Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It all started with a hickey.

If truth was to be told, Atsumu hadn't even noticed it at first until Inunaki suddenly pointed out with a surprised gasp, "Bokuto, is that a hickey?" The MSBY Black Jackals were in the middle of practice, Atsumu working on their fast attack with Hinata. This unexpected exclamation certainly took everyone by surprise, most of all the addressed man who was practicing his serves. All eyes turned towards the said man and a collective wheeze was heard in the gymnasium when the accused hickey was finally discovered on his neck, just below the pulse.

"It is a hickey!" Atsumu almost yelled, pointing his index finger accusingly towards the outside hitter, "where the hell did ya get a hickey?!"

Everyone stopped what they were doing, their curious eyes fixed on Bokuto who was looking equal part shocked and afraid by the sudden unfolding of drama. Even Sakusa Kiyoomi, the infinitely antisocial Sakusa Kiyoomi, stood up from the floor where he was warming up with his freaky wrists to come closer to the pandemonium. 

"Atsumu-san," Atsumu heard Hinata's unsure voice beside him, "What’s a hickey?"

Atsumu stared at the orange haired boy, not exactly sure how to react. Hinata looked back at him expectantly, innocence evident in his big amber eyes. The setter almost felt guilty for discussing such matters in front of him. Almost. Right now he could not care less since Bokuto freaking Koutarou, the biggest goof in the planet of Earth, followed closely by his "pupil" Hinata, had somehow earned himself a hickey. How?

"I-It's not a hickey!" Bokuto exclaimed defensively, covering the "not-hickey" with his palm. The whole scene would have been more believable if only Bokuto didn't stutter and his face was not of the colour of a tomato.

"Sure looks like one." Sakusa remarked casually as if not at all shocked by the wild romantic endeavours of the biggest baby of Jackals. Atsumu looked at the man incredulously, then smirked.

"As if ya know what a hickey looks like, Omi-kun."

"Huh?" Sakusa glared at him with his signature scowl, "I know more than you do."

"How?" Atsumu bared his teeth in a wide smile, knowing fully well how to push the buttons of the Itachiyama alumnus. "Ya can't even high-five people."

Sakusa's glare darkened, and for a second Atsumu felt it was mistake to push too much and he would have if only he wasn't having so much fun bullying Sakusa. Hinata looked between worriedly, trying to say something and then stopping. The little man did not want himself in the midst of the verbal brawl.

"I don't want this attitude from a man who couldn't score a since service ace during the last match." Now it was Sakusa's turn to smirk, his lips curling upwards in an arrogant manner as the setter's face turned red.

"Shut yer trap—"

"Will both of you shut up?" Adirah snapped, his eyes gleaming with mischief as he gestured at Bokuto, "We have more important matters to look into."

Atsumu realized with a start that it was true. He had been distracted, cursing himself and Sakusa, mostly Sakusa, for causing so. He glared at the germophobe one last time before turning his attention back to Bokuto who was looking like he would start running at an opportunity.

"Really, Bokuto, where did you get that hickey?" Inunaki asked with real curiosity, "Do you have a girlfriend?"

"No!" Bokuto screeched, stretching his arms out defensively as his shook his head with vigorous speed. The action did nothing but expose the much-discussed wound. "I'm telling you guys it's not a hickey!"

"Guys," Hinata sounded confused. And impatient. "What is a hickey?"

"It is not a hickey!" Bokuto cried.

"Then what is it?" Adirah spoke up, wriggling his eyebrows as if he won the argument — which he did. Supposedly.

Twenty pairs of eyes stared at Bokuto, demanding answers. "It's... It's nothing really!"

Lame. That was what everyone's expression said.

"I-I fell from my bed this morning!" Bokuto yelled, covering his face with his hands in embarrassment. Everyone kept staring at him for a whole thirty seconds, then the entire gymnasium roared with laughter. Everyone laughed including Bokuto, who joined the party with hesitant chuckle which soon turned into his usual guffaw. Except Atsumu, who did not buy the explanation and was ready to bet Osamu's life on it, and Sakusa, who also did not laugh but rather continued his judgemental stare on Bokuto.

'Is Omi-Omi suspicious too?' Or not. There was the huge probability that Sakusa was physically incapable of stretching the muscles of his face to form a simple grin, let alone a laughter.

When the huffing, snorting and chortling of his gullible team subsided, Atsumu narrowed his eyes at Bokuto. "How do ya get a wound there from fallin' off the bed, Bokkun?"

Bokuto stilled, then laughed. "I sleep weird, Tsum-Tsum!" He scratched the back of his head in an adorable manner. "Don't worry so much about it!"

"But—"

"Let it go, Atsumu," Meian said in his captain's voice, and Atsumu shut up immediately. He respected his captain a great deal. "Everyone, get back to practice. Coach is going to really angry if he hears about this mayhem."

Scattered chattering were heard before everyone returned back to their practices, only Atsumu, Sakusa and Hinata stayed where they were, looking out of the corner of their eyes to see Bokuto practicing his jump serves. He seemed completely in his zone by the third serve, his well-crafted form in the air to hit the ball with power and accuracy.

"He was lyin', ya know." Atsumu said to no one in particular, his eyes never leaving the owl-loving man. He was pleasantly surprised when he heard Sakusa's affirmative hum in reply.

"Why do think he's lying, Atsumu-san?" Hinata asked, glancing at his mentor. Puzzlement was written clearly on his tanned face, and Atsumu could not blame him. Hinata was all sunshine and volleyball, and the setter doubted if the younger man had ever paid attention to anything except volleyball. He was like that just as his rival, Kageyama, who Atsumu could bet, had nothing in his head besides volleyball.

"Because that was a clear hickey," To Atsumu's utter surprise, it was Sakusa who answered. "And even if Bokuto really fell from bed, there is no way he could get a wound there. And if he really sleeps weird, then he must fall from the bed quite often. And if he really falls from the bed quite often, then he would have been wounded a number of times in that particular area too. And if he did, you," Sakusa pointed at Hinata, "must have noticed since you are bouncing on his shoulders every day."

Atsumu gaped, his jaw wide open while the ginger was nodding his head understandingly. Hinata looked up at Sakusa and practically beamed. "Wow, Omi-san, I didn't know you pay so much attention to us!"
Sakusa's ears turned pink. He coughed, opened his mouth to say something, then decided against it. Atsumu decided to put the poor bastard out of his misery. "Okay, so now that we know Bokkun is lyin', we gotta figure out how we're gonna find the mystery person who gave Bokkun the hickey."

Hinata nodded his head enthusiastically, his eyes gleaming with the excitement of approaching adventure. Sakusa, on the other hand, looked positively disinterested. "Don't count me in."

"Huh? Why?!"

"I am not going waste my time on," Sakusa gestured vaguely with his hand, "this."

Atsumu raised his eyebrow at that, returning the same gesture in the air. "And what's 'this'?"

"Waste of time."

Veins were twitching on Atsumu's forehead. "Ya said that before," Why were people so bothersome around him? Taking a deep breath, mainly to control his urge to strangle someone, the blonde setter began again. "Come on, Omi-Omi, it'll be fun!"

Sakusa did not deemed it necessary enough to reply. He merely stared at him.

"Don't ya want to know who's Bokkun been hidin'?" Atsumu pointed discretely at Bokuto, "Bokkun who shares every fuckin' little thing like what he had for breakfast or how he got to see an owl at the park, is hiding something this big. I mean someone actually gave him a hickey!"

To Atsumu's absolute wonder and internal enjoyment, Sakusa puffed a defeated sigh and nodded. "Alright."

"Guys, just to let you know, I am in," Hinata let his presence known again in an uncertain voice, "but can I ask something first?"

"What is it, Shouyou-kun?"

"What the heck is a hickey?"

Chapter Text

Kiyoomi had no clue what evil had possessed him when he had agreed to go with Miya's bizarre plan of finding out Bokuto's lover. Yes, he was curious to see who had captured the eyes of the eccentric wing spiker who according to Kiyoomi, did not possess an ounce of maturity. He was basically a child in a huge man's body with moods like the sea and stomach like a canyon. He indeed was curious about the hickey and how it came to be on the most unlikely person on the team, except Hinata who was basically a mini version of Bokuto anyway. But he did not sign up for this.

Kiyoomi glowered at the door strong enough to drill holes in it, completely ignoring the two idiots who stood beside him, chatting each other's ears off. It almost sounded like they were gossiping about different qualities of katsudon, but he was not interested enough to pay attention. At this moment, all he wanted to do was to crawl into the shower and wash himself until he was satisfied that all the germs from the outside had been cleared off. But from the look of it, that seemed a goal as far as climbing Mt. Everest.

But a man could only hope.

They were currently standing in front of Bokuto's apartment, waiting for the man to open the door. It was actually Miya's idea, which should have given him the clue about how stupid it was going to be, but as claimed before, it seemed like Kiyoomi was possessed and somehow agreed to his plan to invade Bokuto's apartment out of the blue. He was sure that their unannounced visit would be sure to produce some results such as anything left by Bokuto's apparent lover or something.

At that moment, Kiyoomi had found it "not so bad", but now that he imagined how clumsy Bokuto actually was and what number of different types of germs would be in the apartment which might not be as clean as one could hope, he was trembling deep inside. He wondered if his mask and gloves were going to protect him in the hell he was to enter.

"I'm telling you oyakodon is better than tonkatsu," Hinata announced excitedly, stomping his foot on the floor to solidify his statement.

"Listen to yer senpai, Shouyou-kun," Miya narrowed his eyes at the shorter boy, "oyakodon doesn't stand a chance against tonkatsu."

Hinata stared at him for a moment, then thought out loud, "You almost sound like Kageyama, Atsumu-san." His eyes blazed with defiance. "That means you're wrong!"

"Huh?" Miya scrunched his face in pure confusion, and Kiyoomi did not blame him. He too had no idea where the logic came from. Miya looked over to the raven. "Omi-Omi, what'dya think? Tonkatsu or oyakodon?"

"Both of you, shut up," Kiyoomi glared at him and saw them flinch, "You two are giving me a headache."

"Sorr—" Hinata stopped abruptly when Bokuto finally opened the door, revealing himself they did not expect.

Bokuto was holding his phone on his ear, his cheeks pink and a stupidly happy smile plastered on his face. His golden owl-like eyes widened in surprise when he saw the trio. His smile faltered a bit but did not leave his face. "Hey hey hey," Bokuto exclaimed in his over-the-top cheery voice, "What are you guys doing here?"

"We're here to hang out with ya!" Miya was a frightening man. There was not an iota of doubt in his eyes as he spoke. Not that Kiyoomi was looking at his eyes. But still. "Come on, invite us in, Bokkun."

"Yeah, come in guys," Bokuto stepped aside to welcome them in as they walked in one by one, Kiyoomi loitering behind. Bokuto seemed to notice this, flashing his 1000 megawatt smile at the mask-clad man. "Omi-kun, it's your first time in my place, isn't it? Well, make yourself at home." And laughed. Bokuto's laughter was annoying, boisterous, loud and contagious, something Kiyoomi had always admired about the man but would never say it out loud. Never ever.

Cautiously Kiyoomi followed his teammates into the apartment, passing Bokuto across the entryway while doing his best not to touch the broad-shouldered man in the narrow space. There seemed to be soft noises coming from the cell phone Bokuto was holding in his ear, which indicated that the phone call was still connected.

Stepping into the living room, Kiyoomi was pleasantly surprised. He truly had no decent expectations about the condition of Bokuto's home; the idea solidified by how many times he had seen the older man throwing away his jackets on the floor or how messy an eater he was. But his apartment looked... not bad. It was mostly clean — because nothing could ever be too clean for Kiyoomi, and had a homely feel, which was expected from someone like Bokuto. It was a little packed for his liking, several framed pictures hanging on the wall, owl plushies sitting on the coffee table and... a book on the couch.

'Bokuto and book!' If Kiyoomi had the ability to act shocked, he would. But fortunately he didn't and unfortunately his airheaded teammates did.

"Book?!" Hinata exclaimed as he held up the book in the air, "Does Bokuto-san like to read?"

Kiyoomi glared at the redhead. "Keep quiet," he hissed, "And don't touch anything!"

"Sorry," Hinata mumbled, putting the book back on the couch. 

"Looks like some novel," Miya pondered, "It can't be Bokkun's, ya know. Must be his lover's."

Kiyoomi hummed. That did seem like a possibility. But the question plagued his mind was that what was a person, whose hobby seemed to be reading, doing with a simpleton idiot like Bokuto. He often heard the phrase "opposite attracts", but he never really believed it. If anyone was to ask him, which anyone wasn't, two people with totally different personalities and preferences could not function together. He knew he could never be with anyone who did not love volleyball as much as he did. Not that he wanted to be with anyone. Why bring more germs in his life?

"It can belong to one of his friends too, you know," Hinata looked thoughtful, "May be one of his friends left it here when they visited. I mean, I have tons of Kageyama's stuffs in my apartment since the idiot always forgets something. But that doesn't mean I'm dating Kageyama."

Hinata did make a point, Kiyoomi thought. But his example of him and Kageyama might not be an ample one. The crackling chemistry and over-the-top rivalry/friendship between the two Karasuno alumni was the laughing matter for both of their teams. Some even betted on how long it would take the two most oblivious persons on Earth to get together. Kiyoomi was not one of "some". He did not bet. Because he did not care. But with these turns of events, he might just.

But to focus on the matter at hand: Bokuto had a book on his couch, which definitely did not belong the man himself, and might belong to either his friend or his lover; preferably the later one so that they could finally unearth the mystery of the hickey.

"What's takin' Bokkun so long?" Miya asked suddenly, and the other two noticed with surprise that he was indeed right. The three of them were in the living room for quite some minutes now, and Bokuto had still not come in. The setter quietly got up to peek at the entryway, and waited a whole minute. Kiyoomi and Hinata shared a questioning glance at each other.

"He's on the phone," Miya whispered, coming back to his original position, "He's inviting someone to come on Friday. I think it's his girlfriend."

"How do you know that?" Despite himself, Kiyoomi whispered back.

"He's still on the phone even though he has guests," Miya smirked his signature grin, "Must be a special person."

Kiyoomi frowned. He hated it when Miya acted like a goddamn idiot, but he hated it more when he actually used logic. It was a contradictory reaction, he realized, but it was the truth. 'It must be Miya's natural talent to be so unlikeable', he decided finally.

"Okay, so what do we do now?" Hinata's question brought him back from his deep introspection of his loathing feelings towards their setter.

"Let's come unannounced on Friday, like today," Miya proposed, still whispering, "We'll catch him red-handed."

"Nice plan, Atsumu-san!" Hinata whispered back excitedly, if there was such a thing. The two looked at their black-haired teammate with hopeful eyes, and much to his own dismay, Kiyoomi nodded. If he suffered this much, he might as well see the bottom of it.

"But we need to know the timing too," Kiyoomi said in a quiet voice. He refused to whisper like some teenage girl.

"I heard like seven or something."

Kiyoomi scowled again, nodding his head in agreement. He could not freaking believe that he was actually agreeing to come to this germs-filled hole to spy on his ultra-irritating teammate's apparently active love-life, and in the process spend more time with his other two ultra-stupid teammates. Just wow!

There must be something horrible going on with him.

He was certain.

"Alright!" Hinata exclaimed again, his need of whispering gone. Both Kiyoomi and Miya glared at the shorter boy.

"Shouyou-kun, shush!"

"Hey, guys," Bokuto came in with a beaming smile on his face, his owlish eyes brimming with curiosity, "What're you guys shushing Hinata about?"

Chapter Text

With a lot of body-straining exercise and another lot of heavy practices, Friday came by pretty quickly. At least that's what Shouyou thought. Atsumu, on the other hand, was too antsy for his own good. He kept a sharp eye on Bokuto, who was as normal as ever, and kept pointing out random things about the former ace of Fukurodani, suggesting a deep connection with the infamous hickey. Shouyou could not see any connection, and he was pretty sure neither did Sakusa, evident by the unimpressed glare he shot the setter everytime the said connection was mentioned.

