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The first day that Yahaba walked into the gym with a beanie was also the day his life turned into slight hell.
The setter left earlier than normal, brain sprinting slightly showing the hair outside of the hat back into it. Walking past Sakanoshita, stumbling in nerves filling him up slightly, he zipped his jacket up fully, using the turtleneck underneath to cover himself slightly, pulling the hood up, taking out his glasses case.
“Hello welcome to Sakanoshita,” The owner mumbled not looking up from the manga he was reading, not until the bright turquoise jacket caught his eye, “Aren’t you the setter from Seijoh?”
Yahaba almost dropped the banana in his hands, hoping that he wouldn’t have noticed him, “Um Oikawa? No, I just go to his school.” He responded shaking slightly, not turning around to look back at him.
“No the other one, the pinch server, Yahaba.”
Before the server could respond, Ukai was already behind him, “You caught me.”
“What are you doing here anyways, I feel like you wouldn’t want to be near Karasuno?”
Yahaba took down his hood, zipping the jacket down slightly, “I just wanted breakfast, practice is soon and this was the closest store and I didn’t want to feel bloated, can I please just get a banana.”
“Listen kid, I didn’t mean to stress you out, just take the banana, have a good time at practice.”
“Thank you sir.” Yahaba almost ran out of the store, leaving some yen on the counter of the store.
He unpeeled the fruit, shoving it into his mouth, when all of a sudden someone jumped onto his shoulders, “Yo what’s up Yahaba, why are you wearing your glasses today? I haven’t seen you in that sense the beginning of our first year.”
“I just wanted a banana, why does everyone have to interrogate me today about a banana? I was just hungry.”
“Calm down, it’s not that big of a deal. But it’s still true you never wear your glasses,” Watari leaned onto the setter’s shoulders, flicking his head slightly, “And you never wear hats. Who were you hiding from?”
“I had to go to Karasuno’s coach’s store. He’s so weird.”
“Eh he’s a part of Karasuno what are you expecting, they’re all a group of weirdos.”
“That’s true. At least he gave me the banana for free.”
“Let me guess, you gave him your money anyways.”
“That’s how the economy world,” Before Yahaba could continue his conversation, a hooded black figure bumped into him not doing anything except flipping him off, “Tsk, bastard.”
“It’s not that big of a deal he’s probably just having a bad day”
“But still he rammed into me, and I’m at fault.”
“Just calm down, speaking of a rush didn’t you want to get to practice early, if you still want to we need to get going, like 10 minutes ago.”
Both of them started sprinting through the streets. Arriving at the clubroom, covered in sweat, considering the frigid temperature outside.
“God why is it so cold, it should be at least a little hotter by now.” Yahaba complained, taking off his extra 3 layers of clothes.
“To be fair it’s not like you do great in hot weather, you’re like a piece of white bread being placed in a toaster oven on 6.”
“Why do you always have the weirdest analogies?”
“You get what pops into my brain.”
Both of them were done changing, both of them walking out in a sweater and sweatpants, “I know it’s cold but are you leaving the hat on?” Watari pointed out, pointing at the knitted item atop his head.
“My roots were coming out, and I didn’t have time to dye them. Honestly I think that I should’ve re-touched them a week ago.”
“I don’t understand how your hair grows so fast, like I think you could shave it all off and it would grow back in a month.”
“Like you’re one to speak you shave your head like daily.”
“First of fall I don’t plus it’s like a 5ºclock shadow it just grows back constantly and you need to touch it up.”
“Tell me when you actually grow a beard.” The setter mocked.
The second years walked into the gym, both of them seeing the same black figure before this time arguing with their coach, “Oh fuck.” Yahaba slipped out of his mouth, “Nope I don’t want to do this goodbye.” He tried to escape through the door, before the libero stopped him.
“If this ship is sinking then you’re going down with me.”
“Oh I’m sorry Mr.CalmDownIt’sNotThatBigOfADeal.”
“Not the time for dumb nicknames, why do you think he’s here and why do you think that he’s arguing with coach?”
The new person was in a heated argument with his new coach over the piercings in his ears, “It’s for your own good you can’t play while there are piercings in your ears, you’re going to rip your skin out.” Coach Irihita pointed out.
“It’s fine I’ve done it before!” He yelled back.
“You can’t play if you don’t follow the dress code.”
“Ugh fine.” He slammed the wall, storming out of the gym.
