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“I never saw you here, who are you?” Akaashi looks up nervously at the taller kid who spoke to him. “Are you new? I’m Bokuto Koutarou!” He smiles and Akaashi notices how his two front tooth are missing.
“Akaashi Keiji.” The other kid looks down at him intensely jumping once he gets the answer he was waiting for.
“That’s such a cool name! It sounds like a prince name! Are you a prince? You’re very pretty too, just like a prince would be. Maybe you are a prince. Oh my God am I speaking to a prince?” Akaashi watches as Bokuto keeps rambling about how he could be a prince and didn’t know, sitting beside him on the floor.
It was Akaashi’s first time going to a book reading meeting at the public library. He had heard about it from his colleagues at kindergarten and once he knew someone would be reading to them, he asked his mother to go. She accepted to take him as soon as he spoke, thinking it would be a great way for her son to make new friends. And maybe she wasn’t wrong.
Bokuto was still talking about how he once saw a movie about a little girl who was living a normal life but it turned out that she had been a princess all along and the same could be happening to Akaashi, when Akaashi finally noticed his hair.
“Why is your hair like that?” Bokuto stops speaking abruptly, his smile appearing once again on his face as if he was glad Akaashi had brought that up.
“I spike it with a lot of hair gel to look cool!” His eyes then widen. “Does it not look cool?”
“It looks very cool.” The other little boy beams with excitement, liking the approval.
“I know right! I also do it like this because I want to look like an owl. Do I look like an owl? Owls are my favorite animal because they’re so cool-” Bokuto starts rambling again, moving his hands eagerly around intensifying everything he says.
Akaashi pays attention to every word, finding the boy next to him fun and full of energy, the complete opposite of Akaashi. He was more quiet, more kept to himself, he talked and always said what he was thinking but he knows he would get tired of talking if he spoke half of what Bokuto had already said.
The lady from the library comes asking all the kids to be quiet as the reading was about to be begin. Bokuto pauses his talking almost immediately and Akaashi sees as he eyes focus on the adult sitting on the chair in front of them, waiting intensely for him to begin.
They hear the man dictating the story, his soothing voice taking them to another world making them feel happy as the little girl from the story finally crosses the river and sad when she finds out her bunny was gone. They all smile and clap at the end when the girl reunites with her bunny after days of looking for him. They thank the man for taking an hour of his time and coming read for them, getting ready to leave as some parents start to arrive.
“Akaamshi! Did you know I can also read?” Akaashi looks at Bokuto who was already up and had a hand extended to help Akaashi. “I’m already 7 years old and I’m almost finishing first grade that’s why I can read. Can you read too, Akaamshi?”
Akaashi shakes his head. “I’m only 5 yet, I’m making 6 next month and I’m still in kindergarten but I’ll be going to an actual school next year and learn a lot of things.” Akaashi smiles proudly.
“That’s so cool, maybe you can go to my school! That would be so cool! And you can’t read yet so that means I can read for you. Do you want me to read for you, Akaamshi? We can go to my house and I can read you all the books you want because I’m a great reader.” Bokuto puts his hands on his waist face turning proud as if he’s the best reader in the world.
“I would like it if you read for me.” Bokuto jumps excitedly grabbing Akaashi’s hand and taking him to his mother.
“Mom! Mom! Can Akaamshi go to our house today? Can he? Can he? Can he?” His mother laughs sweetly, putting a hand on his head to calm him down.
“If his mom is okay with it, of course he can.” Bokuto looks at him, eyes shining with happiness.
Akaashi’s mother arrives seconds later and as soon as Akaashi announced that, he was being pulled towards her by the other boy to ask if he could go. After a moment of hesitation and a few minutes of speaking to Bokuto’s mother making sure Akaashi wouldn’t be a bother, she finally gave in and the look on Bokuto’s face was indescribable.
The ride to Bokuto’s house was loud, with the boy telling the story he heard to the woman jumping back and forth on his seat and making sound effects as if the story had been about superheroes saving the world. Once they arrive, Bokuto only gives Akaashi time to take off his shoes before grabbing his hand and pulling him to his room and closing the door claiming this is their thing now and nobody else can hear him read to Akaashi. He makes Akaashi choose a book presenting him his shelf full of them and the quiet boy picks one quickly.
They sit next to each other at the ground, leaning against Bokuto’s bed and Bokuto opens the book putting it between them and pointing to the words as he starts reading slowly. He stops sporadically when he doesn’t understand or can’t read a word, bringing the book closer to his face and narrowing his eyes to read it better.
"And then they lived hap-happily ever after. The end.” Bokuto smiles before closing the book and frowning. “Why do books always end like this? They marry and live happy forever, means we have to marry to be happy?”
Akaashi looks at him, head spinning as he wonders as well. “Maybe. But I’m happy and I’m not married.”
Bokuto nods. “Maybe it’s a different kind of happy. Let’s marry each other to see it.”
Akaashi shrugs. “Okay.”
“I’m so tired.” Akaashi lets himself fall in Bokuto’s bed, back to the ceiling and hiding his face on the other’s pillow.
“Want me to read for you?” Bokuto says after laughing.
“How are you not tired? Practice was hell today!” Bokuto laughs again and Akaashi blushes feeling the other’s hand starting to play with his hair.
“Practice was fun! And your sets were perfect as usual! Did you see that cross shot I did that almost hit Konoha in the face? It was so cool!” Akaashi turns his head to look at him, a soft smile on his face.