But Shouyou himself did notice some strange things about his mentor: like how Bokuto would sometime linger on his phone, having an uncharacteristic soft smile on his lips, or how he sometimes gazed dreamily at couples holding hands together in the street or how sometimes he would graze his fingers on his neck where the hickey had faded, whenever he was having a rough time. It was all blatantly glaring at them, little but obvious tell-tales announcing the possibility of someone very special in Bokuto's life. And none of those was new, well except the neck-grazing part; it was all always there. They just did not notice it previously because nobody had even the slightest doubt that Bokuto might have a lover.

Shouyou wondered why. They should have anticipated that. After all, Bokuto was a very attractive man. And he was the coolest! He played volleyball so well that Hinata could not help but gape at the mind-blowing spikes and the surprising feints. He was the best and most amazing mentor! Though he had a doubt that he was being biased. But he didn't care. To him, Bokuto would always be the coolest. 

But even with those great qualities, Bokuto was not a ladies man. He was a natural charmer, but always gave off a friendly aura, never crossing the limit that might lead into a romantic relationship, be it with men or women. In fact, one time Bokuto flustered and sputtered like a madman when a fan flirted with him after a match. The woman had complimented his enviable physique, in apparantly raunchy words, judged by how red his senpai was though Shouyou had not understood a lot of those words, and Bokuto had uttered or more accurately, yelled the exact words: "T-t-thank you! Wish you a good day, ma'am!"

Even Shouyou knew that was not how you reply to a flirt.

But now that he knew his mentor had a lover, those made sense. Bokuto himself never flirted with anyone, and ran away from anybody who tried to flirt with him. A sense of pride filled him at how loyal his mentor was in his yet-revealed relationship.

His long chain of Bokuto's lover related thoughts shattered by the unpleasant sharp sound of the calling bell. Shouyou frowned. Who could that be? It was Friday, and he had cleared his schedule so that he could join his two teammates to spy on another teammate's personal life. Yes, just regular stuff.

Shouyou opened the door after the bell rang two more times, the span between each ring decreasing. It revealed a very familiar and very annoyed face. Intense blue eyes glared at him, before stepping into the abode without any invitation. 

"What took you so long, dumbass?"

"What the hell are you doing here, Bakeyama?"

Both asked at the same time. Kageyama scowled at the shorter boy, but his voice was little unsure. "You are in my apartment all the time! Why can't I come?"

Shouyou sighed, feeling guilty for behaving so horribly. He did really spend a lot of time in Kageyama's apartment, and without the setter's invitation too. It was just fun spending time with Kageyama. They would talk about volleyball, about any amazing play that caught their eyes in the international games, about Shouyou's time in Brazil and Kageyama's time in the Olympics, about their old memories of Karasuno, and about absolutely random useless stuffs. Those were all fun. He never got bored with Kageyama. So whenever he had free time and had come to know that the other one was at home, he paid his rival a friendly visit.

But this was not the time. It was not that he had any problem with Kageyama's sudden arrival, in fact quite the opposite. For some reason, he felt surprisingly happy that Kageyama also looked forward to spend time with him. But he had already promised Atsumu and Sakusa, and he really, really wanted to see Bokuto's lover. He had no option but to send Kageyama back. Unless...

...Unless he brought Kageyama with him!

Yes, that was the perfect solution. That way, he could spend time with Kageyama and also could get to see the person who bestowed his senpai with the hickey. He was sure Atsumu and Sakusa would not mind. At least he could hope. Bokuto, on the other hand, would love it. He was a friendly person and he liked Kageyama well enough. But the biggest obstacle was the King of the Court himself. How was he supposed to persuade the most obstinate and anti-social person in the world to come with three of his rival team's members to spy on rival team's another member?

"No, of course you can visit," Hinata flashed him a blinding smile, bracing himself for the yelling that was about to come. "But I was actually leaving."

Shouyou watched with shock as Kageyama's face fell, but momentarily before his scowling was back on full force. "See you later then," he said, making a step towards the door when Hinata spoke again.

"Come with us. We're going to Bokuto-san's place. It's gonna be fun."

Kageyama turned his head to look at Shouyou over his shoulders. "Who are 'we'?"

"Atsumu-san, Omi-san and me," Shouyou grinned again. "And you."

"No." Kageyama said with finality before taking another step. Shouyou glared at his broad back.

"Why are you so grumpy, Kageyama-kun?" He smirked, knowing the effect of his upcoming words, "Can't handle three jackals alone?"

Bingo! Kageyama turned around to face him, shooting the haughtiest look at the redhead. "Let's go."

Shouyou laughed internally. For a genius, Kageyama was really stupid. At least, at things other than volleyball. But now that he had convinced his dumber-than-a-coconut friend, they could finally go.

The trio was supposed to meet at the bus-stop near Bokuto's apartment. The whole way to the bus stop with Kageyama was really fun for Shouyou. They talked about their usual things which unsurprisingly consisted a lot of volleyball related stuffs, and they bickered like there was no tomorrow, which was also unsurprising. Shouyou noticed with a happy smile how much Kageyama had changed in the years. He was taller now (Shouyou hated him for it), more muscular, his bangs no longer hid his forehead. He had changed a lot in the inside too. He wasn't as much short-tempered as before. He was calmer, more focused and the best part — he smiled more often.

"Oi, dumbass," Kageyama barked, pulling his out of his thoughts, "Why are you spacing out?"

Shouyou made a face at his taller friend. "Kageyama, I think it's time to expand your vocabulary."

As expected, Kageyama scowled, pressing his hand on the ginger's head. "I have a good vocabulary," he said, messing up the already messed up orange locks, "But you are a dumbass!"

Despite everything, Shouyou smiled. Some things never changed. Kageyama was still as bad with words as he was before. But fortunately, with many years of practice, he had gained the ability to decipher the raven's harsh words, and in normal language, what Kageyama said was: "I know other words too, but you are the only one I call dumbass."

When they reached the bus stop, Atsumu and Sakusa were already there. The duo looked at the new duo and sported two identical frowns. "What's Tobio-kun doin' here?" Atsumu asked. "Hello there, Tobio-kun."

"Hello." Leave it to Kageyama to greet someone in the driest way possible.

"He was at my place, so I invited him here," Shouyou smiled happily, not at all bothered by the irritation his setter felt upon seeing the "genius setter". "It'll be fun with more people, won't it?"

Atsumu looked like he wanted to say "no", but he didn't. Instead he said, "Whatever. Let's go see Bokkun's lover."

He started walking, followed by a silent Sakusa who looked equal part irritated and bored. Shouyou and Kageyama followed them too.

"What's with Bokuto-san's lover?" Kageyama whispered as they followed the other two.

Shouyou didn't answer for a moment. Should he tell Kageyama? He could, it was not like Kageyama would tell anybody. "Bokuto-san has a lover," Shouyou whispered back.

"So?"

"But he won't admit it. He had a hickey on his neck and when everyone asked how he got it, he denied," Shouyou said conspirationally, "But he was definitely lying. So we want to see who the secret lover is."

Kageyama nodded. "What's a hickey?"

Shouyou's whole face warmed up. He was pretty sure he was flushing like a tomato. It was good to know that Kageyama also didn't know what that particular thing was. He would hate to lose to Kageyama. But there was no way he could tell the other boy what a hickey was, not without blushing fifty shades of red. When Atsumu had previously told about it, Shouyou had been utterly scandalised. He refused to bask in the embarrassment again.

"Y-you should ask Atsumu-san!"

"Huh? Why?" Kageyama shot him a weirded look, "You know what is it, right?"

"Just ask Atsumu-san, Bakeyama!" Shouyou sped up his pace, "Come on, we're gonna be late."

Chapter Text

The evening was not going according to Atsumu's plan. No, not at all. That was all he could think about as he sat on the couch in Bokuto's living room, holding a cup of tea he'd rather not taste, surrounded by a bunch of people who seemed to have forgotten his existence in the room, and on top of that, he was nowhere close to finishing his mission i.e. to find out the unfortunate person who gave Bokuto the hickey.

If Atsumu wanted to, he could blame a lot of people for this failure of an evening. It was not like he wanted to, but he could. But for the majority of it all, he would blame his newest teammate, the sunshine incarnate who also went by the name of Hinata Shouyou. It was Hinata who decided to bring Kageyama along their little adventure. Unsurprisingly, Atsumu was not pleased. It was not like he hated Kageyama. Nope, not at all. It was just that he'd rather not deal with the genius setter who stole his spot as the top server, when he was already on edge after getting into a fight with Osamu.

But he could bear with it, if only because they were about to catch Bokuto red-handed with his girlfriend or boyfriend or whatever. Just the thought of the shock and surprise on Bokuto's face when they barged into his apartment, brought immense joy and anticipation to Atsumu's dampened mood. He had been trying to imagine what type of person Bokuto would be romantically engaged with. So far it had been proven a tough job. Bokuto Koutarou was not a person you'd imagine having a lover. He was, as evident in the years of comradeship Atsumu had with him, a baby trapped in the body of a tall buffy man. He was loud, kind of an idiot, and very moody, and not at all what one'd fancy in a partner.

But Bokuto was also reliable, kind and faithful. But those moments of virtue were mostly lost in the sheer intensity of the less-than-appreciated characteristics of the man. It pleased Atsumu that someone saw through the dumbly loud exterior of Bokuto and appreciated the man inside.

But what kind of a person would do that? It was one thing to recognise the talented kind person inside, and it was totally another thing to be romantically engaged with. Atsumu wondered if the hickey was acquired during a hook-up. It could happen. He knew it better than anyone. But he quickly subsided the idea. From what he could tell from his experience, Bokuto was not a hook-up kind of guy. He'd seen the man react whenever someone flirted with him. It had not been pretty, but damn, it was hilarious.

A relationship, then.

Yeah, that might be it. However impossible it might seem, imagining Bokuto in a relationship, it was still far more plausible than the hook-up scenario. Atsumu tried to picture the person: the person must be loud as Bokuto, if not to the very extent, but loud nonetheless. Otherwise, the relationship would just be Bokuto shouting on the top of his lungs to his hearing-impaired partner.

The person must be a risk-taker. They had to be. Or else, how would anyone justify being in the relationship with the loudest person in the world? Yes, the person was definitely a devil-may-care type of individual, as impetuous as their lover.

What else? The person must like volleyball. They must be at least interested in it if not actually like, if they were dating Bokuto. The mentioned man was all about volleyball and owls. He could never shut his mouth about the two things he loved most (and in general).

Now, these were the theoretical qualities he expected in Bokuto's partner. As for the proven ones, they had two of those. Number one would be that the person loved reading. This was debatable, though, since the book they had formerly found in Bokuto's apartment could easily belong to one of Bokuto's friends. But still, the possibility remained that it belonged to the same person who endowed Bokuto with the hickey.

Number two would be that the person was erm...affectionate. More clearly, physically affectionate, as evident by the hickey that started it all.

These were the thoughts swirling around Atsumu's mind as he walked towards Bokuto's apartment with Sakusa walking beside with enough space to place a car between them, silent and frowning as always, and Hinata and Kageyama trailing behind, bickering as always. It was 7:06, which meant they were already six minutes late, but that was nothing. Judging by the distance from where they were, it would take them around 10 minutes to reach. The time Bokuto's lover was supposed to come was 7, and Atsumu doubted they would leave in just sixteen minutes.

But all his calculations went down the drain when the sound of the bickering between the two former teammates intensified. Both Atsumu and Sakusa halted and turned around to find those two glaring daggers at each other. Kageyama had his hand on Hinata's bright orange hair, pressing painfully while the shorter man was stumping on the other's feet, also rather painfully.

"What are saying, dumbass?" Kageyama's frown looked almost demonic.

"I am saying your receives sucked in the last match, Bakageyama" Hinata had a similar frown. He was never one to back down.

"Hey, ya two," Atsumu called, fighting the urge to kick their asses, "Stop fighting."

Needless to say, he was ignored. The two idiots had already progressed to physical brawl, kicking and punching and shielding and whatnot. A few people in the street were looking at the scene with judgemental eyes and scandalised whispers. Not that Atsumu blamed them. He, too, was doing the same thing, whispering to the taller man beside him, "Omi-kun, make them stop, will ya?"

Again, ignored. Atsumu wondered if at this point he was more embarrassed for getting caught in the whatever was going on between Hinata and Kageyama, or more humiliated for being ignored multiple times. He decided there was no point in getting an answer since both sucked. This evening sucked.

Only if he knew.

Sakusa, quiet as ever, ignored Atsumu's request, then decided to ignore the whole scene between the former crows. He turned around and walked two steps before stopping again. "You two are embarrassing me. Stop it."

Atsumu wanted to chide him for saying "embarrassing me" and not "embarrassing us", but he decided against it when the fighting duo stopped. 'Omi-Omi has such gravity, it's impressive,' Atsumu thought, 'If only his personality was good too!'

While Hinata and Kageyama stopped the physical fighting, the war was still not over. They both looked away from each other at the same time, then looked back at each other, got caught in eye contact, shot deadly glares, then looked away again. The whole thing was so time-coordinated that it would be funny if only there was not a chance of the two going at each other's throats again.

Atsumu, being the kind and thoughtful man he was (he knew Osamu'd disagree but what did he know?! Screw Osamu!), he decided to buffer the tension. He'd keep one of them company until they reached their destination, and by extension keep them apart. He had two options, but the answer was clear as crystal.

'Shouyou-kun, definitely Shouyou-kun!' What? He was a thoughtful person, not a saint! He did not want to know how the genius setter got all the techniques right or how spent his days tossing to Ushiwaka and featuring in advertisements.

Trailing behind, Atsumu matched his pace with Hinata and placed his arm over the shorter man's broad shoulders. Hinata looked up at him, a little surprised. Kageyama, on the hand, scowled at them as if they were committing a crime right in front of him.

"What's up, Shouyou-kun?" Atsumu flashed his usual charming smirk.

Hinata smiled back. "Are you excited to see Bokuto-san's girlfriend, Atsumu-san?"

Kageyama huffed, looking away from them. Hinata frowned at the back of his face, then decided to let go. 'Wise choice,' Atsumu thought.

"It could also be a boyfriend, ya know?" Atsumu watched as realisation hit the other boy, cheeks turning pink from embarrassment.

"Of course!" Hinata almost yelled, sounding apologetic, "I didn't mean it like that! I respect everyone's—"

Atsumu thought it would be better to stop the guy before he went on to bow and beg for forgiveness. "Chill out, Shouyou-kun," Atsumu patted his shoulder assuringly, "Ya don't have to be so stiff with me."

Who stiffened at that was Kageyama. The blue-eyed setter caught the back of Hinata's t-shirt and tugged. "Oi dumbass, you have a cut on your arm," he frowned, pointing at a small red cut on Hinata's arm which was probably caused by the setter himself during the fight, "Let's get you a band-aid."

While both the Jackals stared at Kageyama with shocked eyes, a smile soon broke into his face. Atsumu glanced at his small teammate quizically. "Yeah," Hinata said, looking at his team setter. "Atsumu-san, is it okay if we wait for a minute? The medical store is right across the street."

Now, what do you say to that? They were getting late for their raid, but it was not like Atsumu could stop his teammate from taking care of his body. So, he nodded. "Yeah, I'll go tell Omi-Omi."

As he pulled away his arm from Hinata's shoulders to go ahead, he watched the former freak duo crossing the street, bickering among themselves, but with fond looks in both their eyes. Atsumu huffed. 'What the hell.'

Atsumu paced up to catch up to Sakusa who didn't even bother to glance back. He walked as if he was the only person in the world or would prefer to be: hands stuck in his jeans pockets, face half-hidden by a mask and a gloomy scowl plastered on his handsome face. Atsumu tried to remember if he ever saw Sakusa without his scowl, and found out that no, he didn't. The outside hitter was similar like that with Adler's setter.

"Omi-Omi," Atsumu called, and was immediately enraged when the addressed did not stop or turn around. "Can't ya wait for a bit?"

This time Sakusa did stop, and turning, focusing his intense eyes on the blonde's face. "Why?" He said, "We are already late."

"I know, but Shouyou-kun's got a cut. So he and Tobio-kun went to the medical store across the street."

Sakusa looked alarmed, and Atsumu immediately regretted his action. He knew Sakusa was overtly sensitive about these stuffs. He should have lied and told that they were thirsty and went to get soda or something. "Is he getting a vaccine?" Sakusa's voice was tense.

"Of course!" Atsumu mustered up a strained laugh, "Chill out, Omi-kun! They'll be back in a minute."

