Chapter Text
Nishinoya wasn’t exactly homeless. “Homeless” would imply that he had nowhere to turn to for shelter, that he was tossed out onto the streets. That wasn’t the case. While his parents were out of the picture after the big move, he certainly had a place he could go. However, he would have much rather actually been homeless than go crawling back to his ex-boyfriend who, at the time, was certainly laughing up a storm at his misfortune.
No, he was in desperate need of a place to stay. After all, how long can one really spend bouncing from overnight spa to overnight spa? In Nishinoya’s case, about two weeks before being referred to a landlady by one of the spa employees. The landlady in question was Hinata-san, a short, middle-aged woman with, frankly, the most well-kept perm he’d ever seen. As he soon came to find out about her, Hinata-san was a single mother to two kids, Shouyo and Natsu, had a passion for baking and pottery, and used to want to pursue a career in musical theater. Hinata-san, along with being quite the chatterbox, was a weirdly persuasive woman and, after finally hearing about Nishinoya’s situation, almost immediately had him signing a lease on one of the available apartments in her building. Upon first viewing it with her, he realized why she was so eager to get someone moved in; the place was cramped with a living room that bled into the kitchen space and a “bedroom” that was hardly more than a bed and a small desk on a loft above the kitchen. Space was certainly limited, but it was nice enough, rent wasn’t too expensive, and, well, he wasn’t exactly in a position to complain. So, Le Palais’s Apartment 203 became his new home.
In contrast to the unusually quick lease-signing process, moving day was a bit more orthodox. He had had enough sense to move what little furniture belonged to him from his ex’s place to a self-storage facility and, with the help of Hinata-san, one moving truck, and two polite movers, the living room was furnished. Furnished with one loveseat and a cheap coffee table, but furnished nonetheless. Hinata-san assured him that she would bring some furniture catalogues she kept for new tenants the next time she came by to check on him.
Aside from the furniture, he had a couple of smaller items in various boxes, though he brought those up himself. The trek up to the second floor was up two flights of stairs and the boxes took a few trips to receive so, by all means, he should’ve been exhausted. However, years of volleyball had prepared him for such physically straining work, and he was quite energetic by nature, so he had no issue with it. Still, the day was warm and, within about 30 minutes, he was splayed out on the loft bed, staring up at the off-white ceiling only six feet above his head. On this hot late-spring day, he wanted nothing more than a glass of lemonade, but he hadn’t done any grocery shopping yet and had absolutely no desire to get out of the house. Maybe ordering food would be a nice moving-in treat. He reached beside him for his phone but only felt smooth duvet. He palmed his jeans next, hoping he had left it in his pockets. He sat up and groaned. God, where's my phone? Is it in one of the boxes? Did I drop it between the loveseat cushions already? Shit, is it in the moving truck?!
He begrudgingly stepped down to the lower floor and made his way to the cardboard boxes that had been piling since this morning. Sitting down on the hardwood floor, he began his search with one of the smaller boxes that had earlier housed his books and picture frames. Not long into this search (about five minutes, to be more specific) he decided that asking Hinata-san might be a better first step. After all, she had helped call the movers for him, so she could easily call them back if he had really left his phone in the truck. He turned the knob to the front door and jolted with surprise.
Standing just outside his door was a tall, dark-haired guy, about his age.
“Umm, hello?” He greeted.
“Hi,” the man returned awkwardly. “Hinata-san said you lived in this apartment. You’re the new tenant, yes?” He looked behind Nishinoya into the sparse living room filled with countless boxes.
“Oh, yeah. I am. I’m Nishinoya Yuu,” He offered his hand for the man to shake. “And you are?”
“Azumane Asahi. I live upstairs in Apartment 303.”
“Well, thanks for the dropping by. I’m actually in the middle of looking through all of my stuff right now, so excuse the mess behind me,” he chuckled. “I lost my phone earlier and I was going to ask Hinata-san if she knew where it was.”
