they are shown the door but it's alright because you are a bunch of former athletes needing to prove your worth against two NBA players anyway, and you end up in a park, with Satsuki and Riko commandeering their teams like it’s a war and Hyuuga gives a heart rending speech at one point about how they owe it to Teppei to win, which seems really out of context to you but seems to strike a cord in them.

It’s all rather too pathetic and there are too many tears after it all and you can’t stop smiling, because it’s the first time you’ve played basketball in years. You are in a suit and tie and truly awful shoes, and you will be sore all over the next day, but it’s worth it because you get to see how far he’s come. You know now you could never reach him and you think that maybe you’ve grown up a bit because it doesn’t hurt at all to know he left you behind simply because he hasn’t stopped smiling throughout the entire game.

You are extraordinarily proud to know him, to have been able to play next to him and later, against. His laughter is infectious when he passes you the ball and when you execute his own move perfectly and score, it looks like he can barely contain his joy.

You are 25 and you finally, finally, make peace with the past.

*

They are in town for scarcely two days and you don’t get a chance to see him again but you get a message from him when he’s already boarding the plane.

Come and see me in NY, it says and you clutch the phone in your hand so tight you hear the plastic crack.

*

“Come on,” he says impatiently and throws the ball at your head and you let it hit you because it’s the kind of game the two of you play, and you wave goodbye to the girls who’d come to ask for your autograph.

“I’m sorry, it’s not on purpose,” you apologize but you are pleased that he is pulling you away from them.

“Yeah right.”

“Don’t you like girls, Aomine?” Kuroko asks and he shrugs.

“Girls are fine, but we are supposed to be playing now,” he answers and you are still in middle-school but you figure out with that sentence how priorities work for him.

*

It’s three in the afternoon on a Friday when, on a whim, you ask Kuroko to take a picture of you posing with one of your own ads. It’s something you used to do when you were younger and since you are being foolish already, you send it to Aomine with a silly emoji.

You don’t get a reply until it’s almost midnight

Take more pictures, it says, and you feel your heart swell and you are glad you are alone so you don’t have to be embarrassed about your blush.

*

A month later he gets interviewed and he sends you a picture of the spread. He’s in mid air, in the middle of a fadeway, the muscles of his arm taut, his skin gleaming, his brow furrowed. You save it and look at it whenever you miss him, you are happy his dream has come true and it feels a bit like victory.

*

You call Momoi a few days after your Birthday to thank her for organizing it all and she says she’s just glad that you had a nice time. The conversation turns to the game afterwards and you don’t notice that your voice goes soft when you talk about him, that you sound fond until she suddenly says: “you should really tell him.”

“Tell him what?” You ask distractedly.

“That you love him,” she answers and you freeze. You try to stammer out a denial, only to realize that you can’t bring yourself to lie to either of you and instead end up telling her that there is no reason to say anything at all because it’s one sided anyway.

“He took a 15 hour flight to spend an evening with you,” she says and you have to sit down because, well...

“Either way, you have to make a choice,” Momoi continues. “Things will eventually change. What will you do when he moves on?”

You feel as if the floor has fallen away underneath you because in all honesty, you hadn’t thought about it. It hadn’t occurred to you that there might come a point where you couldn’t keep the relationship you have now, because he’s been part of your life for what feels forever and you suddenly realize that you can’t imagine it without him.

“What should I do,” you ask mostly yourself but Momoi answers you anyway.

“Kise, it’s like Basketball, you either take the odds and make the shot, or you let go.”

*

You visit Kuroko that week and find him packing. You are equal parts jealous and happy because Kuroko would be packing just for one reason.

“Man, you have to tell me all about that,” you say mostly happy and accept the beer he offer yous.

Kuroko looks at you and says with all seriousness, “the sex was great,” and you spit out the beer you were drinking.

*

“Momoi, I’m taking the shot.”

*

You are 25 and he’s 24 for just one more day and you are in New York, turning the corner of the street where he lives at. You pull your phone, take a deep breath and speed dial the number you know by heart. You walk while the phone rings and you pay attention to the building numbers.

“Hey,” he answers, easy as he always has and you hear the noise on the TV in the background. The normalcy of the routine calms your nerves and you convince yourself that your hands are chilled by the night.

“Hey, what are you up to,” you ask and you are glad that your voice doesn’t sound like you a stomach full of frogs.

“Not much, I think Kagami is coming over in a few.”

“Oh?”

“He kinda made that squinty face and very obviously hinted that I should stay home.”

You laugh and it eases your tension because you can actually picture it. “Did he now?” You ask and stop in front of his building. You know which apartment is his, you’ve thought this out for a month and a half after all, and make sure you can be seen from his window.

