Chapter Text
Then I see you, you're walking 'cross the campus
Cruel professor, studying romances
3 minutes left. I can make it. Shoyo glances at his watch as he sprints down campus, past his fellow students who all clear the way for him with wide eyes as he barrels through. He can’t believe he woke up late, and on his first day of class no less. Living in his own dorm far away from home, there wasn’t a mom or an annoying little sister to wake him up for school, he had to rely on himself and the seven alarms he had set, none of which managed to do the trick. Shoyo had blinked awake in his dorm room, realized he had about 15 minutes to get to his classroom halfway across the campus, and well, here we are.
Thank god he’d gotten a tour of the campus long before his first day, otherwise this would’ve been a completely different scenario. His sense of direction definitely... left something to be desired. But he’d spent hours studying his map of the huge college he was attending just to make sure it wouldn’t be a problem. And well, he certainly wasn’t lost.
Shoyo looks at his watch again, still sprinting at top speed. Just his luck that his first class of the morning was all the way across campus. His lungs were starting to burn, but dammit he would not be late on the first day and completely embarrass himself. It was still 10:33! Class started at 10:35, and he can already see the building coming into view. Come on, almost there-!
Wait, why is he on the ground?
“Oww…” Shoyo feels the sting where the cement sidewalk bit at his elbows, and the dull pain throughout his entire front which he realized was from hitting something dead-on. No, not something, some one . In front of him, on the floor with several scattered papers Shoyo assumes were from the folder he’d been carrying with him, was another boy. The first thing Shoyo saw were stark blue eyes, stunned wide.
“Oh my god I am so sorry are you-” Shoyo scrambles to his feet, slipping a bit on the papers that are littered across the ground, oh shit his papers ! He’s back down on the ground immediately, trying to gather the important things his professor had asked everyone to bring to class today.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” An angry voice snaps from in front of him. Shoyo connects it with the equally angry looking person he’d rammed into, who was now standing on his feet. He looks up, ready to give a response to the angry remark. Oh.
Just his luck that he’d basically run over an extremely attractive guy on his first day. The first thing he noticed was his eyes. Dark blue, narrowed with discontempt, shadowed by a slight fringe of dark hair. The first thing that pops into his head is that this guy would be 10 times more attractive if he wasn’t using his pretty face to scowl at Shoyo. At the moment, the handsome stranger was looming over him, which might’ve had something to do with the fact that he was staring up at him from the ground like an idiot. Shoyo had always been on the shorter side, but even he could tell this guy was tall. And he looked even taller towering over Shoyo like this. “Why the fuck are you just sprinting around campus like this? And not watching where you’re going?”
Shoyo’s brows furrowed together in annoyance. Sure it was his fault, but why the hell was this guy getting so mad? He’d already apologized, and it was obviously an accident! He stands up with the huge pile of papers that were definitely out of order now. It was well past 10:35, but the less late he was the better. Shoyo looks up to meet the other student’s eyes, trying to ignore how good-looking he was.“Look, like I said earlier, I’m really sorry, but I really have to be somewhere so if you don’t mind.” And once again he takes off towards the school building. He definitely had to apologize to that guy later though, he did not seem like someone Shoyo wanted to be on the wrong side of.
“Hey!”
Huh, that’s weird. It’s almost like someone’s shouting after him.
“Hey, dumbass!”
Dumbass? Who the hell was calling him a dumbass. Shoyo whipped his head back to look at the offender only to see the handsome guy he’d plowed over running after him ? Oh god, was he about to get beat up? Did he seriously piss off someone who was willing to beat him over a simple accident? God, he really did not have time for this. He looked over his shoulder again, and to his dismay his pursuer had not given up at all, and was actually catching up. So, Shoyo did the only thing any sensible person would do. He ran faster.