Sakusa did not say anything after that, but his whole posture looked stiff and tense. Atsumu stood there awkwardly, too afraid to say anything and too restless to not say anything.

When the duo came back, seven minutes were already passed. Sakusa started walking as soon as he spotted them, careful to keep a safe distance from Hinata. Atsumu almost pitied the man. Kageyama and Hinata, on the other hand, looked more relaxed than before. The blonde could not say he was happy to see that, but at least he was relieved that they wouldn't start fighting again.

"Thanks for waiting for us, Atsumu-san," Hinata said appreciatively, his dark haired friend nodding along with him.

"No problem," Atsumu sighed, glancing at his cellphone: 07:56. He had no idea they were this late. Bokuto's lover must have been with him for almost an hour now. They might still be there, but there was a possibility that they'd left. Atsumu prayed to God for the first possibility to happen.

When they reached the apartment, it was 8:04. Atsumu was almost desperate at this point. He could kick the Bokuto's door open if he needed to. But he had to see the person. Not only because he was curious, but also because he wanted to achieve the goal for which he had to suffer the hell of an evening. He needed to. For his sanity.

The four of them rushed up the stairs, inattentive to the noises they were making. Bokuto lived on the third floor, which meant a lot of stairs. But what were a few stairs to four A-grade athletes? In a few minutes, they were on the intended floor, bent down with hands on the knees and panting like dogs in summer.

Atsumu straightened up first, only because he reckoned his desperation was the highest. There was a figure in front of Bokuto's apartment, one arm up in the air as if to knock, another arm holding a plastic bag. In the crappy lighting of the hallway, Atsumu could not figure out the features well, but he was sure that it was a guy: tall, broad shoulders with a head full of messy dark hair. He seemed to be wearing glasses.

Before Atsumu could say anything, he heard Hinata's loud, cheerful voice.

"Akaashi-san!"

Chapter Text

"Akaashi-san!"

Hinata's loud voice chimed with the loud buzzer of the calling bell, tearing through the quiet air like an arrow. The man stilled in his place, arm frozen in the air. As he turned to look at them, Kiyoomi saw it was indeed Akaashi: tall and lean with mass of dark hair and a perpetual deadpan look on his face.

Akaashi looked surprised, his eyes widening slightly. He obviously did not expect the group there. "Hello, Hinata," Akaashi got over his surprise pretty quickly, his voice formal and straightforward, and he gave a curt nod to acknowledge the presences of the others, which they returned similarly. The words "what are you guys doing here?" hanging in the air, unspoken.

Kiyoomi had known the former setter for about a year, thanks to him being teammates with Bokuto, even though he had met them in the past. While he'd spoken to him only a few times, mostly replying to compliments after their matches which Akaashi always came to, he knew quite a bit about the man — only because Bokuto would not shut up about how amazing his friend was and how his tosses were the best and many more Kiyoomi hadn't bothered to remember.

"We're here to see Bokuto-san," Hinata's face was bright with joy. Apparently he forgot about the purpose of the raid they were doing. "We thought we could all hang out together."

Speaking of their raid, Kiyoomi wondered what Akaashi was doing there. It was not like he couldn't be there. In fact, he had a better probability than them since he was much closer to Bokuto than any of them were. But Bokuto was having his lover over, and no matter how careless and air-headed he was, Kiyoomi hadn't expected him to be this inadvertent, and more so since the affair was supposedly secret.

'Maybe he knows the person,' Kiyoomi thought, 'After all they're pretty close.'

Yeah, that could be it. Because the other possibility was that Akaashi himself was the said lover.

"What'cha doin' here, Keiji-kun?" Miya's voice came through, cheerful yet snark lurking behind. It seemed like he was having similar doubts as Kiyoomi.

Akaashi looked from Hinata to Miya, his eyes behind the glasses curious and calculating; he probably caught on Miya's unnatural tone. But when he spoke, his voice calm as ever. "Actually I had —"

He couldn't complete the sentence as the door opened, revealing Bokuto standing in the doorway, his face practically glowing. His big golden eyes fell upon the group, going over everyone's face one by one, and widened comically, his mouth forming an 'o'. But his glow remained untainted.

"Hey hey hey!" Ugh, the most annoying sound in the world poured from the wing spiker's mouth, and Kiyoomi instantly regretted his decision to come. Screw curiosity. He could not, absolutely could not, endure the whole evening with this annoying, noisy bunch; though he had to exclude Akaashi and Kageyama.

'I'm going home,' Kiyoomi planned sombrely, ready to announce his departure...when he noticed Bokuto's attire.

Bokuto never dressed fancy. He was almost always seen in MSBY's jacket worn on t-shirts and sweatshirts outside the court. So, it came as surprise when he saw Bokuto clad in well-fitted dark blue dress shirt and a pair of skinny jeans; his remarkable physique accentuated prominently under the fine clothing. By the expressions of his companions, Sakusa noted he wasn't the only one shocked.

It looked like he dressed up for a special event — it had to be a date. Now, the question was that whether the date was over or not. Kiyoomi tried to draw all possibilities in his mind, mulling over the information they gained till now. Bokuto did not seem to be impatient or in a hurry, so his date must have been over. His partner must have come around 7, as Miya had previously heard, and left by the time they came. After all, they were a whole hour late.

That meant they missed their opportunity.

Kiyoomi did not feel pleased.

"What're you guys doing here?" Bokuto asked the group. His tone was questioning but not unwelcoming. Very Bokuto-like.

Akaashi was the first to answer. He looked at Bokuto with an unimpressed expression. "I informed you about my arrival, Bokuto-san," Akaashi's voice was flat, but Kiyoomi doubted he sensed a hint of a smile. "Did you forget that already?"

"Akaashi!" Bokuto whined loudly, his face scrunched up in childish manner. Kiyoomi was 100% sure the man had the emotional maturity of an 8 year-old kid.

"Don't ya be rude, Bokkun," Atsumu said. "We came to hang out with ya. Let us in." He seemed cranky, probably irritated by the fact that they failed their mission. 'Mission?! What the hell!'

Bokuto looked embarrassed and moved from the doorway to let them in. The four of them stepped inside one by one, Akaashi going in last. As Kiyoomi passed Bokuto, his masked nose picked up something completely unexpected — the attractive smell of expensive cologne. It was faint, probably because of the barrier, but strong enough to pick up. It looked like Bokuto had really made an effort for his date.

Kiyoomi and Miya were the first ones into the living room with the other four trailing behind. Bokuto's apartment didn't look much different from the last time they visited. It was surprisingly neat and tidy, and very unsurprisingly had way too many owl figurines for a normal person's liking. The book they had previously discovered was resting on the coffee table.

"Omi-Omi, looks like we missed our chance," Miya said in a low voice, shooting a subtle glare behind at Bokuto who was saying something Hinata and Kageyama — the first one looked like he'd found a unicorn and the latter looked doubtful. Akaashi looked simply flat and impassive.

"Looks like it," Kiyoomi muttered.

It was a shame really. Kiyoomi, no matter what he had told himself several times in this evening, was actually really curious to know the identity of this secret lover. Not because he had an interest in the person, but because he wanted to know how someone tamed the wild beast of a person known as Bokuto Koutarou. And also how the hell did Bokuto — the same Bokuto who overshared every freaking tiny little detail about his life — hide such a huge thing!

"You're so cool, Bokuto-san!" Hinata's loud cheerful voice came and Kiyoomi turned around to find the ginger looking with stars in his eyes at his "mentor".

"Hey hey, Hinata!" Bokuto exclaimed, "You're not so bad yourself, my number one pupil."

"That's right, Hinata," Akaashi said, his tone fond. "You've become a brilliant player."

"Hahhh!" Hinata was practically glowing at this point. Kiyoomi could not blame him. In the short amount of time he had known the former Fukurodani setter, he knew it was not an easy feat to gain a genuine compliment from the man. "Thank you, Akaashi-san!"

"Your tosses still suck though." Of course Kageyama had to make a comment.

"What?!" Hinata glared at the other boy, his big brown eyes shooting daggers. "At least my receive is better than yours!"

"Huh?! My serve is better than yours!"

"But my block is better than yours, Yamayama-kun!"

A headache was already forming on the back of Kiyoomi's head and decided to ignore the idiotic duo for the rest of time. He never had too much expectations for this evening, but he did not expect it to be so bad. Not only was he in another person's apartment which was not sterilized, but also he was stuck with a bunch a people that consisted two brainless but extremely loud duo, the loudest person on the planet and his somewhat indifferent former teammate, and last but not the least, the most annoying person he had ever encountered.

'I hate living.'

The rest of the people in the room also decided to ignore them, and made their way to the couches. Of course, Kiyoomi sat furthest away from everyone. Miya seemed to proceed to sit beside him but his dark scowl made the setter change his mind. Bokuto and Akaashi were sitting together on the opposite sofa, where Bokuto whispered something to Akaashi whose dry expression remained unchanged.

Kiyoomi and Miya exchanged a look when Akaashi picked the book from the coffee table and opened it as if to check if everything inside was still there. 'Oh, so it belonged to Akaashi,' Kiyoomi thought to himself, 'Guess Hinata was right.'

"Ah, it was your book then!" Hinata's voice came over to them. It seemed like he and Kageyama had stopped fighting and were standing by the couches. He looked happy and proud.

Akaashi looked the small man, a look of surprise flickering in his eyes but only for a moment. His voice, however, held no emotion. "Yes, it is my book. Why do you ask, Hinata?"

Hinata panicked. He stared at the man with an open mouth. "Ah—"

"Actually, Keiji-kun," Miya spoke just in time to rescue the ginger, flashing a sugary smile at the editor. "The last time we visited, we found yer book and began to wonder who it belonged to. Because, ya know, Bokkun can't read and all—"

"Hey!" Bokuto whined, "I can read! I do read! Tell them, Akaashi!"

Akaashi looked at his former captain with a deadpan look. "Looking at manga doesn't consider as reading, Bokuto-san."

"Akaashi!" Bokuto's whine got louder and Akaashi sighed. He seemed tired enough as it was; Kiyoomi had no idea how he could still deal with the man-child.

"Bokuto-san, you didn't offer your guests any beverage," Akaashi said, noticing the pout forming on the other's face, "It's bad manners, don't you think?"

Bokuto looked embarrassed. "Sorry guys! Do you want tea? I'll make you guys some tea!"

"Let me help you," Akaashi said, putting the back in his bag, and got up. Bokuto's face brightened in response to this little gesture. He flashed a blinding smile.

"Thanks, Akaashi! And you guys, wait a little. Hinata, Kageyama, don't fight again!"

As the duo disappeared into the kitchen, Hinata jumped into the couch and whispered, "What do you think?"

"We think it's yer fault that we missed our chance, Shouyou-kun," Miya frowned at the shorter man. "If it wasn't for Tobio-kun and yer fight, we wouldn't have missed Bokkun's lover."

Hinata lowered his head in embarrassment and guilt. "Sorry! Kageyama, you say sorry too!"

"Sorry." Kageyama said, and Miya huffed in annoyance. He seemed to be on edge this whole evening. Not that Kiyoomi cared. But still, he noticed.

"But I think I know who Bokuto-san's lover is." Hinata said, his eyes glowing in excitement. Kiyoomi frowned in disbelief. Truth to be told, he respected Hinata for his exceptional skilla in volleyball but he did not have much respect for his intelligence. Miya looked dubious as well.

"Who is it, Shouyou-kun?"

"It's obviously Akaashi-san!"

"Why'dya think so?"

"Well, duh," Hinata said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Akaashi-san is always with Bokuto-san. He always comes to our matches. And Bokuto-san always talks about him. It's pretty clear, don't you think?"

Of course, Hinata's logic wasn't entirely wrong. All of the points were valid, but at the same time, those necessarily didn't imply their relationship as a romantic one. They could just be friends. Sure, the closeness and emotional intimacy between the two were certainly exceptional and hard to miss. During high school, Kiyoomi had come to contact with those two in a match, and had witnessed the bond between them; even then it was impossible to think of one without thinking about the other.

But still. They didn't look like a couple but rather a set of bestfriends. Their personalities were not only different, but contrasting. While Bokuto was loud, cheerful and all about volleyball, Akaashi was quiet, impassive and always found with dry wit and blunt remarks. It was hard to imagine compatibility between the two most unlikely duo.

Miya also seemed to find that true, as evident by his remark. "That's not reason enough, Shouyou-kun. I don't think it's Keiji-kun."

"Eh? Why?"

"Well, first of all, those two are nothin' alike," Miya said, and raised his hand to stop Hinata when he started to protest. "Also, do ya see Keiji-kun givin' someone a hickey?"

Hinata's face flushed like a tomato. If one noticed sharply, they could see smoke coming out of his head. He shook his head as reply, unable to say anything. It was amusing. Kiyoomi wasn't going to confess.

"Now ya see my point, Shouyou-kun," Miya chuckled, eyeing Kageyama who looked as confused as someone could possibly be. Kiyoomi could bet that Kageyama had no idea what the hell a hickey was. Of course. He and Hinata seemed to share a single braincell most of the time anyway.

"Miya is right," Kiyoomi said quietly; it hurt even to utter those words. "I don't think Akaashi is the person."

Miya beamed at him as if he had regained his honor as the best server. "Omi-Omi, did ya just say I was right?"

Kiyoomi glared at the setter, and decided not to reply. It was better not to indulge his already inflated ego.

"But Bokuto-san always talks about Akaashi-san! He knows everything about Akaashi-san!" Hinata protested again. It was like he wanted the two to be together. They had to stop their conversation as Bokuto and Akaashi entered the living room with tea and cookies.

"Sorry to keep you waiting, guys," Bokuto announced loudly (his default setting) as he put the cups and plate of cookies on the coffee table. "Try the cookies. They're delicious!" He looked at Akaashi and tilted his head slightly as if deep in thought. "Hey, Akaashi, did I use 'delicious' right?"

Akaashi sighed. "Yes, you did, Bokuto-san."

Yeah, definitely not a couple.

Chapter Text

Koutarou woke up with the biggest smile on his face. And why wouldn't he? It was a Sunday after all. He loved Sundays. He didn't have practice on Sundays, and while he used to be extremely pissed about it during high school, he was relieved about it now because now he knew rest was as important as training like crazy. Another good thing about Sunday was that Akaashi didn't have to go to work, and that meant they could spend the whole day together with just each other. It was the best part about Sundays — at least according to him anyway.

He looked to his left where Akaashi was sleeping, head lying on his chest. He looked younger while sleeping, his usually calm face looking even more serene and peaceful. Seeing him like this always reminded Koutarou of the quiet sixteen year old boy he had fallen in love with, and still fell with passing second they spent together.

Akaashi squirmed in his hold, his eyes fluttering open, and he looked at Koutarou with heavy-lidded sleepy eyes. "Good morning," he mumbled, smiling that small smile that Koutarou knew was reserved only for him.

"Good morning, Keiji," Koutarou beamed.

"Can we stay in the bed a little longer, please?" Akaashi said, tightening his hold around the older man and nuzzling closer. Koutarou chuckled at his antics.

"Sure," Koutarou said, pulling his boyfriend closer to him. After years together, he'd come to know that Akaashi was not a morning person. It took him some time to come out of his inner world and into the real world, while Koutarou himself loved mornings and how it brought a new day with new opportunities. They were different like that, and probably that was why they worked so well together.

"Hey, Keiji," Koutarou called, and smirked when Akaashi looked up at him. "We should go for drinks more often."

As expected, Akaashi frowned. "I'm never getting drunk ever again."

"Eh? Why?" Koutarou asked innocently even though he knew the answer. "You're so affectionate when you're drunk."

Again, as expected, Akaashi blushed. Koutarou loved seeing him blush; it didn't happen often. "Can we please not talk about that?" Akaashi deadpanned, ignoring his own flaming cheeks. "Ever?"

"No!" Koutarou laughed, "Please, let's talk about it, Keiji!" Akaashi's frown deepened, and he tried to turn around to get out of his boyfriend's embrace, but Koutarou was stronger. He held the pretty man close to him and flashed a sugary smile. "Don't go away, Keiji."

"I won't if you stop talking about it."

"Stop talking about what?" Koutarou blinked, tilting his head sideways as if to feign confusion. "Are you talking about the time when you got super drunk and almost ju—"

Koutarou was stopped abruptly when Akaashi slapped his hand on the other's mouth. "Don't say anymore."