The setter and libero walked up to their coach, “Uh who was that?” Watari questioned, pointing at the person sprinting out of the building.
Coach sighed, “We got a new wing spiker,” Yahaba looked extremely crossed from the sight, “I don’t know if you’ve met him before, but I know he might be pretty aggressive but he’s a good player.”
“Did he transfer here? I haven't seen him before.” Watari questioned, trying to calm the setter down.
“Yeah he just transferred here.”
“Whatever, let’s just start I’m sure he’ll be back to argue soon.” Yahaba complained, going to grab the cart of balls in the closet.
Watari gave an awkward chuckle, “Ignore him, someone woke up on the wrong end of the bed.”
“It’s fine, does he know that his glasses are on?”
“I’m sure he’ll figure it out.” Watari ran away, helping him set up.
Soon the other members of the volleyball team came into the gym, seeing a very pissed off Yahaba and a concerned Watari.
Oikawa approached his coach, “Hey coach who was the new kid making a mess in the locker room?”
“We got a new wing spiker now,” He slightly deflated heading out of the room going to the club rooms, “Oikawa you’re in charge for now, get the team warmed up.”
Oikawa directed everyone warming them up like how they normally would. When in the middle Irihata came in throwing him into the rest of the group. Once everyone was finished, he pulled the new kid to the front of the room, “Everybody I would like you to meet our newest member,” He tugged on his arm.
“Kyōtani.” He muttered, slightly kicking the ground.
“I hope you all help him get adjusted.” Irihata subtly turned to Yahaba and Watari, “He’s a second year so I hope that you all get along like teammates.” Coach pushed him towards the others.
They soon all started practicing serves and revives, Yahaba of course being paired with the Kyōtani, “Do you want to serve or receive first?” The setter politely asked secretly wanting to slap him.
He didn’t get an answer instead Kyōtani took the glasses off of his face, “You’re going to break these if you play with them on.”
The setter just gave a slight smile, “You’re right, thank you. Anyways do you want to serve or receive?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Ok you serve and I’ll revive.” The setter left grabbing a ball grinding his teeth while grabbing the balls. Yahaba went to the other side of the net, serving the ball up slamming it to the ground, Kyōtani seeing it drop outside of the court, not trying to grab it, “Why didn’t you go for it?”
“It went out, why would I get it?”
“Still it didn’t look like it was going out from where I’m from you should’ve just went after it.”
“Well it was a crappy serve, if I went for it I would have gone out.”
Yahaba took a very deep breath, grabbing a different ball, “It’s fine, let’s just try that again.”
The setter went along serving the ball up again, and again, and again, Kyōtani continuing to critique every single one. Then they got to switch, finally. Except for the fact that everytime Yahaba tried to receive the new kid continued to comment on every attempt.
To Yahaba’s relief they finally finished, he could leave. He went to the clubroom with Watari.
“So how was practice?”
“I’ve never wanted to strangle anybody more in my entire life, I didn’t know it was possible but he did it he pissed me off.” He was fuming, smoke almost coming out of his ears, face turning red.
“I see that, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so angry.”
Yahaba slammed his locker shut, taking off his glasses that weren’t there, “Fuck, I left my glasses in the gym, more like he took them.” He mumbled to himself, grabbing his bag storming out, Watari chasing him from behind. Slamming the door open, seeing him still in there, he immediately slammed the door shut.
“Is there something wrong?”
“I suddenly don’t want my glasses anymore.” The setter stormed out of the area, the libero following behind a few minutes later.
“Where are we going?” Watari questioned.
“Food, I’m hungry.”
“Are we going to dye your roots later?”
“If you want to but I need more hair dye if we’re going to.”
“Ok that works, if we go to the smoothie place then we can get it from the beauty store that’s across the street.”
“Works with me.” Yahaba announced, pushing the crosswalk button.
They arrived at the restaurant plopping into a booth, sitting with drinks in hand.
“Ok but really how the hell does your hair grow so fast?”
“You think I want to, it's a pain in the ass to do it all the damn time, like no one should ever buy the amount of hair dye that I do in a year.”
“I mean you could just stop dying it.”
“Ah yes go out announcing to the world, hello look at me I’m the weirdo with purple eyes and white hair with no melanin, please judge me.”
“I mean if you want to keep the hat on be my guest, but honestly if you want my opinion you should probably just take out the contacts.”