Okay look, any normal person would be terrified if some giant (albeit handsome) dude came running at you with murder in his eyes. What the hell else was he supposed to do? His lungs are burning again, accompanied by his legs. Even though he still messed around with volleyball in his freetime, he was nowhere near the athlete he used to be in highschool, and running for your life was really taxing, especially when the person chasing you has legs about twice as long as yours. Shit he’s fast. He’s probably an athlete, too. The guy was definitely built like one, from what Shoyo could tell during their brief conversation. Not that he was looking, of course. This was certainly not the time to think about how hot the person currently chasing him down is. Actually, why the hell was he being chased? There’s no way any sane person would get this mad over a measly collision. Okay, well maybe it wasn’t that measly as they’d both ended up on the ground, and Shoyo’s pretty sure his elbows are still bleeding, but there’s no way this handsome asshole was anything more than slightly inconvenienced by someone of Shoyo’s size running into him. That’s like a brick wall getting mad that someone ran into it! So why the hell is this dude still fucking chasing him?
Thoughts flitted through his brain as he got closer and closer to the doors of the building his class was in.
“I said wait, idiot!” Mr. Handsome Asshole yells from behind him, right as Shoyo smacks his hand on the door handle and flings it open, careening through the entrance. He hears the door slam open again, no doubt from his hunter opening the door after him. This guy was seriously going to follow him all the way to his classroom. How was he going to explain this to his teacher? He was already late, now he had to get beaten up in front of his entire class just because he wasn’t paying attention to where he was going? His sneakers squeaked against the hard tiles of the hallway. Straight down this hall, then make a right after the water fountain, 3 doors down on the left, and there’s his classroom!
Shoyo all but dives for the door. There’s no way this guy will follow him all the way inside, right? And he definitely wouldn’t start anything in front of a teacher. He’s halfway through the door when he hears another “HEY!”, much louder than the previous shouts. He feels something heavy slam into him from behind before he’s once again acquainted with the ground, this time with a heavy weight on top of him. Shoyo groans face first into the floor, dull pain echoing throughout his entire body. He pushes himself up with his hands and twists around to face his assailant, who’s sprawled over his bottom half.
“Did you just tackle me ?!” Shoyo shouts.
The person in question props himself up too, scowling at him. “Well, you wouldn’t stop! What the hell was I supposed to do?”
“WHY WERE YOU CHASING ME IN THE FIRST PLACE?!” His anger explodes out of him. This guy was fucking insane!
“Because you-”
“AHEM.” A new voice joins in from behind, well, above them. They both look up at the source, a short bespectacled man standing at the front of the classroom. The...classroom…
Oh shit.
“If you two are done, I’d appreciate it if you’d stop making a scene in front of the entire class and take your seats. Usually I wouldn’t mind if students are a few minutes late, but you two had...quite the entrance.” Professor Takeda says with a strained smile.
Shoyo scrambles to his feet immediately, bowing probably a hundred times while he blabbered panicked apologies. It was only his first day and he’d managed to look like a total idiot in front of the entire class and make his teacher hate him. And it’s all thanks to this asshole, Shoyo thinks to himself as he shoots a glance at the source of all his problems sitting next to him. He’s listening intently to whatever the teacher is talking about; it was mostly just going over the syllabus so Shoyo couldn’t bring himself to listen. He’d much rather fume about how this person had completely wrecked his day.
"Why are you even sitting next to me?” He huffs quietly, not really to anyone but himself, but the other boy seems to hear anyways. Shoyo really needs to come up with a name for this guy.
“Do you see any other open seats?” Mr. Handsome Asshole says through gritted teeth, quiet enough so no one else in the crowded room can hear. Shoyo looks around and realizes he’s right. The lecture hall is filled to the brim with students, some listening intently like his seatmate was, others obviously not paying attention much like Shoyo himself.
“Fine, whatever. Can you at least tell me why you were running after me like a maniac earlier?”
“Our papers got all mixed up when you ran into me, dumbass.”
“Huh?” Shoyo looks at the folder of papers sitting in front of him, then back at the other boy, then back at the folder. Upon opening it, he sees his own papers mixed in with ones that are identical but written on with much neater handwriting than his own unruly scrawl. “Wait so you’re saying that the only reason you hunted me down and tackled me was because our papers got mixed up? ” It’s all he can do to stop himself from yelling, as there was very much still a lecture going on in the front of the class.
“Well, you weren’t stopping, and those papers were important!”