Koutarou smiled against the palm. "Why are so embarrassed?" He mumbled, "I'm your boyfriend, you know? You're allowed to do stuffs to me. In fact we do stuffs to each other, remember?"

Akaashi groaned in embarrassment, retracting back his hand to cover his face. "I know," Akaashi muttered softly. "Still I can't believe I gave you a hickey. What was I thinking?!"

"You were thinking 'my boyfriend is so hot! I must kiss him and mark him so that everyone knows he's taken!'" Koutarou said thoughtfully. "At least that's what you were saying."

"You're horrible," Akaashi mumbled. His hands were still covering his face, but Koutarou could see the redness in his neck and tips of his ears. He was blushing like crazy.

Koutarou pried his hands away to reveal his boyfriend's pretty face. Akaashi was absolutely beautiful. He was looking up with his messy dark hair and gunmetal blue eyes and his pink plump mouth twisted in a pout. Koutarou's heart skipped a beat. "You're cute."

"You're embarrassing," Akaashi said, but his lips were already curling up to form a smile. "I'm sorry my hickey got you in trouble."

Koutarou blinked. What trouble? Akaashi seemed to understand his confusion, as he always did, and spoke again. "With your teammates. You said they asked about the hickey."

Realization dawned on his face. "Oh, right," Koutarou grinned. "I totally forgot about that! Well, don't worry about it. I managed a good excuse!"

Akaashi looked unimpressed. "You told them you got it by falling from the bed. That's hardly an excuse, let alone a good one."

"Eh? Don't say that, Keiji!" Koutarou cried. "They totally believed me! They never talked about it ever again."

"Are you sure?"

"Of course, I'm sure! Don't you worry so much, Keiji," Koutarou said, but the worry lines didn't disappear from his lover's forehead. He knew Akaashi had a habit of overthinking, and even though he respected the intelligence and analytical skills Akaashi possessed, he didn't like the negative effect it left on the man. So, he decided to distract his boyfriend by changing the subject. "Hey, Keiji, you didn't tell me how I looked this Friday! I worked so hard to dress nice for you!"

Akaashi smiled bashfully, his fingers trailing softly on the other's bare chest. "You looked very handsome," he said, avoiding eye contact. "You were very tempting. I'm sorry I was late."

"You thought I was tempting?" Koutarou repeated, his cheeks burning. It was not often that Akaashi expressed his thoughts about him in explicit words. Even after seven years, it still made him a blushing mess. "But I need to apologise to you, Keiji! Hinata and the other's crashed our date night. I had so much planned and it got ruined. I was still happy to see you, though!"

"I told you before, it's okay. I was happy to be with you anyway," Akaashi said softly. Koutarou knew how genuine his words were and felt lucky to be at the receiving end of such genuine feelings. "But Miya and Sakusa seemed a bit odd that evening, don't you think?"

Koutarou shook his head. He didn't even noticed anything different about the two. He was too engrossed in his joy to see Akaashi, his annoyance to miss their date night, and his duty to entertain his guests. But apparently Akaashi did. "How so?" he asked.

"Miya asked me two times what I was doing there and Sakusa seemed to observe me sharply," Akaashi replied contemplatively. "It was weird."

"Well, you know, those two are a bit weird. Tsum-Tsum pokes his nose at everything and Omi-Omi glares at everybody. Don't worry too much about it, okay?"

Akaashi hummed. But Koutarou knew he was still overthinking about it. He could read Akaashi just as well as Akaashi could read him. He cupped his boyfriend's face with his hands and pulled him closer for a sweet kiss. Akaashi sighed in contentment and kissed him back just as lovingly. When they pulled away, they shared one of their special smiles and just laid there together in each other's embrace.

After spending a few minutes in comfortable silence, Koutarou nudged Akaashi slightly. "Hey, Keiji?"

"Hm?"

"What happens next in Tenma-san's manga? Does the hero get a new power?"

Akaashi frowned at him. "I can't tell you that," he said. "And even if I could, I wouldn't, because you're a terrible secret keeper."

"Huh?" Koutarou cried. "What are you talking about? I'm an excellent secret keeper. I kept 'us' a secret!" And that was a truth. Koutarou, no matter how loud-mouthed and forgetful he was, he kept his relationship with Akaashi a secret for seven long years. Of course, there were a handful of people who knew — like their families and their old Fukurodani teammates, all of whom had realized their feelings for each other before they themselves had. But for the rest of world, they were just two friends who remained close no matter how different their world had gotten.

"That you did," Akaashi said in his usual flat tone, but Koutarou could hear the remnants of sadness in his voice, because he knew his voice contained the same stream of sadness and guilt.

Being with Akaashi was one of the best things life had given him — volleyball being the other one, and the fact that he had to hide their relationship saddened him deeply. He was generally an attention-seeking man and a show-off. He loved it when he was cheered and praised for his skills and every eye in the stadium was turned to him. He wanted to show off Akaashi to the world, and let them know that he had the best boyfriend.

But declaring their relationship was a little more complicated than he'd thought at first. Homosexuality might not be as much of an issue in Japan as in other countries, but the prejudice was still there. It might not be a simple matter for a public figure such as himself to announce his sexual orientation. He was still in the beginning of his career and had a long journey to the top, and dragging the attention from his game to his personal life might not be a good idea — at least according to Akaashi.

Akaashi, who was loving and sensible and analytical, had advised him in the beginning of the relationship to hide their relationship. He knew it hurt Akaashi deeply, but his former setter would always watch out for him, complete him in a way nobody else could.

He was so gonna marry that beautiful guy one day.

But for now... "I don't wanna keep 'us' a secret anymore, Keiji," Koutarou said, his voice deep with determination. Akaashi looked up at him with surprised eyes.

"I don't too, but what about public reaction? You're one of the most popular players in the country. Your fans adore you. What if they—"

"My fans love me because of my skills in volleyball. My relationship with you should never be a factor of that. I believe in my fans. I know they won't be so petty as to hate me just because I'm in a relationship with a guy."

Akaashi nodded his head, his face hooded. "But what about your team's image and what will your manager say and..." 

Koutarou sighed. He didn't want to stress Akaashi, not on the only day they had each other 100%. He wanted to spend an awesome day with his pretty boyfriend and have lots of fun. He held Akaashi's chin to make him look and grinned. "Don't worry now, Keiji! We'll figure this out together later, okay?"

Akaashi's eyes softened incredibly and he smiled in a way that made Koutarou melt. He caressed Koutarou's cheek with one hand, his other hand resting on the other's chest, and pulled him into another kiss — a slow, lazy but passionate kiss. Koutarou sighed.

He was so gonna marry this beautiful guy one day.

Chapter Text

Shouyou was stretching with Inunaki when Bokuto rushed into the gym. He watched with interest as the outside hitter approached their captain and said something that seemed like "sorry Captain I'm late, won't happen again". Meian patted his shoulder reassuringly and probably told him not to be late again. And that was when Shouyou noticed.

Bokuto was late on a Monday, and not just one Monday — Bokuto was late on every Monday. He was never drastically behind time, only five or a few more minutes, and that was precisely why he hadn't paid attention to it earlier. But everything seemed to have an ulterior meaning behind Bokuto's actions lately. Maybe this lateness on a particular day had some story behind it too.

"Inu-san," Shouyou said to his stretch partner. "Did you notice that Bokuto-san is late on every Monday?"

"Is that so?" Inunaki replied, stretching his legs on the floor. He glanced at Bokuto who was now warming up, and thought for a moment. "Yeah, you're right. He is actually late on Mondays."

"Why do you think?" Shouyou asked again.

"I don't know. Maybe he oversleeps on weekends." Inunaki offered. Shouyou nodded, but he didn't really buy it, though. Given the recent glances at his mentor's personal life, he smelt something more — something that'd probably lead to them finding out the identity of person they were dying to know.

Shouyou, in spite of his older companions' immovable logic, still wanted Akaashi to be that person. He knew it might seem unlikely since Akaashi was a person who could be described as the exact opposite of Bokuto, with his composed expression and level-headed nature as opposed to Bokuto's loud over-the-top persona. But that didn't mean much. He'd seen a few couples who were nothing like each other but still fell in love. Like Tanaka and Shimizu (though she too was Tanaka now).

And, they were always together. Not literally, but there was always an underlying presence of Akaashi in Bokuto's life. Be it in Bokuto's stories or among the audience in every one of their matches, Akaashi was always there. It had been the same ever since Shouyou saw them first at Nekoma's gym or got acquainted with them in the third gymnasium of Shinzen. Bokuto and Akaashi were together.

It was quite likely to form a romantic bond between two people who were present in each other's life in such extent, right?

But what stopped him from believing any romantic relationship between the Fukurodani alumni was the fact since the time Shouyou'd known them, no matter however close they were, they never behaved even remotely like a couple. Bokuto never expressed his interest in Akaashi, like Tanaka and Nishinoya did with Shimizu. And Akaashi, well Akaashi always seemed miffed and tired of his senpai's antics. There was never lingering touches or longing glances at each other, at least according to him. No way they were together like that.

With mild irritation, Shouyou realized that Sakusa and Atsumu had been right, and he had effectively made a fool out of himself by suggesting it in the first place. Kageyama's taunt ringed in his ears: "Don't use the brain you don't have, dumbass." Shouyou was going to kick his ass someday.

Putting aside his intense urge to smack his rival on the head, Shouyou noticed that a new clue had presented itself: Bokuto came late to practice every Monday. This could lead them to the knowledge they had been pursuing for five days.

In between practice, Shouyou kept a close eye on Bokuto to check if the older had suspected anything of their plan after their unannounced visits to his place. Bokuto, however, seemed oblivious as ever.

During their break, Shouyou went to Sakusa who was drinking water from his bottle, dragging Atsumu along with him. Sakusa raised an eyebrow at them, not bothering to voice out his question. "Did you guys notice that Bokuto-san is always late on Mondays?"

Both of them seemed to contemplate it for a moment before speaking simultaneously, "Yeah", Atsumu with excitement and Sakusa with indifference.

Encouraged by their interest or what Shouyou assumed was Sakusa's version of interest, he said, "Why do you think he's always late on that particular day?"

Sakusa looked unbothered. "Maybe he oversleeps. It's the day after Sunday, after all."

Shouyou deflated. He knew that was a possibility, and a strong one at that, but still he was expecting something more exciting than oversleeping. But his disappointed vanished again when Atsumu's sly voice came. "Or maybe Bokkun spends Sunday with someone and gets distracted the next mornin', if ya know what I mean."

Hinata did not know what he meant, but Sakusa seemed to get the point. He visibly cringed at the setter. "Do you always have your mind in the gutter?"

Atsumu frowned. "Don'tcha get all holy on me, Omi-Omi. Ya know all about hickeys and yet ya pretend like—"

"Don't you ever shut up?"

Atsumu made a face at the taller man. He glared at Sakusa before turning his attention to Hinata who stood there like a kid on their first day of elementary school. The setter offered him a smile. "Good job findin' that one, Shouyou-kun."

Shouyou beamed. "Thanks! But how will we know for sure?"

"I've got a plan." Atsumu announced in a low voice, a sly smirk playing on his lips.

"None of your plans work, Miya." Sakusa's commented as matter-of-fact, and Shouyou almost winces.

"Do ya always have to antagonise me, Omi-Omi?"

"I don't have to," Sakusa's face turned into an unpleasant scowl. "It's your natural talent to be so annoying."

"What'cha—"

"Atsumu-san, Omi-san, please don't fight," Shouyou practically begged. "Captain's gonna get angry again."

The older duo casted a glance at Meian who was chatting along with Barnes near the benches, and decided it was better not to rile up their usually calm but oddly scary captain by bickering on pointless things.

"So as I was sayin'," Atsumu paused deliberately, glancing between the two, "I've got a plan that'll work 100%."

Before Sakusa could throw in another snarky remark, Shouyou chirped in excitedly, "What plan, Atsumu-san?"

"We'll get Bokkun super drunk," Atsumu's smirk widened. "And he'll spit everything out."

"Gross." Sakusa twisted his face in disgust, causing the setter to glare at him. Shouyou, on the other hand, did not like this plan only because he hated alcohol. Drinking out never did him any good, only bad headache and hazy memories of the night in the next morning that cost him a whole day of practice. On top of that, he was a really bad drunk. No, he absolutely did not want to embarrass himself in front of his fairly new teammates.

"Will it be a good idea, Atsumu-san?" Shouyou asked unsurely. "Getting drunk, I mean. We have a match this Saturday, after all."

"Don'tcha worry, Shouyou-kun. It'll be fine. Just a couple of drinks won't hurt. It'll be bondin' time, I tell ya."

"First of all, I'm not getting drunk," Sakusa said. "And second, your plans suck. There's no way Bokuto will tell us about his lover."

"Shut yer mouth, Omi-Omi! I bet'cha it'll work. Drunk people say private things about themselves all the time," Atsumu said nonchalantly. "But if ya don't wanna drink, no problem. Shouyou-kun and I will get drunk with Bokkun."

"Um, Atsumu-san?" Shouyou fidgeted in his spot as the older men turned their attention to him. "I don't wanna drink either."

"Huh? Don'tcha do that, Shouyou-kun! It's clearly Omi-kun's bad effect on ya!" Atsumu practically howled, causing a few, including Bokuto, to look in their direction with incredulous expressions. Sakusa glared daggers at the blonde who muttered a small "sorry" under his breath.

"I'm sorry, Atsumu-san but I'm a terrible drinker! I'll get wasted much before Bokuto-san and our plan won't work that way."

Atsumu seemed to understand his point and nodded. "Alright, Shouyou-kun, ya don't have to drink. I'll drink with Bokkun and get the secret out."

Optimism bloomed in Shouyou’s chest. He beamed at his setter. "Really? Thanks, Atsumu-san!"

"No problem," Atsumu flashed a charming grin. "Besides, I'm an awesome drinker."

When the plan was made, Shouyou didn't know this was how it was going to turn out. He sighed in distress at his own naivety. Of course things would turn out like this when his teammates were involved. He should have known better by now. But what was done was done, and now he had sit in his apartment, with cheap vodka, two very surprised men and one very drunk Miya Atsumu.

"Shouyou-kun, this vodka isn't very good, ya know!" Atsumu whined, his words coming out slurry. "Ya could've loosened the purse strings a little!"

Shouyou gaped, glanced at the half empty bottle, then back at the speaker. "Um, Atsumu-san, you brought the drink."

Bokuto burst out into laughter beside him, earning a glare from the blonde. Surprisingly Bokuto had amazing alcohol tolerance, and drank as many as Atsumu without any prominent indication of his intoxication. The most clear traits of his drunkenness were the flush on his face and the pitch of his voice that got higher with every shot. 

Sakusa, on the other hand, sat with a scowl and a prominent distance from the rest. He did not look impressed by the state of Shouyou’s place, which he admitted was not in an ample condition, with manga and magazines and DVDs of old volleyball matches littering the living room, and his bedroom in a worse condition.

"Tsum-Tsum, you okay there?" Bokuto asked with way too much energy, nudging the addressed man with his elbow and earning a snarl in the process. Atsumu set his drooping eyes on his attacker and frowned.

"Bokkun, y'know I'm so jealous of ya! Why'dya have so many fans?!" Atsumu said accusingly, swallowing another shot. "And that stupid clap thing! Laaaaaaaameee!"

Bokuto pouted at the words. "You're mean when you're drunk, Tsum-Tsum!" The big man whined. "Don'tcha call my fans lame! They're cool! Right, Hinata?"

Shouyou nodded weakly. When Atsumu'd claimed that he was a good drinker, he should've expected the exact opposite. The way the setter had plunged into the realm of chaotic drunkenness, Shouyou doubted if their actual plan would even be put to work. Looking at the way Atsumu was spewing his own deep seeded thoughts about his teammates instead of questioning about "the lover", it was unlikely that he'd get Bokuto to reveal any secrets.