“I mean probably, then I could sneak into Sakanoshita without being interrogated.”
“Just go buy bananas.”
“It’s weirder if I walk into practice with a bunch of bananas then if I sneak into Sakanoshita for one.”
“You should bring the bananas I want some.”
“You want me to go buy bananas for you to eat them, sounds like a fair deal.”
“My point exactly.”
“Maybe I should just start bringing eggs.”
“See that’s even better, you should just start feeding me constantly.”
“I actually hate you sometimes.” After Yahaba said that their food arrived and the two boys started digging in, both starved from practice.
They both started fighting over who should’ve payed, Watari ultimately winning, “I’ve never won over a paycheck. I now feel very accomplished in life.” The libero pointed out, as they started heading for the beauty store.
“I know but I didn’t want to physically knock you out in public.”
“Maybe we should start eating in public more often.” Watari opened the door, both of them heading into the store, heading to the hair section. He looked over at Yahaba who looked slightly pissed, “Is something wrong?”
“Sorta, the color I normally put isn’t here.”
“Well just get the smaller bottle then, then you can just get the bigger one later.”
“Do you think I haven’t tried doing that? The smaller one isn’t here either,” Before Watari could respond, he could feel his hat being taken off, “What are you doing Watari?” He bolted off of the floor, looking up seeing the worst thing that he possibly could, the setter snatched the hat back, “What the fuck are you doing.”
Kyōtani didn’t answer, just stared into Yahaba’s white roots, Watari had to watch the rage grow inside of his friend. He tried to get in between them, until words were formed from the spiker’s mouth, “The dye job is really shitty.”
“Not the response I was expecting but at least it was something.” Watari gave a sigh of relief.
“Thank you.” Yahaba just gave a very large fake smile.
“Let’s go.” He announced, dragging both of them out of the store into his car, Yahaba in the passenger seat with Watari in the back, then he began to drive off.
“What the hell are you doing?” Yahaba announced, fuming at this point.
“Put on your seatbelt.” As his new teammates did that he bagan speeding off, going well over the speed limit.
“Um I know we’re in your car but Kyōtani would you mind driving the speed limit.” Watari tried to calm him down.
“It’s fine, normally I go faster but I wanted to be nice to my guests.”
“Where are we even going?” Yahaba persisted, gripping everything he could possibly have held.
“We’re going to my place, now shut up we’re almost there.”
Kyōtani parked in the driveway of a townhouse, dragging both of them into the garage, forcing the setter into the seat of a sink.
A woman with bright orange to red hair, wearing a yellow coat over a white jumpsuit came from the door leading into the house, “Yo Kentarō, who are these people?” She asked, jumping down the step walking towards the group.
Neither of them answered until Watari decided to open up, “Uh we’re Kyōtani’s new teammates, my name’s Shinji Watari and I’m the libero,” He pointed up to the other, “And this is Shigeru Yahaba and he’s one of the setters, and we’re both second years.”
“See I told you that going to a school with other people would be fine.” She pointed at her younger brother. “Well my name’s Mei it’s nice to meet you both.”
Kyōtani forced his setter's head down into the sink, turning on the water, “What the hell that’s cold.”
“You should know this by now KenKen you wait for the water to get hot before you start washing someone’s hair. Actually why are you washing his hair?”
He growled at his sister, “Don’t call me that. The dye job in his hair is shitty so I’m going to fix it. Do you know where the shampoo is, it wasn’t in the cabinet.”
“It’s in the bathroom cabinet.”
“Can you go get it?”
“Get it yourself, why do I have to do it?”
“Fine you can wash his hair.” Kyōtani left the water on leaving the room.
She went to the sink, “I hope he wasn’t too much of an issue, I know he can be a lot but he’s a really sensitive dude deep down, he just puts on the tough guy act.”
“I don’t see how he can have a sensitive ounce of his body.” Yahaba complained.
“Haha ignore him, someone had a bad morning.” Watari tried to shut him up.
“I don’t mind knowing him he probably forced you here, he doesn’t have the greatest people skills, we actually homeschooled him since he was in middle school.”
“Why?” The libero questioned, plopping down onto the cement floor.
“He may or may have not tried to bite some of the other kids in elementary school.”
“I would expect nothing less.” Yahaba moaned.
“Honestly if it wasn’t for volleyball I don’t think he wouldn’t’ve gone back only like 4 years later but it’s fine.”