“We were going to the same class. It didn’t occur to you that you could’ve just asked me when we were there? Or maybe, I don’t know, just tell me that I had some of your papers?!?!” He’s whisper-shouting now.
“Hey, it’s not all my fault! You’re the one who kept running!”
“What the hell did you expect me to do? You had this scary look on your stupid handsome face like you were going to murder me. Anyone would run from that!”
“My face is not scary! Wait, did you just say h-”
“AHEM.” The pair whips their head around towards the front of the room, where Professor Takeda was standing there, giving them another strained smile. It’s clear he didn’t want any trouble on the first day, but Shoyo was pretty sure he was already on thin ice. He laughs nervously as other students peer curiously at them, some annoyed that class has been interrupted by the same people twice in one day. He lets out a sigh of relief when the lecture resumes, before giving his deskmate a dirty look.
“Here, just take your stupid papers.” Shoyo takes them out of his folder and shoves them towards the other boy, but not before catching the name written neatly across the top. ‘Kageyama Tobio.’ Huh. Why did that name sound so familiar?
Kageyama gives a quiet grunt of thanks before handing him his own papers back, and they didn’t talk or even look at each other for the rest of the class. Finally, when it was over Shoyo got up immediately, desperate to be back in his dorm as soon as possible. His roommate was supposed to be coming in today. Whoever it was, they had to come in a couple days late for some reason, and hadn’t moved in on the same day he had. It would definitely be better if Shoyo made a good impression on the person he’d be living with for the rest of the year, so he was eager to go and give a warm greeting. There was just one small problem.
Shoyo stops in his tracks, and doesn’t even bother to turn around and face the person who’d been skulking behind him ever since he’d left the lecture hall. “Why are you following me?” He asks Kageyama.
“I’m not. You think you’re the only one who lives in that dorm building, dumbass?”
“Hey! Stop calling me that! You know, you don’t have to be so rude all the time.” By now, he’s turned around to face Kageyama, who’s looking at him with furrowed brows. Seriously, what a waste of good looks. He doesn’t offer him any more conversation, and continues his way to the dorm, picking up the pace of his steps as he goes. There’s no way he’s walking all the way to his dorm with this guy in tow. But, much to his dismay, Kageyama starts picking up his pace too. There’s a weird push and pull, where Shoyo will walk even faster and Kageyama will increase his speed too, until they’re both doing this weird speed walking thing down the pavement. He doesn’t start running, because he’s drawn enough attention to himself today and would rather he didn’t gain the reputation of that weird short kid who sprints everywhere, but he’s definitely not gonna let Kageyama beat him.
“Why are you following me again? Seriously, what is with you?” He huffs, not slowing his pace down at all.
“You started walking faster first, dumbass.” Kageyama bites back, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
“The whole point was so you wouldn’t follow me all the way back to the dorms.”
“I live here too! We’d have to be in the same building anyways!”
Shoyo groans in exasperation. “God you are insufferable!”
They make it to the doors of the dormitory building, and Shoyo feels a strange pride that he reaches them first. Not that it was a competition or anything! But...if it was, he definitely won. He gives a smug smile at Kageyama, who just rolls his eyes and enters the building without another word. Thankfully, his dorm was on the first floor. His roommate should definitely be here by now, so maybe talking to them can erase the entire experience he’d had today. He reaches his door, 107, but Kageyama is still standing there, looking at him expectantly.
“Um, you can...go now.” Shoyo says flatly.
“What are you on about?”
“This is my dorm.”
Kageyama looks at him incredulously. “No, this is my dorm.”
“That’s impossible. My roommate is supposed to be arriving today, and…” he trails off as it dawns on him. He looks at the other boy with wide eyes. “No way. You’re not…” Shoyo immediately scrambles for his folder, pulling out the paper that had his room assignment under it. He hadn’t given it any more than a quick glance to check what dorm he’d been staying at, not even bothering to look at who his roommate was. Shoyo didn’t know anyone here, and whoever it was, he was sure he could get along with them fine. He was good at that! Or at least, he thought he would be.
“You’re my roommate?!”