He needed to stop whatever crazy stuff was about to come, potentially a verbal fight, judging by the way Bokuto and Atsumu were snarling at each other. He could always say he was getting tired, but he didn't want to be rude to his teammates. He wanted to say he had somewhere to go, but he really didn't. If it were some other time, he could pay Kageyama an uninvited visit, but the man was currently in Hokkaido for a match. Maybe Kenma then—

"Shouyou-kun!" Atsumu's slurry call snapped him out of his thoughts, and Shouyou laughed internally when he realised he'd mentally blocked the chaos his teammates (of course, excluding Sakusa). But he mental laughter halted suddenly and he chocked on thin air as his setter went on. "When are ya and Tobio-kun gonna stop dancin' round each other and just... y'know!" Atsumu made some vague gestures with his hands, but Shouyou was too shocked and too flustered to make out anything.

Annoyingly, Sakusa snickered at the baseless comment of the setter, while Bokuto didn't even try to control himself and laughed out so loudly that Shouyou was afraid his neighbours were going to hate him until he perished from the world. He knew Atsumu was drunk and probably had no filter or mind to control his speech, but cheeks didn't get the memo and were burning bright red.

"Don'tcha laugh too much, Bokkun!" Atsumu reprimanded the outside hitter. "Why don'tcha tell us how ya got that hickey?!"

Bokuto's howling laughter stopped abruptly, his golden eyes wide and his face scarlet. He instinctively reached out to touch the place on his neck where the hickey was previously discovered, and sputtered, "W-What hickey? What are you talking about, Tsum-Tsum?" Bokuto forced out a laugh that sounded more of a choked sound than anything. "You're drunk, Tsum-Tsum!"

Shouyou and Sakusa shared a glance.

Atsumu glared at Bokuto as if he had demanded a kidney from him. "Ya suck at lyin'! I know ya have a lover! Fri—"

Atsumu couldn't finish the sentence as Sakusa captured everyone's attention by calling out uncharacteristically loud. "Oi, Miya, you're drunk. Let's get you home."

That seemed to work. Atsumu, intoxicated as he was, forgot the previous conversation in a second and beamed at the black-haired man. "Ya'll get me home? Aww, ya do care for me, Omi-Omi!"

Sakusa's face was hidden by the mask, but just by the dark look in his eyes, Shouyou could tell that he was making a disgusted face. "Don't get to wrong conclusion. I'm offering because I am a decent human being, unlike you," Sakusa muttered the words dispassionately. "Now get up before I leave you here."

Atsumu got to his feet like a child promised candy by their mother, beaming unreasonably with a dopey smile on his face. "See ya later, losers!"

With that, he followed Sakusa, who only nodded at the two dumbfounded people in the room and left without saying anything, out of the door. Their voices could be heard in the hallway which sounded something like Atsumu exclaiming “wow, ya smell so good, Omi-Omi!” and Sakusa snapping at him “that’s because I am clean, unlike you.” Bokuto and Shouyou remained in the apartment with their mouths hung open;  the former being baffled and the latter in a mix of emotions that included amazement, shock and exasperation.

They still did not know who gave the hickey.

Chapter Text

Miya Atsumu was having a weird week. Granted, it was only Wednesday, but still. It all started when Hinata had pointed out that Bokuto was late every Monday, and Atsumu had very stupidly proposed to get the drunk and pull the truth out of his surprisingly tight-lipped mouth. However, Bokuto had turned out to be a monster in drinking. After four shots of vodka, while Atsumu's brain had been positively turned into mush, the outside hitter had only been tipsy: flushing bright red and sporting a grin goofier than usual. Despite poking the subject of his love-life several times, he answered with nothing but "hey, do owls feel butterfly in their stomach when they fall in love? Do they get scared it's the same butterfly they ate? Hey don't ignore me!"

So, in the end, the plan totally flopped, and they came to know nothing about Bokuto's lover, and a little about how Atsumu was kind of a loser in drinking — nothing he was happy about.

After these many failed attempts and absolutely no solid proof about the alleged lover, Atsumu was almost ready to believe the person never existed. It was all a big misunderstanding. Maybe Bokuto was saying the truth and that was not a hickey but a scar and he had truly gotten it by falling off the bed. Maybe the reason he was always late on Mondays was because he overslept in the weekends. That could be it.

Yeah, that did seem really plausible because after "the date" on that Friday, Bokuto hadn't behaved in any way that might indicate him having a lover, except for the times when his phone chimed with text messages and he smiled brightly while reading them. But that could be anybody. The bicolor haired man looked happy even when Hinata texted him. Other than that, he was as normal as ever, at least as normal as Bokuto could be. He was always over-energetic, always yelling and always being annoyingly good in volleyball. He still shared every tiny useless details about his everyday life like "I have to buy new shampoo" and "I found two new moles on my body today". Listening to him blabber about, Atsumu wondered how was it possible for such a loud-mouthed man to keep such a huge secret. Maybe they were wrong.

Another weird thing about this week was Atsumu's confusingly pleasant feelings about another one of his outside hitters, also known as Sakusa Kiyoomi. It started when he got too hammered trying to fish out the identity of Bokuto's lover, and Sakusa had to escort him home.

Atsumu didn't remember everything clearly, due to the alcohol in his system, but he did remember few things, like he had teased Hinata about Kageyama, and how Sakusa smelt so nice, and the way Sakusa had held him when he was about to trip and fall down. It was nice, he thought. Sakusa always carried a wall around him, masked with the notion "I don't give a shit about anyone", but deep down, he cared.

Atsumu also remembered that when Sakusa had asked him for his address, he'd made a lame joke about how it'd felt like a date with the two of them walking together under the moon and going to one's apartment to spend the night. He didn't remember what Sakusa had answered, but he had a pretty good guess it hadn't been anything pleasant.

When the two of them had finally reached Atsumu's place, Sakusa had tried to bid him farewell, only for him to whine and practically drag the taller man into the apartment. He didn't recall the details, but he was sure Sakusa had cringed and nagged about the hygiene. But what he did remember properly, for some unknown reason, was how displeased Sakusa had looked when he'd jumped on the bed without changing his clothes, and had said, "You need to take better care of yourself."

He knew Sakusa had only meant it in a casual way, probably about sanitation and careless alcohol consumption, but still the words had pierced him in a way that it'd survived through his haziness caused by cheap vodka and the hellish hangover next morning. He'd even almost missed practice, but the words stayed.

He might've been imagining the whole thing since he was indeed very drunk, but he wanted to it believe it was true. It was nice believing the person who appeared disgusted with him most of time to say such a sincere thing.

Atsumu's head was filled with these thoughts when the practice ended and everyone was panting and wiping sweat and drinking water after the tiring physical activity. He could hear the voices of teammates in the background, but he couldn't focus on them; his mind muddled with thoughts about a certain dark haired man.

Still preoccupied, Atsumu got up from the bench and headed towards the locker room. He knew all of his teammates were still in the gym, but he wanted to take a shower before anyone else. Of course, Sakusa was going to be hellishly angry if someone took a shower before him and contaminated it with germs. He could imagine the way the spiker would glare at him, and found out that he wouldn't really mind. It was fun to rile Sakusa up and he truly wanted a long shower more than anything else.

Atsumu was just about to enter the room when a heard a very familiar voice: a voice that was usually too loud to endure, but at the moment too affectionate not to notice. The sound was soft, but he could still hear it properly (thanks to years of practice of making out the curses Osamu was throwing at him under his breath).

"Yeah, my practice's over. I'll meet you in thirty minutes at the restaurant, babe," Bokuto was saying. "Love you. Bye." And with that, the man hung up, securing the smartphone in the locker, and headed to shower, leaving a certain blonde with his mouth hung open.

"What. The. Hell." Atsumu uttered the words with difficulty, shock creating space between each word. He stared at Bokuto's locker, wishing for the thing to just bang open so he could take the phone and see who the hell was this person of his teammate's affection, and how the hell did they manage to make the loud-mouthed man keep the relationship a secret. Maybe the person would turn out to a wizard or a witch. He was curious.

Scratch that. He was desperate. He needed to know—

"Atsumu-san, are you alright?" Atsumu almost jumped when he heard the voice behind him. Turning around, he found Hinata and Sakusa standing and looking at him; the taller man with a frown and the shorter man with curiosity. The others were still probably in the gym. Perfect timing!

"Ya won't believe what just happened," Atsumu whispered, leaning closer to them.

Sakusa made an unimpressed face. "Not this again."

"What, what? Is it about Saturday's game?" Hinata perked up, just like he always did when volleyball was involved. It was almost overwhelming how much he loved the sport. But, yeah, sometimes irritating too.

"No, Shouyou-kun, it's about Bokkun and his lover," Atsumu said, and turned his attention to the raven. "And Omi-Omi, don'tcha dismiss me so fast!"

Sakusa didn't find it necessary to reply. Thankfully, Hinata did. "Eh? What about Bokuto-san and his lover?" The little man said. "Did you find who it is?"

Now, Atsumu felt a little stupid. There was too much expectations from him. "Er...no," he began lamely. "But I actually got to hear somethin' good."

Sakusa rolled his eyes. Even Hinata looked disappointed. But before they both lost interest in whatever he was saying, he quickly started again, "I just heard Bokkun talkin' to his lover on phone. He's gonna meet them in a restaurant in thirty minutes."

"How do know it was his lover?" Surprisingly, Sakusa said. Doubtfully. "It could've been anybody." Hinata nodded his head in agreement.

"But he called them 'babe'" Atsumu said, then changed his tone to honey and smirked at the tall spiker. "Of course, ya wouldn't call some 'babe' unless it's yer lover, now would ya, Omi-kun?"

Sakusa's frown deepened, almost bordering on murderous, but Atsumu could see the very faint tint of pink on his ears. It was adorable, really.

"But what do we do now?" It was Hinata, breaking whatever tension was brewing between the two older man. Atsumu turned his gaze away from Sakusa to look at Hinata — cute, jumpy, orange Hinata. If it was someone else, Atsumu would've damned them to hell, but the cuteness of the opposite hitter made it impossible to be angry with him.

"We follow him to the restaurant and catch them red-handed." 

"Miya, I think we've all established all of your plans suck," Sakusa made a displeased face. "And none of them works."

"Huh? Don't say like that, Omi-kun!" Atsumu practically wailed, gaining a glare from the addressed man. "I'm tellin' ya, this time it'll work and we'll see who gave Bokkun a hickey."

"Whatever. Count me out."

"What?! No! Ya have to come with us, Omi-kun!"

"I am not going. Stop pestering me, Miya."

"Guys," Hinata spoke suddenly, and the two men stopped arguing to look at him. "If we're gonna follow Bokuto-san to the restaurant in thirty minutes, I think we should get going. But where is Bokuto-san now, anyway?"

"He's in the shower."

Sakusa clicked his tongue in annoyance, his face darker than it usually was. He might be plotting about killing Bokuto in his sleep, but Atsumu hoped he wouldn't kill Bokuto until the learn who the secret lover is. After that, he himself might help Sakusa in the deed since the owl-like man gave them so much trouble finding his secret affair.

"Okay, so we'll have to take quick showers then," Hinata nodded his head wisely. "Omi-san, please don't take long. At least for today."

Sakusa grumbled, but muttered a stingy "yeah, alright", gaining a blinding smile from the shortest of the three. Atsumu was itching to yell why the hell Sakusa agreed to Hinata so casually when he never agreed to Atsumu even once. He got that Hinata was adorable, and thus it was impossible to say "no" to him (he was pretty sure Kageyama would disagree), but Atsumu was adorable too (now maybe Osamu would disagree). It should be impossible to say "no" to him too.

"If I have to go with you," Sakusa said and immediately grimaced when he saw the hopeful looks on the other two. "'If' being the keyword here, how are we going to do that? Bokuto, no matter how stupid he is, will know we're following him."

Atsumu grinned in a way he hoped looked charming and not like a creep. "I'm glad ya asked, Omi-kun," Atsumu said, and decided to ignore the doubtful looks on his teammates' faces. "We're gonna go in disguise!"

"Wah! That's so cool, Atsumu-san!" Hinata glowed.

"Okay, that's it." Sakusa said with finality. "You're not going to make any more plans."

"Why?!" Atsumu whined. "It's a good plan! It'll be like those spy movies."

"Shut up. We don't need any disguise. We'll just need caps and sunglasses," Sakusa said, pointing his fingers towards the others. "And you too need to wear masks."

"It's not fun like mine," Atsumu grumbled. "But it's not entirely bad, either. Ya win, Omi-Omi."

"But, Omi-san," Hinata's brighter than the sun smile was back on his tan face. "Does that mean you're really coming with us?"

Sakusa didn't answer, obviously too embarrassed to snap. He made his way towards his locker, opening it to get his stuff. He looked over his shoulders and grumbled once again. "I'm going to shower first. Then you two can go."

Chapter Text

"Stop trying to be sneaky. You're drawing more attention that way," Kiyoomi hissed at Hinata, whose fluffy orange hair was tucked in a cap, and his eyes and mouth shielded by sunglasses and a mask. He was currently walking in a way that he thought looked cool and spy-like, but only managed to seem like a total moron. The other one with them wasn't any better. Wearing sunglasses, mask and a hoodie, Miya was puffing his chest and looking around like some stupid prince of some stupid kids' movies. He too only managed to look like a moron.

Kiyoomi had never really been able to find out just what evil had possessed him almost a week ago when he'd made the mistake to ask about the damn hickey. But at this point, he felt like it wouldn’t make any difference anyway. The harm was already done.

"But, Omi-san," Hinata exclaimed, unable to show his bright grin under the mask. "Look, I'm Ninja Shouyou!"

“Good one, Shouyou-kun!” Miya probably grinned, holding his thumb up to show encouragement at the ginger.

Kiyoomi sighed. It was no point trying to reprimand them. He rather focused his attention to the man they were following. Yes, he knew following someone without their knowledge was a bad thing to do, and they should never ever do it. He also knew that if Meian came to know about this little adventure of theirs, they'd get their asses kicked by their captain. But still, there was no way they'd give up when they were so close. 

And mainly because if after hanging out with the most irritating people on Earth didn't bring any fruition, he might pull his own hair out.

Kiyoomi instead focused his attention on the man they were currently spying on. Bokuto was a good twenty steps ahead of them, blissfully ignorant about his teammates’ not-so-moral activities. Unlike the three of them, who Kiyoomi later realized must’ve looked like extras from some cheap mafia movie, Bokuto was wearing a plain t-shirt under the MSBY jacket with normal jeans. His attire didn’t really scream fancy or date-like. But that must’ve the intention since the whole affair thing was a secret and all. And this was the reason why the whole thing bothered Kiyoomi so much: how did Bokuto managed to plan all these when he thought that world’s best ice-cream was made in Antarctica. ‘You never know a person truly.’

It had been around fifteen minutes since Bokuto had bid them an over-energetic farewell and had set out to meet his secret lover after throwing a careless excuse like “I’ve got some things to do” to those who had questioned his haste. Kiyoomi, Hinata and Miya hadn’t gone immediate after him, and waited for three who minutes before they started trailing the golden-eyed spiker. He guessed the restaurant must be near their gym since Bokuto didn’t taken any transport and instead walked.

“How far is he gonna walk?!” Miya said irritably, his eyes possibly glaring at Bokuto behind the sunglasses. He casually moved closer to Kiyoomi, shoulders touching the taller man’s arm. “Do ya think he’s onto us, Omi-Omi?”

Kiyoomi glared at the setter. “No, I don’t think he’s onto us,” he said through gritted teeth. “And don’t come close to me.”

Miya’s whole body seemed to deflate; his shoulders drooped and his hands fell out of his pockets. His eyes and half of the face were hidden, but a look of hurt still flashed in his features. Kiyoomi’s frown deepened as a sudden pang of guilt presented itself to him, which was weird since it was nothing new that he’d scold Miya for being gross when the latter invaded his personal space. That had been the case since he’d joined Jackals and had become teammates with the setter. Then why the sudden wake of conscience?

Maybe it was because Miya had been acting a little weird since the day he’d gotten his ass drunk while trying to find out about Bokuto’s lover and failing miserably. It wasn’t anything very over-the-top, which was usually the case for the blonde, but the weirdness was still there in the little things. For example, he was being extra clingy to Kiyoomi, which was weird and also annoying beyond anything. During the practice, he was unbearable, asking for high-fives every two seconds or just talking to him for no reason. Sometimes Kiyoomi could feel he was being stared at, and he did not like it. “Do ya always have to be so mean, Omi-Omi?” Miya asked, his smirk flowing in his voice. He was back to normal, it seemed. ‘What the hell is going on with him!’