Yahaba gave a slight, “Tsk.” as Kyōtani came back into the room, throwing the shampoo onto his head.
“Do you know what you’re doing?” Mei questioned, looking at what he was doing.
“Why would I do this if I didn’t.”
“Well if you’re going to bleach it that’s going to burn.”
“There’s no point in bleaching it. Did you even look at his roots? They’re practically white,” Yahaba felt his heart slightly sink, “Do we have color remover? I’d rather just do that than try and watch this shit out.”
“I can get you some, I need to go to the salon anyways. What color do you plan on doing?”
“Probably not this weird brown color.” Kyōtani started feeling his hair more, “How damaged is your hair?’
“Well if it’s damaged then you should probably just sit it out and wash it.”
He turned the water back to frigid cold, “Well I really hope you had no plans today.”
“He’s not lying, anyways I’ll be back I’m going to the salon. Do you guys need anything?” The two original second years gave a hard pass, while Kyōtani handed her a small notepad, “Aye aye sir, see you guys later.”
She came back an hour later, with two bags of food and one filled with mostly hair dye, “You make any progress?”
“Yeah.”
“Well I got food come eat.” She pulled out a foldable table and chairs, setting up the wings and fries, along with red solo cups filled with Pineapple Fanta.
“Do you have a bathroom?” Yahaba asked, starting to blink a lot more than before.
“First door to the right.” Kyōtani responded.
Yahaba excused himself from the table heading into the bathroom, removing the small parts of film out of his eyeballs, revealing the original violet shade.
Before the setter came back Kyōtani gave Watari a glare, “Why does he wear contacts?”
He looked shocked by the question, “Um well the same reason that he dyes his hair and wears glasses, he has albinism so his body doesn’t produce melanin.”
Kyōtani looked back down at his food, his sister slapping him over the head, he gave a slight moan, “Fine, thank you.”
Yahaba came back in, eating the food in front of him, “Did I miss anything?”
“Not really.” Watari responded.
As soon as they finished, they started once again. Spending hours just scrubbing out layers upon layers of dye that has been stored on Yahaba’s head. The sun started to set soon leaving only the crickets chirping, “Well I got most of the dye out. It’s getting late, just come tomorrow and I’ll finish it up.”
The Kyōtanis said their goodbyes, with Watari and Yahaba leaving their garage.
“I mean you look good with white hair.” The libero commented.
“I hope it does, I stayed in his garage for hours, well this is the point where we depart, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Ok I’ll meet you at your place at 8 in the morning and we’ll come back here.” Watari declared.
“Ok see you tomorrow.” Yahaba left on the train, while Watari grabbed the train.
In the morning both of them met up heading straight to Kyōtani’s place, heading right back into the garage.
“Good to see you boys back.” Mei commented, walking into the garage this time in black skirt, a turple neck, and a large oversized coat. Dragging her little brother out piercings back in his face, wearing tattered black jeans with turtle necks under a graphic band with way too many chains.
“Let’s go.” He said abruptly.
“If you don’t mind me asking, where are we going?” Watari questioned, thinking back to what happened last time he dragged them into a car.
“I work at a hair salon so we’re going there to finish Yahaba’s hair instead of being in the garage.”
Everyone waddled into the car with her brother in the passenger side with the others in the back. Much to Yahaba’s and Watari’s relief she drove like a normal person and at the speed limit.
Everyone got out standing outside the salon as Mei attempted to unlock the door, “Welcome in.” Everyone went inside, sorta just standing in the lobby until Kyōtani went into the main room, heading into the back room.
She dragged the others into the main room, placing the setter into one of the chairs, “Are we cutting it.” She yelled to her brother.
“I mean I would, at least.” He yelled back, walking out of the back room.
“I’m just going to cut off the damaged parts.” She started wetting the hair slightly, beginning to chop a lot of his locks off. She turned him around showing the others, “Here you go bro, he’s all yours now.”
Kyōtani walked over, taking stuff out of the bag, mixing together bowls of dye, sectioning off certain parts of his hair. Carefully dying the tips of his hair.
“I don’t know why you made me bring stuff from here if we came from here anyways.” She pointed out dropping onto a chair.
“Well you never told me that we were coming here, what was I supposed to do, read your mind?”
“Touche.”
He continued to take each section, applying the dye with the amount of precision that a hunter had. Kyōtani finished folding up the last couple of pieces in foil, “Should I be scared of what you did to my head?” Yahaba asked, not being able to see what he did.