“Yeah, wasn’t planning on doing anything anyway.”

“Really? It’s such a nice night out though,” you say and bite your lip, your heart suddenly speeding up.

“Yeah I guess,” he answers and you wait for the penny to drop. “Hey, wait, how’d you know?”

“You should look outside,” you say and there is rustling on the other side and a few moments later he’s leaning out the window. You lift a hand, the movement catching his eye., and he stares at you like he can’t believe you are actually there.

“Happy Birthday,” you say because you weren’t expecting him to not say anything at all and then he smiles.

“Kise,” he says and your tongue goes thick and your throat tight because he’s never said your name quite like that ever before, but then he’s moving again. “Wait, I’ll release the lock and-”

“Ah no, wait,” you interrupt him and take a deep breath. “I-There is something I have to say first and after-” you swallow, “if you still want, I’ll come up.”

“Okay,” he answers and you can hear the confusion in his voice.

You feel the air grow heavy around you, your heart is in your throat, your hands are clammy and your mouth is dry. You want to tell him that he’s your best friend, that he’s more, above and beyond that. You want to tell him you fell in love with him ten years ago on a Summer day, when you were both 15 and he had dimples in his cheeks. That you have been chasing him ever since the day you saw him jump in a school gym and you hadn’t stopped, that you didn’t know how to, that you didn’t want to. That your world ended when you were 16 because you thought you had lost the only chance you had and that you have been mourning since. That your world began again when you ran into him on a street in Tokyo. That you hoarded all his messages and pictures, like the most precious of treasures. That he is the constant in your arbitrary, chaotic universe, your anchor and your port, the harbor you’ve been steering towards.

You don’t know the words to tell him, that he’s everything and more than that.

So you use the only ones you have, inadequate as they are.

“I love you,” you say because that’s the only truth you know, that this feeling you have will never go away, regardless of what happens now, of what happened yesterday and what will happen tomorrow. . “I have always loved you.”

You are 25 and in New York, you hear the line go dead on the other side and feel your heart break.

*

It’s a beautiful summer day, he’s 15 with skin too dark and eyes too deep and he’s beautiful and you don’t know it yet, but you start to fall in love here and then never stop.

*

Later you will remember this moment lasting for eons, but really it’s just around a minute and a half that you are standing alone on a sidewalk in August in New York.

He’s gone from the window. Your eyes go blurry and it takes you a while to understand that you are crying. You look down then and you don’t care about where you are because you never thought such pain could possibly exist. Your press your hands to your eyes and sobs are wrecking through your body making it shake, and your chest hurts like someone reached in and ripped out your entire rib-cage. Every breath is an awful sound and you can’t stop them, are afraid you might never be able to, that from now on every single breath you’ll take will feel like a punch.

And then the door opens.

He’s standing there, in a t-shirt and jeans, breathing heavy and you look at each other for an eternity or maybe it’s only a second, before he surges forward and takes your face in his hands and kisses you, and everything inside you that had wilted, blooms.

“Kise,” he says and you know he means ‘yes’. “Kise,” he says and you know he means ‘always’ and you can’t stop crying.

“It’s you,” you say in between kisses and sobs, your hands curl around his wrists and hold on, “it’s always been you.”

He brushes his thumbs over your cheeks, rubbing away a decade worth of heartache.

“Ryouta,” he says and you know he means ‘I love you’.

You are 25 and he’s 24 and you let yourself finally, finally, be in love.

*

You are in his bed and in New York and it’s six in the morning. He’s pressing kisses onto your bare shoulder, his body is warm against yours and when you sigh he pulls you closer still.

“Good morning,” he greets and his voice is sleep rough, deep and languid.

“Yes,” you say and embrace him when he moves on top of you.

You smile when you kiss and it feels like coming home.

*

You are 26 and in New York again. You just got home from dinner where you both had just a touch too much to drink and you are all laughter and languid smiles and you end up dancing in the living room of your messy apartment, with no light because the bulb burned out a week ago and the two of you keep forgetting about it.

He pulls you close, a large warm hand splayed low on your back and you feel like floating when he guides you in lazy circles. The alcohol has made you soft and easy, and you sigh when he presses his face against yours.

“Ryouta,” he murmurs and he has this way where he makes your name sound like it’s something sacred and your knees go a bit weak.

“I want to do this with you,” he says and you are about to make a joke about it but he rubs his cheek against your hair, presses his mouth closer to your ear. “Let me always do this with you,” he says and you know what he is trying to say and your throat closes up and suddenly you can’t get enough air but in a good way.

You are 26 and in New York, it's winter again and you look at him and think "yes."