“Yes, I did, it was a really amazing cross shot.” The other smiles proudly, sitting on the ground next to the bed, a book on his hand.
“Okay, now close your eyes and let me read for you.” Akaashi did as he was told, relaxing with the sound of Bokuto’s voice.
After that first day they met, him and Bokuto started to do that almost everyday the book reading meeting existed. They would either go to Bokuto’s house or Akaashi’s house, lock themselves in the bedroom and Bokuto would read to him anything he wanted.
Then Akaashi finally entered primary school, the same school Bokuto went to and they became inseparable. They would go to each other’s houses everyday and stopped going to the book reading meeting because “We have our own meeting and it’s just us” Bokuto had said.
The years continued to go by and they just became closer and closer, even when Bokuto went to middle school and decided to start playing volleyball, spending almost all of his free hours training. Akaashi hadn’t complain about it, because he spent all of his free hours watching him. There was something about how Bokuto gave it his best and never gave up even after the ball hit his head more times than not. A week before Akaashi started middle school, Bokuto managed to convince him to enter the volleyball club, claiming it was a way for them to spend more time together, and obviously Akaashi couldn’t say no to that. After having Bokuto explain all the positions to him, he had decided to be a setter and he believes he never saw Bokuto so excited while saying they would be the best duo in the world.
They started to practice a lot together, perfecting Akaashi's tosses and Bokuto's spikes and once Bokuto was finally able to spike a toss from Akaashi perfectly, that was the moment Akaashi knew he fell in love with the other.
But then Bokuto entered high school and they got separated again. For a whole year Akaashi wondered if Bokuto had found a better setter, never having the courage to say something about it, scared it would be true.
Akaashi went to Fukurodani the following year and they reunited, Bokuto announcing that Akaashi was the best setter he had ever known and his tosses were perfect.
During that whole time, not 2 days passed where Bokuto wouldn't sit beside or in front of him and read something to him. Wether it was a poem or a whole story, it didn't matter, it was their thing.
But Bokuto was on his last year of high school. Akaashi hadn't had the courage to ask what he was intending to do once he graduated, scared the boy he was completely in love with would say he would go to another country and leave him here.
"Because if you love someone, you tell them, you don't let them slip away without knowing. You look at them in the eye and say 'I love you'. The end." Akaashi opens his eyes slowly.
"That was beautiful." Bokuto smiles at him, raising his hand and putting it on Akaashi's cheek.
"Look what I found." Bokuto reaches behind himself and brings another book to Akaashi's field of vision.
Akaashi narrows his eyes to the children's book that Bokuto put in front him. "Do you not recognize it?"
Akaashi is about to shake his head when light comes to his mind and his mouth opens in suprise. "It's the first book you ever read to me!"
"I found it on the boxes in my garage while I was donating my old toys and thought this was too precious to give away." Akaashi smiles. "Can I read it to you?"
"What if I read it to you instead?" Bokuto's eyes turn surprised.
"What?"
"You heard me." Akaashi sits on the floor in front of Bokuto. "C'mon, give it to me." He extends his arms reaching for the book.
"But I'm always the one who reads for you, Akaamshi!" He pouts making his best puppy eyes.
"But I want to read this one." Akaashi reaches again but Bokuto hides it behind his back.
"You can't." Akaashi frowns, still not giving up and reaching again. "Akaamshi, no!"
"Why not? What's the problem?" He hears Bokuto sighing.
He looks at him, seeing him swallow hard and his cheeks turning red.
"I did something to it."
"What did you do?" Bokuto's face turns even redder.
"I wrote something on it... something as in, a confession." Bokuto looks into Akaashi's eyes. "A confession to you."
Akaashi's eyes widen as he feels his breath being taken away. He was expecting everything but that. "Can I- can I read it?"
Bokuto gives the book to Akaashi before hiding his face between his hands. Akaashi opens it and passes every page until he reaches the last one and sees Bokuto's clumsy handwriting.
"Dear Akaashi,
I really really like you. I think you're the coolest person in the whole world and I really want to live happily ever after with you. So I really want to marry you.
Please marry me back.
Bokuto Koutarou."
Akaashi can't contain the smile that forms in his face. "This is the cutest thing ever."
"Yeah, whatever." Bokuto grabs the book from Akaashi's hands holding on to it.
"Kou..." Bokuto looks at him. "I will marry you back."
Bokuto rolls his eyes, even though a small smile is forming on his face. "Oh shut up."
Akaashi's smile dies after that. He looks down at his hands, his mind telling him that it's now or never. He has nothing to lose if he confesses now, and everything to gain if Bokuto's feelings from childhood hadn't fade.
"Koutarou." Akaashi swallows hard as Bokuto's eyes land on him again. "I'm not joking. I mean not marry you, because that's still early but... I really do like you. Like as in... I'm in love with you."
Akaashi doesn't see Bokuto's reaction to his confession, still keeping his eyes glued to his hands. He does feel Bokuto's fingers brush on his chin and making him look up. He sees the seriousness on the other's face and his eyes shining in a way Akaashi had never seen before.
"Do you mean it?" He whispers.
Akaashi nods slowly and a second after he feels lips against his in a soft kiss. They separate after a moment, Akaashi opening his eyes, seeing Bokuto's beautiful smile.
"I love you too."
And then they lived happily ever after. The end.