“Maybe.”
“Ignore him, he knows what he’s doing.” Mei reassured him.
They all sat in the lobby, looking at their phones waiting for the dye to sink in. Kyōtani goes back to the sink, with his sister watching.
“Are you just going to wash it out like that?” She pondered, looking over at what he was doing.
“The dye has already dried; it's not going to bleed to the rest of his head.”
“Just making sure.”
Once the sink was off Kyōtani handed the setter to Mei to style it. She took a towel shaking out some of the water, mowing over to the chair, blow drying the hell out of his head. Once she was done Yahaba had a second to look at it, seeing some of his tips in a violet shade the rest being blue, all of it being blown out from the air.
“Well do you like it?” She questioned running her hands through his head.
“Yeah, it’s nice, thank you for your time.” Yahaba stood up bowing to both of them slightly, “Um how much should I pay you?”
“Don’t be silly it’s fine. I'm just happy to hear that you like it, now I have to do my actual job so get out of my salon.”
“Tsk, whatever bye sis.”
All of them headed out walking down the street. Watari brushing his hands through the server’s hair, “Stop it, what are you doing?”
“It’s fluffy.”
Yahaba slipped on his beanie, “You suck.”
“Thank you.” Watari responded, looking up at the new wing spiker almost running in front of them, “Hey Kyōtani where are you going?”
“I don’t know but you two don’t have to follow me, I know you guys don’t like me.”
Yahaba took a slight breath in, “Do you want to go get some food or something, considering I couldn’t pay you.”
“Goody two shoes,” Kyōtani murmured under his breath, “That’s fine with me.”
“Let’s go get ramen. I know a place.” Watari announced, nervous of them starting to fight, again. Watari directed them to a small hole-in-the-wall restaurant. They all ordered when all of a sudden the libero got a phone call, “Sorry I have to get going, my parents want my help with something.”
Yahaba looked at Watari like he was about to murder him, when all of a sudden he cancled his order and left. “You really don’t have to be here, just leave.” Kyōtani suggested once again.
“And why do you think I don’t want to spend time around you?”
“No one ever wants to spend time with me, I get angry at people and they often just get pissed off at me.”
“Well it’s probably because you have a shitty personality.”
“Yeah probably, I know that I don’t have friends and I really don’t care.”
“I guess that’s something that we can relate to,” The spiker raised a brow, “My parents were never home, they left me with a maid and butler all the time. I don’t even know their faces at this point.”
“Oh boo hoo rich boy feels neglected.”
“Yes I do, they blamed me for having albinism. My parents got together because they were rich, important people who got together to show the world that they love each other, and then when the thing popped out as imperfect they threw me to the curb and just had more children and ignored me.”
“Tsk, I guess that there is a part of me that can understand why you could feel neglected.”
“It’s because I was, my parents shoved hair dye in me and contacts in my eyes when I was 4, a goddamn toddler.”
“Yeah but at least your parents gave you something. I was practically raised by my sister in a basement, then they sent me to a place where I never fit in with anybody, I was six how was I supposed to know why the other kids didn’t like me, then my sister got a boyfriend and instead of a basement I got an actual room.”
“Do you like her boyfriend?”
“Yeah he’s a good dude, he actually cares more about me than my actual father,” Kyōtani gave a slight sigh, “That’s the first time I ever told that story too.”
“I mean Watari figured it out already, but that’s the first time I told someone that directly.”
The food came, both of them eating in silence. They just looked at each other both slightly appreciating each other, their appearance. Yahaba ended up paying, not having to argue too much.
“I had a good meal.” The setter commented.
“Yeah, thanks.”
They both stood in silence, continuing to look at each other, until Yahaba broke the silence handing him a small box, Kyōtani doing the same thing, “I’ll see you at school later.” The spiker tried to push himself away.
Once they both got off each other's sight, both of them opened their boxes, with Yahaba finding his glasses, and Kyōtani finding a silver ring.
The next morning at practice the setter came in with his glasses and natural eye color. The spiker walked in with the ring on a chain, “Nice glasses.” Kyōtani complimented.
“Thank you, nice necklace.”
Oikawa came up behind them, “Now kiss.”
Iwaiuzmi walked behind his setter, slapping him in the back of the head, “Shut up, Crappykawa.”
“Mean Iwa-chan.”