“Shut up.”

“Y’know if yer fans see ya so prickly, they’d run away.”

Kiyoomi glared at the setter. “Still I’d have more fans than you.”

As expected, Miya gasped. “Ya did not say that, Omi-kun!”

“Shut up,” Kiyoomi hissed. “Don’t be dramatic.”

“Hey,” Hinata spoke up suddenly. “Who do you think has most fans in our team?”

“That’s obvious, Shouyou-kun,” Miya pointed his thumb at his chest. “The best setter in the country!”

“The best setter title was given to Kageyama,” Kiyoomi said and felt awfully pleased when the blonde clicked his tongue in annoyance. “And Bokuto has the most number of fans, at least recently.” 

“Wow!” Hinata’s energy seemed to gleam through the shades and mask.“ That’s so cool! I knew my mentor was the coolest! But I won’t lose to him!” Hinata punched the air determinedly, but quickly lowered his hand when Kiyoomi glared at him. “Atsumu-san, don’t mind! Kageyama got the best setter title, but I think your sets are very cool too!” Hinata said with an intention to encourage, but the setter was anything but. He huffed irritably, turning his face away.

Kiyoomi snickered. “Serves you right.”

“Huh?” Miya turned to glare at the taller man. “What –”

“Look, look!” Hinata’s chirping voice. The two quarrelling men turned to look at what Hinata was pointing, and gaped. Their destination restaurant was visible from where they stopped walking, and in front of it was Bokuto… with a woman.

The woman, though not near, not very far either, seemed to be around their age. From the distance, Kiyoomi could figure out that she was short and plump, red hair falling around her round face. She was smiling at Bokuto fondly as the man grabbed her in a loving hug. By the movement of her lips, it was clear that she was saying something, and as a reply, Bokuto burst into his boisterous laughter.

“What the hell!” Miya exclaimed louder than he should have, earning a few looks from the people around him. “So, this is the person!”

“I can’t believe Bokuto-san kept this a secret,” Hinata muttered, and by the redness evident in his neck, he was probably blushing at the public display of affection of his teammate. “She looks familiar, though.”

“Do you know who she is?” Kiyoomi asked, his eyes never leaving the couple across the street. The couple was no longer hugging, but talking to each other animatedly – at least Bokuto was talking animatedly while the woman had more of a laid-back attitude. The woman then said something to Bokuto, and he hid his face in his hands, possibly blushing at a comment meant for him. They did look close, but still something was off in the way they behaved that Kiyoomi couldn’t quite point out.

“Not really, but…” Hinata trailed off.

“Why aren’t they goin’ in?” Miya asked.

“Maybe they are waiting for someone,” Hinata supplied helpfully. That could be the case, judging by how frequently the woman glanced at the street. So, there was this possibility that this was the woman they’d been trying to find out for more than a week, or there was this other possibility that the person they were waiting for was yet to come.

“She really looks familiar,” Hinata spoke again, his voice frustrated. “Why can’t I remember where I’ve seen her?!”

“Didja see her photo on Bokkun’s phone?” Miya asked, glancing at the redheaded man.

Hinata shook his head. “No, that’s not it. And besides, we only look at memes and cute owl videos on Bokuto-san’s phone,” he chuckled. “Bokuto-san sends the funniest videos!”

“I know! Last night he sent me a video of two men getting kicked in the balls by a giraffe,” Miya laughed as he recalled the contents of the video. A vein popped on Kiyoomi’s forehead. And that was why he never revealed his personal phone number to any of his teammates, except their captain, Meian.

“Hey, look! Bokuto-san’s holding her hand!” Hinata chimed excitedly, pointing his finger which Kiyoomi immediately slapped down, and the smaller man let out a "ouch!". True to the words, Bokuto was really holding the woman’s hand in his own, and was inspecting something closely that they couldn’t see from afar.

"He looks excited," Miya commented, and really, Bokuto did look excited. Even from afrar, the bright excitement on his face was clear. Then, he dropped the hand he was holding, and said something while scratching the back of his neck shyly. The woman laughed, and poked her finger on her partner's stomach teasingly. Bokuto laughed along with her.

The three spectators stared, open-mouthed and gaping. There was no denying it. After several attempts that could only be described as poor, they'd finally done it. Finished their quest. They unearthed the mystery of Bokuto's lover. There was no doubt that the couple were in love, so casually affectionate with each other and so comfortably that could only be achieved with a long time of togetherness. The woman must be the one who gave Bokuto the hickey. But—

"They're still waiting for someone, it seems," Kiyoomi said because while the couple did look like they were having the time of their lives, they still hadn't entered the restaurant. But as if he heard the man talk, Bokuto checked his phone for a moment and led the woman inside the restaurant.

"Huh, looks like they aren't anymore," Miya remarked, supported by Hinata nodding his head. Kiyoomi looked the restaurant one last time, watching the couple disappear behind the glass door. He looked back at his companions, both of them gazing at the door giddily. They seemed happier than they should have. But then again, when did they ever do anything in moderation?

"Stop staring at the door like creeps," Kiyoomi barked, already turning around. "We've seen what we came to see. Now, let's go back. I'm not staying around all these germs."

"Hai!" The idiot duo sang in unison.

Chapter Text

Shouyou was in a bit of a predicament. After lots of cunning plans and failed attempts, it was only yesterday that they got see Bokuto’s lover when they’d been following Bokuto and had located the couple in front of a restaurant. They were yet to know about the person’s identity, but otherwise it was a successful expedition.

The woman with Bokuto, who was indeed his girlfriend, judging by the way they were behaving with each other, seemed like a nice lady. Shouyou was happy that his mentor had found himself in a healthy relationship. While he was still in Brazil, he’d heard some not-so-flattering stories about horrendous relationships that had made him feel less sorry for himself for never having any luck with ladies; not that he ever tried to, anyway. But that aside, for some reason, Bokuto’s girlfriend really looked familiar to him. He felt like he’d seen her somewhere, but he couldn’t point his finger on exactly where or when. Maybe Atsumu was right and he saw her picture on Bokuto’s phone.

But the real question was, now that they’d seen the person, what were they going to do about it? Were they supposed to confront Bokuto? What should they say to Bokuto while confronting him about his love life? And if they confronted Bokuto, wouldn’t they have to confess that they were following him and making schemes to poke their noses at his personal matter? No matter how sweet and carefree Bokuto was, he was bound to be angry with them after knowing everything. Shouyou felt a pang of guilt for that.

Shouyou’s mind was filled with all these thoughts as the team was taking a break from their practice. Everyone was pretty energetic and the practice was going really well. It was Thursday already, and they had their match against Hiroshima Blue Wings on Saturday. Shouyou, himself, was very pumped about the match, as he always was for things related to volleyball. In fact, Atsumu and he was doing a great job at their new quick attack. He couldn’t wait to show it off on the court.

Shouyou’s cellphone chimed, and he picked it up from the bench where it was kept. He smiled when he saw a new message from his fated rival and reluctant friend, whom he’d previously texted, asking him to come to his match on Saturday. He opened the unread message.

From: Kageyama Tobio

I can’t come. I have practice.

His phone chimed again with the arrival of a new message.

From: Kageyama Tobio

All the best for your match. Don’t suck.

Hinata frowned, looking at the message. His eyes twitched in fury. Here he thought Kageyama was getting better at being a decent human being, and the stupid King of the Court went on to prove him wrong again. His hands itched to smack his rival roughly on the head; a kick on his ass would suffice too. While he was fuming, he was also feeling embarrassed. After all, he was the one who asked. And yes, he knew practice was important more than anyone. But he also knew it wouldn’t be much of a problem for the setter to come to his match once. That’s why he’d asked in the first place.

When Kageyama returned to Tokyo after his match, which Schweiden Adlers won by the way, Shouyou thought about inviting his former teammate to his match. He knew Kageyama would later watch the game on his phone or with his teammates to take notes on them, but he wanted his friend to see the match to see him play. It made no sense to him at first, but that didn’t stop him from wanting exactly that.

Shouyou knew it was kind of weird for him to feel this way. But he really did want to play the game he was sure he was born to play, while knowing that Kageyama was watching directly from among the thousand other audiences in the stadium, and he wanted to show off his skills to him. It was something he always wanted to do, but lately the want had increased. Maybe it was because he saw Akaashi come to so many of their matches, mostly the ones in Tokyo but sometimes the away games too, and Bokuto would always search for his friend in the audience. He’d clap his hands at the fans, like he always did before serving. But whenever Akaashi came to their matches, the clap would always be towards his direction. Shouyou found it extremely endearing.

He wanted that kind of experience where his eyes would look for someone in the audience before his serving or after a nice spike or a brilliant dig, and he’d find the same pride he saw in Akaashi’s eyes for Bokuto. Maybe asking Kageyama was a bad idea, since the setter was notoriously infamous for his lack of social skills, but truthfully, Shouyou could not imagine asking anybody else. And that pissed him off the most.

“Shouyou-kun, why’re ya glaring at yer phone?” Shouyou’s mental rambling snapped when he heard his setter’s voice. Atsumu was looking at him curiously, glancing between him and his phone.

“It’s nothing,” Hinata grumbled. “It’s just stupid Kageyama.”

Atsumu looked amused. “Tobio-kun is a bit stupid, ain’t he?”

“Of all the people in the world,” Sakusa said as he came to join the duo by the benches. “You shouldn’t call anyone stupid, Miya.”

“Huh? What’s that supposed to mean, Omi-kun?” Atsumu whined. “Why’re ya so mean to me?”

“I am just telling the truth,” Sakusa remained indifferent to the setter’s whining.

Fearing another one of the duo’s dispute coming, Shouyou decided to change the topic to distract them. Being the youngest member of the team, that was his only option anyway. “Atsumu-san, Omi-san,” he called to successfully draw their attention to him. “Now that we’ve seen Bokuto-san with his girlfriend, what are we going to do next?”

“Nothing.”

“We’re gonna trick him into confessin’.”

Atsumu and Sakusa said at the same time. Shouyou gaped. The other two looked at each other; Sakusa frowned and Atsumu made a face.

“Nothin’?! After everythin’ we’ve been through, ya wanna do nothin’ about it?” Atsumu asked, his hands doing exaggerated to make his point. “Don’t ya wanna let him know that we won?”

Sakusa seemed to mull over the matter for a moment. “It’ll be fun to humiliate him,” he said casually, glancing at Bokuto’s direction where he was having a serious discussion with Meian and their coach, Samson Foster. Shouyou wondered whether they were discussing the strategies for the upcoming match. They were looking very serious, after all. He wanted to join them. “Maybe the humiliation will shut him up for a few days.”

“Now yer getting it, Omi-Omi,” Atsumu smirked which never failed to irk the dark-haired spiker.

Sensing another incoming clash, Shouyou intervened again. “Hey, isn’t it great that our last attempt worked?” He was getting good at that. Was that how his high school upperclassmen used to feel when he and Kageyama fought over every tiny little thing? ‘Sorry about that, Daichi-san, Suga-san,’ he thought, then remembered his other two high school captains who had to take over Daichi and Sugawara’s duty during the last two years of high school respectively. ‘You guys deserve a sorry too, Ennoshita-san, Yamaguchi!’

“Of course, it’s great, Shouyou-kun,” Atsumu’s signature haughty smirk flashed, reveling the praise. He wiggled his eyebrows at Sakusa. “Omi-Omi, ya made fun of my plans all the times. See, I told ya it’ll work. Never doubt a setter, Omi-Omi, and certainly not the best one!”

Okay, so maybe Shouyou wasn’t as great at distracting fights as he’d previously thought. He watched anxiously as Sakusa frowned at the setter, opening to mouth to, no doubt, throw a burning insult. But the gods above seemed to pleased with Shouyou, and their break ended, everyone running back to practice. Shouyou went with Atsumu to practice with their quick attack, and Sakusa went to practice digging with Inunaki, Bokuto and Tomas.

By the time practice ended and Sakusa came back from showering before everyone, while Shouyou, Bokuto and Atsumu were chatting with others in the locker room, the trio had no solid plan about how to make Bokuto confess about his affair. The team was laughing at a funny story about a goose Inunaki was telling, Bokuto most of all, with his carefree loud laughter that Shouyou always found cool about him.

“Atsumu-san,” Shouyou said in a quiet voice so that only Atsumu and Sakusa, who were standing beside him, could hear. “What’s your plan?”

“I say we wait until everyone’s gone,” Atsumu replied in low voice. “So that we can ask him in private.”

“Of course,” Sakusa said in a voice that indicated that it was the most natural thing to in this situation, and anyone who thought otherwise or included it in a plan was a moron. Shouyou kind of agreed. Not Atsumu being a moron part, because he knew how clever their setter was and also in his whole life, he’d the urge to call only one person moron and he was certainly doing that already, but it was the other part that he agreed with.

Thankfully, in return of Sakusa’s mocking, Atsumu only huffed.

The chatting and gossiping about opponents and other stuffs Shouyou listened but had no clue of went on as the players showered and changed into their civilian cloths and left, while the four youngest players remained. Shouyou had purposefully engaged Bokuto in a long conversation by asking him about muscle training. The older man had caught the bait, and now was listing about several types of exercise that would make the short spiker “as beefy as the best ace in Japan”.

When his long speech about muscles and great physique was done, the trio shared a knowing look. Their plan was still non-existant, but Shouyou had put his utmost trust on his setter to handle things. Sakusa did not seem to share the sentiment. The usual.

“Bokkun, we’ve somethin’ to ask ya –”

“I’ve something to show you guys –”

Atsumu said and Bokuto exclaimed at the same time, then stared at each other with open mouths. Shouyou caught Atsumu saying something under his breath that sounded a lot like “not this again”. He inhaled deeply as if calming himself not to snap at everyone, and looked at Bokuto with curious eyes. “Ya go first, Bokkun.”

Bokuto beamed at the offer; he was easy to please. He took his phone out of the pockets of his sweatpants. Sakusa and Shouyou remained silent, but attention peaked. What was Bokuto going to show them? A picture of his girlfriend? Was he finally going to confess about being in a relationship?

Bokuto scrolled through the screen of his phone for a moment, then stopped; probably found what he was looking for. The other three men watched him with bated breath. Bokuto finally turned the screen towards them and the trio saw a picture – a photo of two women with arms around each other. One of the women was the woman they’d seen yesterday with Bokuto, the other woman was taller than her counterpart and had shoulder-length brown hair and freckles on her pretty face. She seemed very familiar too.

The women in the picture looked very close and very happy. They had identical soft smiles on their faces and both of them were holding their left hands up, the backs of the hands facing the camera. Shouyou belatedly noticed the matching rings on their ring-fingers.

“Wh –” Atsumu opened his mouth to say something, but Bokuto beat him to it. He looked extremely happy, and proud.

“See, see,” the golden-eyed spiker exclaimed. “They’re my friends, Yukippe and Kao-chan. They’re getting married! Ain’t that cool? Ain’t that cool?”

While Bokuto was practically jumping with excitement over the upcoming wedding of his friends, the other three men gawked at him. They shifted their gaze from the picture to Bokuto, then back to the picture again. So, the woman who had been standing with Bokuto in front of the restaurant was not his lover but his friend. And that meant, the person with whom Bokuto had talked on the phone and had called “babe” i.e. his lover had come to restaurant but they didn’t see the person, possibly because by the time the person came, they’d already left the spot.

In short, the mission failed.

Shouyou saw the picture again. Yukippe and Kao-chan. Bokuto’s close friends. ‘Ah, right!’ Shouyou suddenly remembered. He knew them, not well but he’d seen them and even interacted with them once or twice. They were the managers of Fukurodani. He’d seen them during their Tokyo training camp. They were already third-years then, so he didn’t see them after that. He faintly recalled something about the red-haired woman, possibly called Yukippe – she ate a lot. He could relate, and he admired her for that.

While he was busy reminiscing about his high school volleyball and training camps, his other two companions were in a state of shock. Sakusa looked like there was nothing he hated more in the world than the beautiful picture of the engaged couple, and Atsumu looked like he was this close to pulling his hair out. Bokuto, however, was blissfully unaware of this. He pocketed his phone and slung his gym bag over his shoulders.

“Let’s go, guys!” Bokuto announced way too happily for the mood. It looked like he'd forgotten that a few minutes ago, Atsumu was going to say something, which was lucky for them. “I wanna take a nap!”

