Work Text:
Nishinoya Yuu was anything but quiet. Everyone knew when he walked into the room, he made a scene in every circumstance possible. He was showy, absolutely basking in the attention and praise. If someone were to guess, they would say that Noya had no shame whatsoever.
Asahi knew better.
Noya was the polar opposite to his boyfriend in every way, from the physical to the behavioral aspects. Noya was short and spunky, Asahi was tall and reserved. Noya‘s voice filled a room with energy, Asahi’s barely ever reached a shout.
Asahi was anxious, anyone could see that. He was a kind person, more on the reserved side, but always was there for his friends. He chose not to speak up at every opportunity but that wasn’t to say he didn’t have important things that he spoke up about. He was level-headed for the most part and while sometimes his anxiety got the better of him, he was able to work through a lot of it pretty well. Asahi couldn’t say the same for Noya.
Secretly, without anyone at all knowing, Noya was falling apart at the seams, barely able to keep himself together, always scrambling to be the best he could be. He tried to be sociable, funny, and off-the-cuff random. It was endearing honestly though there was so much more to it than anyone could ever imagine, which made it less fun for Asahi.
Noya had a crippling fear of disappearing into the shadows, being someone the world would deem unimportant, someone who would be washed away in the sands of time. He practiced harder than Asahi had ever seen anyone and he kept going, with little regard to taking a break, even if it was much needed. Every single moment of Noya’s life seemed to have to be productive. If he wasn’t practicing, if he wasn’t eating, getting water, sleeping, anything that wasn’t improving himself or taking care of his basic needs, it wasn’t deemed ok for him to focus on it. He kept going and going and going until he could barely get up off the floor, both from exhaustion and the pain all over his body. He was covered in bruises every day, something not at all unusual for a libero, but with Noya, it seemed like too much to be normal even for that. The look in Noya’s eyes when they were practicing scared Asahi sometimes. Noya would be the first to already be practicing by the time they got to the gym, would be the first one ready to get back to work after either Coach Ukai or Daichi called a break, and he’d be the last one to start cleaning up. Even clean up seemed like it was part of his efforts to better his skills.
Outside of practice though, Noya didn’t rest either. Even in his interactions with all of his friends and Asahi, he was always quick to crack a joke or try to make someone laugh. He never seemed to turn off, his head was constantly running. Asahi felt exhausted just watching him, he couldn’t imagine putting up a charade like that for so long. And for Noya, this was every day. This was his life.
And even with wanting to put himself out there, Noya seemed to have a crippling fear of humiliating himself too. It was hard to tell but he got more embarrassed than he would've ever admitted. Every time he said something that didn't get a laugh, every time someone would look at him uncomfortably for a weird comment he made, every time he messed up in practice, every time he drew any sort of negative attention and his anxiety worsened. It was a paradoxical Hell, a fragile balance between wanting to be seen and not wanting to make an idiot out of himself. Asahi was surprised Noya wasn't constantly paralyzed with fear but even when he should've been, he only used more of that anxiety to keep putting himself out there, again and again and again.
Asahi had lots of problems with anxiety, he knew that. He was always teased about how he needed to speak up more for himself and that he shouldn’t worry so much but he was working on it. Noya’s support was a large majority of what helped him start to work through those issues. He was nowhere close to being perfectly able to manage it, nor was that going to be possible, but he was making progress in it and he could at least take pride in that.
Noya’s anxiety was on another level that Asahi felt terrified about trying to understand. He didn’t want to know what ran through Noya’s head, it seemed like a nightmare. Asahi may have had anxiety but Noya’s was unlike anything he’d ever seen and it seemed to crush Noya underneath its weight.
There was one night where everything broke, all at once. Noya was hanging out alone with Asahi when suddenly he was crying, harder than Asahi had witnessed up to that point.
Everything spilled over in that single moment and Noya was crying about not wanting to be forgettable, being terrified of making an idiot of himself, failing to be good enough at everything he was doing, not being the person everyone expected of him, and not wanting to deal with the anxiety of that anymore.
They ended up watching a movie with Asahi being the one comforting post panic attack for once and it was honestly pretty nice. Noya snuggled in close to him, not even watching the movie at that point as his head was buried shyly and weakly into Asahi’s chest. Asahi didn’t say a word, merely holding him close and kissing his hair occasionally.
Noya would never be pegged as someone with anxiety. Asahi knows better. Both he and his boyfriend have it. While Asahi had a handle over it, Noya didn’t quite yet. But that didn’t mean Asahi wasn’t going to support him in figuring it out.