“Ah, about that.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out Nishinoya’s phone. “This is it, right? I saw it on the ground by the front gate and brought it to Hinata-san. She didn’t recognize it immediately, so she figured it was yours.”
“Oh wow, thanks! I was starting to wonder if I left it in the moving truck or something. You saved me the trouble of calling and asking.” He glanced at the boxes behind him. “Hey, why don’t I make it up to you? I got some great tea as a housewarming gift from my mom a while back and I’ve been meaning to try it out for a while. I could make some for you if you want.”
“Thank you, but it doesn’t look like you have anything to prepare it with,” he pointed to the kitchen set-up just to the right of Nishinoya. Looking behind him, he realized Asahi was right – he didn’t have any way of making tea.
“Oh. Maybe once I go shopping this weekend, I can get something to help with that,” he laughed.
“Well, I’ve got a kettle in my apartment if you still want to try some of that tea,” Asahi suggested.
“If you don’t mind!” Nishinoya grinned. Asahi nodded and led the way to his apartment upstairs.
Despite being just a floor above Nishinoya’s, Asahi’s apartment seemed like it belonged to a whole other continent let alone the same building. His was far more spacious than Nishinoya’s, with enough space for an actual dining room area and a bedroom that was an actual separate room! On top of that, it was nicely decorated with various potted plants on shelves and tables and contemporary artwork hung on the walls. While Asahi walked over to the kitchen to begin boiling the tea, Nishinoya admired his surroundings.
“Damn, your place is nice! It’s not often that a guy has an apartment this neat, especially not a single guy.” He continued to look around the room before his words caught up with him. “Assuming you’re single, that is. Not that you don’t seem like you could get a girlfriend! I’m sure you’re perfectly capable of getting anyone you want. Not that you seem easy, either!” He made eye contact with Asahi in the kitchen. “I’ll just shut up.”
For a few moments the (very wide) space between them was dead silent. Then, Asahi snickered.
“You’re funny. There's no need to worry. You’re right, I am single. It’s my choice, though. My past relationships haven’t been all that great and, with the work I’m in, it's better that I stay single.” He sat down at the dining table and Nishinoya joined him.
“Why is that?”
"It just takes up a lot of my time and energy. I figure it’s just easier for me to stay single so I don’t disappoint anyone.” He looked on wistfully.
“Well, does your work make you happy?”
He nodded. “Yeah, it’s fulfilling. I get to make others happy with what I do, so it’s worth it.”
“But are you happy with it?”
He paused to think. “I think that it takes a lot out of me and, while it may be stressful for me and even those around me, it’s ultimately something I’m proud of.”
“Then, no offense to your exes, but I don’t think that’s anything to be disappointed about.” Nishinoya saw the slightest curl of a smile on Asahi’s lips and smiled to himself. “So, what do you do anyways?”
“I’m...” He hesitated. “I’m a freelance writer for different websites.”
“What do you write about?”
“Books mostly. Book reviews are my strong suit, but they’re never too popular,” he said.
“I love books, too! Reading them, talking about them, all of that!”
“Really?”
“Yeah! When I was in junior high, I created and became the president of our school’s book club. I mean, it ended up becoming more of a manga club, but it was fun nonetheless,” he laughed. Asahi did too and Nishinoya could nearly feel the reverberation of it in his own chest. Had his voice been this low the whole time?
“So, what do you do?” He asked.
“Right now I’m an assistant editor, although I really want to be a mangaka someday. Actually, I moved here because I was recently transferred to Karasuno Books’s Tokyo office from the one up in Miyagi.”
“You work for Karasuno Books?”
“Yeah! I honestly feel like I lucked out, getting to be a part of producing such killer books.”
“Yeah, that- that's incredible.” He stuttered. “But then why do you live all the way out here? Karasuno’s about a forty-five-minute bus ride away. Wouldn’t you rather live closer to work?”
“Well, I used to live closer. I used to live with my boyfriend – well, ex-boyfriend now – who lives about ten minutes away from the Karasuno building.” He looked down. “But things didn’t end so well with him, so I moved out. And now I’m here! To be honest, it was the quickest and cheapest option, not that Les Palais isn’t a great building.”