The three younger men took their bags quietly and followed the older man out. They did not answer Bokuto’s loud cheers and declarations about scoring ten service aces in the imminent match, nor did they talk among themselves. They were left feeling too stupid to immediately get over. Atsumu seemed to have taken the biggest hit, judging by the unusual and unpleasant scowl on his face.

Though they did not discuss it, one thing was for certain. They were done trying to find Bokuto’s lover.

On their way out, Sakusa said only one single line. He looked at Atsumu and smirked. “Some setter and his plans, huh?”

Atsumu only groaned in reply.

Chapter Text

Keiji was never really fond of crowded places. The loudness and lack of personal spaces didn't appeal to him very much. Yes, he lived in Tokyo, the capital city and one of the most crowded places in the whole country, and had been travelling through train since he was fifteen, but that still didn't cease to make him less uncomfortable. But, the swarm of people in the stadium was different. While baffling, it filled him with a sense of warmth and pride.

It was a little distressing in the beginning — coming to the matches. Keiji remembered the first time he came to see a live match; it was a match between MSBY Black Jackals and VC Kanagawa. Keiji, though stone faced, was nervous as hell, and had bumped into possibly every person in the stadium. Muttering "excuse me", "I'm sorry" and "sorry, I didn't see you there", he had made to his seat with a slight trembling in his hands and a louder trembling in his heart. But it all had vanished the moment Bokuto had come out on the court, surrounded by his teammates and observed by the whole stadium. Bokuto had flashed a beaming smile at the world, and Keiji had stopped breathing when Bokuto had leapt in the air to spike the ball in a shot that could only be termed as perfect.

That was Bokuto's first official match, and Keiji had come to this scene too many times after that to count. The crowd didn't bother him much anymore, and he didn't feel the crippling nerves pricking his skin whenever he saw Bokuto play — he knew everything would be alright, and he took pride in that.

Dodging a group of overeager teenagers, Keiji made his way to the food stalls. There were a few minutes left before the players stepped onto the court, and he wanted to secure his fill of food before he went to find his seat. Keiji went straight to his favorite shop and found Miya Osamu greeting him with a friendly smile.

"Fukurodani setter," Osamu teased, despite knowing the customer's name well. Since Onigiri Miya had opened their new branch in Tokyo, Keiji lost count exactly how many times he'd visited the establishment. He couldn't help it, though. Onigiri Miya indeed had the best onigiri in whole Japan, at least according to him. During these visits, he'd somehow managed to befriend the owner, which wasn't really weird, given their history in volleyball and how their closed ones were entwined in the same team. "How's yer work goin'?"

"It's alright," Keiji said flatly, while groaning in distress internally. His work was killing him. When he'd got the job, never once had he thought being an editor would torture him this much. His mangaka was giving him so much stress that he sometimes doubted he'd go bald before he turned 30. He worked his ass off for three weeks, pulling all-nighters frequently and barely having a healthy routine. He'd been late in all his personal meetings and dates with Bokuto, most regrettably on their double date with Shirofuku and Suzumeda, who'd recently got engaged. Keiji had never felt so bad for being late before.

"Where's yer friend?" Osamu voice pulled him out of his self-pity.

Keiji raised an eyebrow. "Udai-san?" he asked, remembering the mangaka and the last conversation they had about his hellish work load. The former Ace sometimes accompanied him to the matches, enjoying the adrenaline rush of the sport he'd abandoned to pursue life, much like Keiji himself. "He had work and couldn't come."

Keiji placed his order and waited for Osamu to wrap the food, while looking around the place. His heart warmed when he caught sight of two little kids, probably around the age of eight or nine, wearing small MSBY jerseys, the number 12 prominent on both of the shirts. He knew Bokuto was especially famous among children, and the fact never failed to charm him even more than he was.

"There ya go," Osamu said, handing him his package. Keiji thanked him and took the box, and was about to pull out his wallet when Osamu spoke again. "Hey, 's that Tobio-kun?"

Keiji turned around and gaped: there was a tall man walking in, clad in a dark grey sweatshirt, a pair of sunglasses and a Hollywood cap. He looked frightening by the way he was walking, spine straight and head upheld, and managed to scare few people around him. Keiji almost burst out laughing at the scene. Thankfully, he didn't.

"Yes, it looks like him," Keiji answered, pulling out bills from his wallet.

"What's with the look?" Osamu snickered.

Keiji couldn't blame him. The attire was absolutely hilarious. While he understood that Kageyama must've tried to disguise himself to avoid media attention, tried being the keyword, but that didn't mitigate the ridiculousness of the outfit. "I should probably go check," Keiji said, eyeing the disguised pro player.

"Yeah, ya do that," Osamu laughed. "Kid looks confused."

Giving a small nod, Keiji made his way towards Kageyama, barely avoiding bumping into people. When he was in a close vicinity, he called in a voice low enough not to be overhead, "Kageyama?"

Kageyama turned his head so quickly that Keiji was afraid if he broke his neck. "Akaashi-san," he acknowledged curtly.

Keiji wanted to ask what he was doing there, but that would be an incredibly stupid question: of course, he was here to watch the match. So, he asked the next thing that came to his mind, "Are you here to check your opponents?" That was probably the reason, but wouldn't it be better to watch it on the internet? That was what usually pro players did, anyway.

"N-No," Kageyama said, surprisingly flustered. His cheeks reddened a little and his voice came out a bit unsure. "Stupid Hinata asked me to come."

Ah, that made sense. Keiji wanted to laugh at the obliviousness of these two, but then remembered how he, himself, had taken a whole year and a half to realize that he was in love with his wild-haired and bright-eyed captain. But still, Hinata and Kageyama had surpassed them in that department long since.

"How did you recognize me?" Kageyama asked, and Keiji wanted to laugh again.

"That's hardly a good disguise," Keiji said in his neutral tone. "Where did you get the terrible idea?" Kageyama's cheeks reddened once more.

"N-No one. I... I always use it as a cover," the setter sighed. "It doesn't work, does it?"

"Well, no reporter is jumping on you yet," Keiji spoke with the intention to encourage, but he wasn't sure if it worked. "So, I guess we can say it worked."

Kageyama nodded, glancing around him suspiciously, probably trying to find any reporter in sight. He looked tense, but Keiji wasn't sure whether it was because of the potential of the media invading his privacy or he was simply nervous to do this tiny but precious gesture towards Hinata. Keiji placed his bet on the latter. "Do you want to sit together?" he asked, feeling for the younger man in the situation. "I'm sure we can get a few empty seats."

Inspite of his sunglasses, Kageyama looked relieved. The man possibly dreaded the idea of sit among people who'd go crazy if they found out it was Kageyama Tobio sitting among them. Keiji didn't mind sitting together with him. He'd known Kageyama since his second year of high school, and though they weren't close or had kept contact, he liked the man enough and was happy for his achievements.

"Let's go, then."

When Kageyama had said he wanted to something to snack during the match, Keiji had assumed the man might share his passion for onigiri from Onigiri Miya, or anything else really – anything but this: the Adlers setter had bought a shocking number of milk and yogurt, and was currently slurping the milk with his intense gaze firmly fixed on the court where Jackals’ players were coming out one by one. The announcer was introducing the players and the stadium buzzed with the constant sound of clapping.

Keiji’s lips broke into a grin when Bokuto came out, holding hands with a small kid, and it felt like the whole world roared at the sight of the star that Keiji had witnessed years ago. Bokuto looked at the seats, eyes scanning through people until they fell on him, and the spiker smiled a smile brighter than flashing lights of the gymnasium. Keiji returned the smile, small and subtle, like he always did.

The other players stepped onto the court in sequence, each one holding hands with kids from the local elementary school. Keiji glanced at Kageyama when Hinata came out: looking strong and dependable, and his eyes burning brighter than his orange hair. Kageyama’s eyes were firmly fixed on the short stature of the other man, intense in a way that might seem like glaring from someone else's perspective, but Keiji knew it was anything but. He smiled internally.

The match began and Jackals made an amazing start with an intense serve by Hinata. Keiji watched enthusiastically, his mind noticing the brilliant technique of the jump serve and his heart warm with adoration and awe. Hinata’s growth was so startling and beautiful that it never failed to vibrate people with inspiration – at least to the people who had seen him as a short but over-enthusiastic boy determined to win.

Keiji looked over at Kageyama, whose eyes had changed from intense to calculating. He was gawping at Hinata, taking in the posture and the power put behind the serve. He might have come to just make his friend happy, but as soon as the match began, his inner athlete was out to analyze his rival. Keiji, himself, analyzed the play whenever he was in the audience – his intrinsic setter mind doing that instinctively, but never as concentrated as Kageyama. He guessed that was the difference between a high school player and a pro.

The match proceeded, and the setter duo – one former and one still going, discussed their opinions about the plays and the strategy, while each busy with their milk and onigiri. By the time it was Bokuto’s turn to serve, Keiji had already finished two onigiri and Kageyama was working on his second yogurt. Keiji’s eyes glued on the court, where Bokuto stood, facing the spot Keiji was sitting at. He stretched his arms out and clapped, and the whole stadium rumbled with thunderous sounds of clapping, and Keiji’s heart warmed.

The whole world was on Bokuto’s side – Keiji clapped back.

It was then Hinata looked over to where the editor was sitting, and the redhead man’s mouth opened with surprise, or something like that; Keiji wasn’t sure. He was too busy being starstruck. But when he heard Kageyama click his tongue in annoyance, he glanced at Hinata who now had a challenging smirk on his face.

“Looks like Hinata saw you,” Keiji said conversationally, and as expected, Kageyama blushed. He looked extreme embarrassed and ready to die in a second. His cheeks were burning and his eyes looking at anything that wasn’t Hinata. “You don’t have to be embarrassed about it.”

Kageyama mumbled something like “I’m not embarrassed!”

He was. So, Keiji decided and ignore it and continued, “He’s your rival. It’s only natural to evaluate your rival’s skills.”

That caught Kageyama’s attention. “That’s right, isn’t it?” he said, sounding a bit relieved. “Hinata is my rival. Everyone watches their rival’s matches. I’m just here to see how well the dumbass is playing.”

He sounded too pleased with himself, and Keiji decided to have a little fun at his underclassman’s misery. At least, that was what his upperclassmen at Fukurodani did with him (and Bokuto). He looked at Kageyama with a perfectly neutral face and said, “The other players watch their rivals’ matches on the internet, though.”

Kageyama burst into a fit of coughing, which would’ve been really funny if not for the attention it was garnering from the others. Kageyama’s sunglasses were off, his deep blue eyes out in sight. Keiji thought it would not be a good idea to rile the pro setter up and blow Kageyama’s cover, even though it was hardly a good cover, and decided not to tease the younger again… until the match ended.

The match ended with Black Jackals taking the win from Hiroshima Blue Wings by 3-1. The crowd had erupted with cheers when Sakusa had spiked the last ball that scored them the winning point. Keiji and Kageyama got up from their seats as the players from the both teams were done with the formalities and were drinking sports drinks by their own benches. Keiji glanced at Bokuto, who was wiping sweat from his face with a towel while talking animatedly with his teammates, and left the gymnasium with Kageyama on his tow.

Keiji usually waited outside the MSBY locker room for Bokuto, and they talked for a few minutes before Keiji left and Bokuto went along with his teammates to either celebrate victory or mope for their defeat with alcohol. Sometimes Bokuto or the others (Sakusa excluded) pestered him to join them after their grand success, but most of time Keiji avoided going out with the team. It wasn’t because he didn’t enjoy their company, he certainly did, even more so after Hinata joined. But he didn’t want to cause any bad publicity for Bokuto or to make his teammates doubt the platonic nature of their relation. After seven years of hiding their relationship, they’d got pretty efficient in it. But still sometimes it was very hard to keep his feelings for Bokuto concealed behind his stone face.

But now that Kageyama was with him, Keiji wasn’t sure what to do. It would be very rude to just leave the younger man and go about his business. With Udai, he didn’t have this problem since the mangaka always accompanied him to the locker room and complimented Bokuto on his spikes and stuffs. But he knew that would not be the case for Kageyama, since the pro setter was from an opponent team and more importantly, not a people person.

He was about to ask Kageyama if he wanted to see Hinata before he left when he heard a familiar voice calling his name out loud. Both men turned around and found Hinata running towards them, waving his arm in front of him. He stopped when he reached the other two, sweating profusely and panting slightly.

“Hinata,” Keiji acknowledged and the younger man grinned at him. “Great game. Is there something you need?”

“Thanks, Akaashi-san!” Hinata beamed at him, then moved his eyes to the taller man. “Kageyama, you came!”

Keiji watched with amusement as Kageyama’s face reddened drastically. “D-Don’t yell my name, dumbass!” Kageyama growled in a low voice, adjusting his cap around his head. His sunglasses were back on his face. “And how did you know it was me?”

Hinata laughed, making the taller man glare at him through the dark glasses. “You thought I wouldn’t recognize you from these?” he gestured at Kageyama’s outfit. “You’ve been using this crappy disguise since high school! You’re so lame, Kageyama-kun!”

“S-Shut up!” Kageyama stammered, turning around. “I’m leaving. See you later, Akaashi-san.” Kageyama announced, and with a small glare at Hinata, stormed away. Keiji guessed he was more embarrassed than angry, and seemed like Hinata thought so too, judging by the mischievous smile on his lips. He looked at Keiji, his excitement barely contained as he said, “I’ll see you back in the locker room, Akaashi-san. I’m gonna annoy Kageyama some more.” He let out an impish giggle.

Keiji’s lips curled up slightly. “Yeah, you do that. I’ll see you later.”

Hinata nodded and ran after his rival.

Chapter Text

As Keiji walked towards the MSBY locker room, he saw the hallway leading to the room was still empty. That meant the players were still resting on the bench or interacting with fans. Remembering Bokuto’s huge fan following, he smiled to himself. It might take some time for the owl-like man to come, then. He didn’t mind. He could wait an eternity for Bokuto.

At the turning, he caught a glimpse of Atsumu and Sakusa, probably arguing about something. He tried to see if Bokuto was with them, but the two were alone, and possibly didn’t notice his presence. By a closer look, Keiji saw that the two them were, in fact, not arguing. Atsumu looked like he was having fun, his lips curled in a provocative smirk and eyes twinkling. Sakusa, as usual, looked like if he could kill Atsumu with his glare, he would. Leaving the duo to themselves, Keiji proceeded towards the locker room.

He was positively surprised when he saw Bokuto waiting for him outside the locker room. The spiker’s face brightened as Keiji came into view. “Akaashi!” he exclaimed happily, almost jumping on him.

“Bokuto-san,” Keiji said in an attempted stern voice because it was hard not to melt at the sight of his boyfriend’s happy face. “Please, don’t yell. And what are you doing outside?”

“I was waiting for you, duh!” Bokuto cried, grabbing Keiji’s hands. Keiji stared at him in alarm. “I’ve to talk to you about something important. Come inside.” He tugged at his partner’s hands.

“Can’t we talk about it back home? Your teammates might –”

“We still have some time before they come.” Bokuto said and tugged harder. Before Keiji could protest again, he was pulled inside the locker room, and then in a blink of an eye, in the embrace of his boyfriend. Keiji’s face warmed and his heart jumped in his chest as his boy engulfed in the familiar heat of Bokuto’s body. “Bokuto-san –”

“I talked to our coach, manager and captain, Keiji,” Bokuto said without releasing him, face nudging into his neck. His voice was different from the usual loud cheerfulness. Instead it was deeper and thoughtful, the voice he used when they were discussing serious matters. “I’m gonna come out publicly.”

“What?” Keiji asked, releasing himself from the hug to look at Bokuto. “Are you serious?”

Bokuto frowned, pouting his lips in a way that made Keiji want to kiss it off his face. “When am I not serious, Keiji?!” Bokuto whined. But when he saw his partner’s shocked, dumbfounded face, he smiled softly. “We don’t have to hide your relationship anymore, Keiji.”

Keiji didn’t know if his face was still expressionless or if he was bawling with tears. He just knew that his heart was hurting from all the love he was feeling for the man in front of him. Almost nine years of loving him and seven years of being privileged to call him as his own hadn’t prepared him for the intensity of his feelings. He was a very private man, but as with any person in love, he’d craved to announce his affection for his loved one to the world over the long years. He’d spent countless nights imagining them behaving as a couple not only in the privacy of their apartments, but also in public, like many were fortunate enough to do.

“I also have something very, very, very important to ask you,” Bokuto’s voice sounded unsure, small. His owlish eyes blinking expectantly at Keiji. When Keiji nodded, he spoke softly, “Hey, now that we don’t have to hide…” He fidgeted in his position, spiking up the other’s curiosity. “Um… I-I was thinking maybe… um…” he lowered his eyes to the ground. “Maybe we could live together now…” He looked up at Keiji again, and when he saw the other’s expression, he sputtered, “W-We don’t have to if you don’t wanna – ”

He was cut short as Keiji jumped into his arm and captured his lips with his own. Bokuto made a noise of surprise deep in his throat, but relaxed quickly, wrapping his arms around the shorter man’s body. The kissed sweetly, happily, lovingly – familiarity of each other’s lips a source of comfort. Keiji felt so happy that he thought he might die, but then decided there would be no other greater way to die than in his beloved’s embrace. The world vanished around them and only they remained and –

“What the hell!” A sharp yell rang inside the room and the two sprang out of each other’s arms. Atsumu was standing in the doorway, his eyes widened and his jaw hanging. His face looked like he’d seen a ghost, or in this case, two ghosts. Sakusa was standing right behind him, and had a similar shocked expression, only less exaggerated. “What the hell!” Atsumu yelled again.

Keiji stood frozen. His mind had dived into an overdrive and his nerves were about to fail him. But thankfully, his face didn’t betray his emotions. He stared back at the men, eyes flat behind his glasses. He didn’t dare to look at Bokuto and had no idea how his partner looked in the situation. But taking account of Bokuto’s loud expressiveness, he guessed the man must have a look of shock and panic.

Keiji’s dread increased ten times when he spotted that the rest of the team had arrived, even Hinata was there with them, and they were staring at the couple with curious looks. He had a strong urge to just shut his eyes and ran the hell out of there, but his immobile state wasn’t over yet. He watched in horror as the others watched them.

“What the hell!” Atsumu yelled yet again, and Sakusa glanced at him in disdain.

To Keiji’s utter surprise, Bokuto burst into a fit of laughter. He stared at his boyfriend with his jaw hanging, as did the others. But Bokuto, unfazed as ever, just continued laughing. “Calm down, Tsum-Tsum!” he managed to say between his bellows.

His words had exactly the opposite effect on the setter. Atsumu yelled again, “Whatcha sayin’, Bokkun?! I ain’t calmin’ down! Ya two were kissin’!”

“What?!” It was Hinata. He’d managed to crawl his way through the tall statures of his teammates, and was now standing right in front of them. He stared at them with his innocent eyes pooled with disbelief. His cheeks reddened as the setter’s words sat with him. “Bokuto-san and Akaashi-san were kissing?!”

Thankfully, Bokuto’s laughter had stopped, and not-at-all-thankfully, Keiji could hear the snickers of the others because of the quietude. He registered the situation in his mind, avoided the burning of his cheeks and prayed to the earth to swallow him whole. He was feeling a lot of things – embarrassment, nervousness, but the most prominent one was fear. He was afraid that Bokuto’s teammates might not take their relationship well, and this was the reason they were hiding in the first place –

“So, Akaashi-san is the one who gave Bokuto-san the hickey, right?” Hinata sounded way too happy for the situation. He also looked incredibly pleased. Keiji wondered why, but his conscious thoughts flew out of his head when the heard the words “Akaashi-san”, “Bokuto-san” and “hickey” in the same sentence. If he was blushing before, he was downright ashamed now. He wondered if pretending to faint would work on them.

But to surprise him again, Bokuto laughed out…again. Keiji wanted to hit him. The owl-like man pulled him closer and intertwined their hands together, and before Keiji could even utter a word to protest, his boyfriend opened his mouth. “Yup, it was Keiji! My boyfriend’s the best, ain’t he? Ain’t he?”

“Bokuto-san…” Keiji groaned weakly.

“Ha! I was right, then!” Hinata exclaimed in joy, jumping a good deal in the air. He turned towards Atsumu and Sakusa, who for some reason, had similar frowns and sour expressions. “You two didn’t believe me! I told you it has to be Akaashi-san!”

Atsumu glared at Keiji. “Really, Keiji-kun? Ya gave Bokkun the hickey?” the setter made a face. “Yer the one Bokkun was callin’ ‘babe’ on the phone?”

Keiji was sure if more blood rushed to head, the rest of his body wouldn’t have any supply. Bokuto, however, had no such problem. “Yeah, it was Keiji! Who else would I call ‘babe’!”

Atsumu shot him a deadly glare. Again, Keiji wondered why. His wonderment got bigger when this time Sakusa opened his mouth to speak. “The date on that day, in Bokuto’s apartment,” Sakusa said disbelievingly. “It was you?” Keiji nodded his head weakly.

“Hey, how do you guys know about the date?” Bokuto asked, but nobody answered him. Instead, everyone’s attention turned to Hinata who was jumping in joy and shouting “I was right! I was right!” for some reason.

“Shut up, Shouyou-kun!” Atsumu barked, causing their youngest teammate to stop jumping. Hinata pouted. “Eh, why? I was right!”

After what seemed like years, Keiji finally regained his ability to speak. “You knew about Bokuto-san and my relationship, Hinata?” Keiji had never been more grateful for his neutral façade.

Hinata beamed at him. “No, I didn’t! I didn’t even know what a hickey was!” the redhead announced excitedly. “But Atsumu-san taught me. Then, when we overheard Bokuto-san’s conversation with his lover,” he paused, pointing at Keiji, “Which is you because I was right, we heard Bokuto-san was having a date on Friday!”

“Atsumu, you taught Shouyou what a hickey is?” Inunaki wheezed at Atsumu, who looked like he’d had a lemon in his mouth. Bokuto was laughing like there was no tomorrow. Keiji really wanted kill him.

“Yes, he did,” Hinata answered enthusiastically, as if he was trying to commend Atsumu's action. He didn’t notice the frowns some of the older members were shooting at the setter. “I even guessed correctly that Akaashi-san is Bokuto-san’s lover. I was right, wasn’t I, Bokuto-san?” Hinata directed a blinding smile at Bokuto, who returned the gesture with his own outstanding grin.

“Yes, you were right!” Bokuto said with too much pride to be considered appropriate in this situation. “Good job, my number one pupil!”

“Don’tcha go jumpin’ too high, Shouyou-kun,” Atsumu piped in, looking at the twinning beaming faces of the spiker duo in disdain. “Ya changed yer answer! Ya later said it couldn’t be Keiji-kun.”

Hinata frowned, looking betrayed. “Huh? That was because you and Omi-san convinced me otherwise!” the ginger exclaimed.

“But you agreed with us,” Sakusa surprised, well more like shocked, everyone by speaking. “It’s your fault then.”

“How is it my fault? I was right in the beginning! You and Atsumu-san said that there was no way Akaashi-san could’ve given Bokuto-san the hickey!” Akaashi flinched when the hickey was mentioned again. Why was it getting mentioned again and again, anyway?

“Omi-Omi is right,” Atsumu said, giving an eager smile to the dark-haired outside hitter. “Shouyou-kun, that’s not fair to us, y’know.”

“Don’t put me in the same category as you,” Sakusa grumbled.

“Huh? That’s so mean, Omi-Omi! Why are ya so prickly?”

“Shut up.”

While the three of the them continued to squabble and the rest of the people continued to watch the squabble, Keiji worked his mind. He had, in fact, found the trio’s behavior a little unusual, and had even expressed to concern to Bokuto. But the athlete had dismissed his doubts and he, himself, too didn’t get the chance to bother much about it due to his devastating work-load. “That’s why you three came to Bokuto-san’s apartment that evening?” Keiji asked carefully. “You wanted to catch him red-handed?”

The three stopped bickering, and turned their gazes at him. “Yeah.”

“What happened after then?” Keiji was afraid to ask, but he really had to know. He didn’t know how to feel about the whole situation yet.

“We couldn’t find out who Bokuto-san’s lover was, even though I had guessed it right,” Hinata pouted. “So, Atsumu-san made a plan to get Bokuto-san drunk.”

“And then he got his own ass drunk,” Sakusa muttered unimpressively, earning a glare from the setter, which he intentionally ignored. A few of the others laughed at this, mumbling things like Atsumu never changes and that guy can’t even hold an ounce of liquor. Atsumu had a face that Keiji had only ever seen him make in Osamu’s presence.

But Bokuto had a different complaint altogether. His face scrunched up in a way that always made Keiji think ‘cute’. “That’s why you guys got me drunk? But you said you were celebrating my awesome spike in the last match!” He sounded terribly betrayed.

“Com’on, Bokkun,” Atsumu slapped the air casually. “That wasn’t even a great spike.”

Bokuto gasped. Keiji exasperatedly thought if he should comfort his boyfriend or chide him for being so easy to manipulate. Then decided against both when the said boyfriend got into a verbal fight with his team setter. “That was a great spike, Tsum-Tsum! You’re just jealous!”

“Huh?! Why will I be jealous? That was an average spike. Even high school boys can spike like that!”

“You’re wrong! That was a great spike! Tell them, Keiji!” Bokuto whined, tugging Keiji’s sleeves to catch his attention. Keiji sighed. What did he do in the past life to deserve this! Then remembered that while he wasn’t sure what crime he had committed in the past life, he remembered his crime of this life – falling in love with this incredibly energy-consuming but incredibly adorable man.

Keiji ignored Bokuto’s pleas for a praise, as he was proficient in that art already, and decided to focus on the matter at hand. He looked at Hinata and Sakusa, and asked, “Then what happened? I doubt Bokuto-san would’ve revealed anything about us. He has amazing alcohol tolerance.” Keiji blushed again when he remembered how low his alcohol tolerance was compared his boyfriend, and how that low tolerance had led to the event of him giving his boyfriend that hickey.

“No, he didn’t reveal anything,” Sakusa answered. His face was void of any expression, much like Keiji’s own.

“And then Atsumu-san again overheard him calling someone ‘babe’ on the phone,” Hinata chimed in. A happy smile was plastered on his handsome face. Keiji guessed he was happy partly because he seemingly had guessed Bokuto’s boyfriend’s identity right, and partly because Kageyama had come to see his match. ‘Speaking of whom, where is Kageyama anyways? Did he leave?’ Hinata continued on. “Then we followed Bokuto-san to the restaurant – ”

“You did what?!” Both Bokuto and Meian yelled at the same time, scaring the poor redhead man out of his wits. Bokuto seemed a little dumbfounded while Meian was positively fuming. “Hinata, Atsumu, Sakusa, you three followed your teammate and invaded his privacy without his consent?! Are you three this irresponsible? You’re all adults and professional athletes. Is that how you’re supposed to behave? What type of image are you creating for yourselves and this team?”

“Sorry, Captain,” the three of them mumbled, lowering their eyes to stare at the ground in shame. Keiji had never felt so uncomfortable in his whole life. Seeing three grown men getting scolded was never pleasant, and even less so when they were getting scolded because of something he, himself, was a part of. “It won’t happen again.”

“You bet it won’t,” Meian barked. “Whose idea was it, anyway?”

“Miya.”

“Atsumu-san.”

“All three of us.”

Three answers came at the same time, almost in unison. The three addressed man gawked at each other while Meian’s quiet, distressed sigh was heard. Keiji and Bokuto shared a private glance that screamed the words what the hell is going on in silence. The rest of the team had gone from stifled wheezing to full-on howling.

“Ya guys are just throwin’ me under the bus?!” Atsumu exclaimed, shooting glares at the other two as if they’d stolen a kidney from him. Sakusa scowled back at him, while Hinata looked like he didn’t know why Atsumu was angry in the first place.

“We’re not throwing you under the bus. It’s the truth,” Sakusa said, and Hinata nodded his head profusely at that. “Stop being dramatic, Miya.” Hinata stopped nodding.

“No, it’s not! Omi-kun was the one who said Bokkun was lyin’ about the hickey!” Atsumu spat. Again with the hickey. ‘Damn!’

“Miya gave the idea to raid Bokuto’s date.”

“Shouyou-kun brought the cheap vodka!”

“Atsumu-san, for the last time, it was you who brought the drink!”

“That’s not important, Shouyou-kun.”

“It was Miya’s idea to follow Bokuto.”

“Omi-kun told use to disguise ourselves!”

“All of you, shut up!” The last sentence was told, no, more like yelled by Meian. The tall man looked like he had enough of this life and wouldn’t be a little bit sad if he stopped existing at this point. The whole locker room went silent, staring at their captain with fearful eyes. “If any of you say a single word after this, God help me, I’m going to kick all of your asses!”

Nobody spoke, and for a second, Keiji felt like everything was under control. There would be no more bickering and no more mentions of the hickey. All he had to do now was to disappear from the scene and never come out of his apartment for a whole year. He could that, he just had to figure how. That was until the silence broke, exactly thirty seconds after Meian’s outburst.

“You three really couldn’t figure out it was Akaashi who gave Bokuto a hickey,” Inunaki snickered, joined by both Tomas and Oriver. “You guys are so dumb! We knew it from the beginning.”

“What?!” Hinata, Bokuto, Atsumu and Sakusa shouted at the same time, and within a blink of an eye, the squabble began again. Keiji stood frozen, listening to the defeated sigh let out by Jackals’ captain.

‘Here we go again…’

After what seemed like an eternity, the pandemonium of the locker room was solved, and the players were all ready to go to an izakaya to celebrate their victory. Upon their captain’s order and possibly by their own conscience, the guilty three apologized to both Bokuto and Keiji, who were quick to forgive them. Bokuto didn’t seem to mind the incident too much, instead found it more of a source of funny stories. And while Keiji couldn’t be so comfortable about the whole thing, he recognized that there was no ill intention behind it. Besides, he was too happy to be bothered by such things at the moment.

While on the bus, Keiji asked Hinata about Kageyama. Hinata replied that the Adlers’ setter had to go back because he had practice. The redhead man seemed wistful as he talked about how flustered his rival was when he was found, and how much Hinata had bothered him after the match. Seeing his eyes gleaming and cheeks tinting pink, Keiji wondered if the spiker had finally come to understand his feelings. He might not be fully up there, but Keiji was glad that it’d progressed.

Another duo who caught his attention was an unlikely one, and less obvious than the two Karasuno alumni, but obvious still. Keiji silently noticed the crackling tension between Sakusa Kiyoomi and Miya Atsumu. It was rather amusing to see Atsumu clinging to the dark-haired spiker, smirking suggestively and flirting rather badly. And it was also equally amusing to see Sakusa scowling, growling and putting space between them, but never leaving the setter’s side explicitly. Keiji wondered if the mystery of their own relationship had brought these two unlikely souls closer.

As the group entered the izakaya, Keiji caught small snippets of the conversations going on among the team. A few struck him especially:

Bokuto challenging Tomas, “Tom-Tom, this time I’ll defeat you in arm-wrestling!”

Hinata gushing to Inunaki, “And Inu-san, I’m telling you, Kageyama was so red, his face looked like a tomato! A big tomato!”

Atsumu chirping to Sakusa, “Hey, Omi-Omi, looks like both Bokkun and Shouyou-kun have find their lovers. How ‘bout ya and I go on a date?”, and Sakusa barking, “Hah, you wish.”, and Atsumu replying in a silky voice, “I really do.”

Keiji might’ve heard some more, but his head stopped working as a familiar hand engulfed his own. Keiji looked up to gaze at Bokuto’s golden eyes, gleaming in the colorful lights of the interior, and smiled. He intertwined their fingers together – tightly, with the intention to never let go. They had been wanting to do this for so long: just an small innocent act like holding hands in public, and now they could do it without any reservation. Everything faded around him, and only Bokuto remained with him. “I love you,” Keiji said quietly. This time Bokuto blushed.

“Keiji!” Bokuto whined, and Keiji chuckled. His heart felt so warm and full. Nothing else mattered to him at that moment, his feelings that he kept so securely hidden were flooding his mind, soul and body. Every worry, every insecurity, every doubt was gone; only a few golden thoughts swirled around him.

They didn’t have to hide their relationship anymore.

He was going to be living with the man he’d loved since was sixteen.

He was happy.