“Oh... I’m sorry to hear that. I hope you enjoy living here, then. If you ever need any help settling in, you know where I’m at.”
“Thanks, Asahi-san.” Just then, the kettle began to whistle, putting a momentary pause on their conversation. Asahi got up to check on the tea, soon returning with two full mugs. Nishinoya cautiously sipped on the hot tea. “So, what should I know about Les Palais? Any gossip? Special tips?”
Asahi thought for a moment. “Well, definitely don’t use the laundromat in the building here. The machines tend to just eat your money and the dryers leave your clothes all damp. There’s a coin laundry about 2 minutes away that I always go to. I could show it to you sometime, if you’d like.”
"That would be awesome, thanks!”
“Hmm, let’s see. There’s a sweet couple that live right above you in apartment 303, but they can get a little... loud sometimes.” Asahi started to turn pink at the thought. Nishinoya just laughed. “So just be aware of that. I recommend a good pair of noise-cancelling headphones.”
“Noted.”
“Oh, we aren’t really allowed to have pets here. You can maybe get away with a smaller animal like a hamster or a lizard, but no cats or dogs.”
“Damn. And here I was planning on bringing all four of the little guys here,” Nishinoya sighed.
“W-wait four?!”
“Yeah, four sweet little pit bull puppies. It’s a shame. Might have to drop ‘em off at a shelter somewhere.”
“Four pit bulls?” Asahi seemed to go pale. Well, as pale as he could go given his tanned complexion.
Nishinoya grinned. “I’m just messing with you. Don’t worry, I don’t have any pets. I actually used to be pretty scared of dogs, so you won’t see me with ‘em.”
Asahi let out a sigh of relief. “That’s good. Well, it’s not good that you’re scared of dogs. But it’s good that you don’t have any pets.” He took a moment to drink his own tea then. “I think that’s all you really need to know about Les Palais. I’m sure you already looked at the more important rules.”
“I was supposed to read those?” Asahi’s eyes widened, alarmed. “I’m joking! Again!”
“You joke around a lot, don’t you?” He said, voice tinged with concern. “Well, I guess I’ll get used to it the more I see you around.”
“Oh, you’ll be seeing me more often for sure. Besides Hinata-san, you’re the only person I know here. So, if my sink breaks or something, I’m coming to you.”
“I think you should call a plumber for something like that...”
“Nah, that costs money! Why would I do that when I could just call you down?”
“Nishinoya-san, I don’t know the first thing about fixing a sink,” he chuckled.
“Well, built like that, I’m sure you could get the job done.” Nishinoya motioned to Asahi’s figure. There was no doubt he was toned beneath that sweater. Actually, the more Nishinoya looked at him, the more he wondered what he looked like showing a bit more skin.
Asahi blushed. “I could try, maybe.”
They continued their small talk, nursing their drinks every so often. The minutes flew by and suddenly Nishinoya received a phone call. He quickly answered and, a few uh-huhs and okays later, looked back at Asahi.
“Looks like I’ve gotta head back to mine. I’m getting my wi-fi set up in a few so I should probably be there. Thanks again for the tea and the chat. It was really nice meeting you, Asahi-san.”
“Likewise. Like I said, if you ever need anything you can come to me.”
The two shared a soft smile before Nishinoya left. As he walked downstairs, he reflected on the last thirty minutes. Had it really been that long? Their conversation flowed so smoothly that it felt like such a quick exchange. It was a pleasant conversation, one Nishinoya was grateful for. Aside from his terrible ex, he didn’t know anybody in Tokyo. He assured his parents that he’d be fine in the big city and that he’d acclimate soon enough, but to tell the truth, he was nervous. So, he was thankful that he’d met someone so kind so quickly. Asahi seemed like a real sincere guy and, aside from his worrisome tendencies, Nishinoya was glad they’d hit it off so well.
It was a plus that he was so cute, too.