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It was a given, growing up as twins, that they shared things. They shared their room and their toys, when they could be persuaded; they shared baths and hairbrushes and laundry bins; they even shared their faces, perfect copies of one another. Atsumu’s hair was long enough to tie into braids and people still mixed them up more often than not, much to both of their chagrin.
“Y’ think ma will be mad?” Atsumu asked, head tilted forward to let his brother work.
“Yeah, ‘course,” Osamu replied, matter-of-fact as ever, and suppressed a grin when Tsumu laughed. “Sit still, unless ya want me takin’ off one of yer ears.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Atsumu groused and tucked his chin against his chest, watching as black hair fell to the floor in clumps. It probably wasn’t the sort of thing that was meant to be done with craft scissors, but they could only work with what they had. At least they had managed to find an actual set of clippers, which hummed against his scalp as they buzzed away the last few tufts on the sides of his head. When they clicked off, Samu dusted his neck with a towel and surveyed his work, shrugged his lips and tilted his head: not bad.
He brushed his hands together and looked at Tsumu in the mirror. “What next?”
“Samu, can I borrow this?” Atsumu asked in an uncharacteristic show of respect for his twin’s belongings. Osamu gave him a near-offended look of confusion, lips pulled into a slight snarl and brows drawn in.
“I said y’ could pick some stuff out, why the heck’re y’ bein so polite about it?” he asked, as though Atsumu was trying to get one over on him.
“Well excuse me for bein’ a gentleman,” Tsumu shot back and they both rolled their eyes as he pulled the shirt out of Samu’s closet.
“Nothin’ gentle about you, dickhead,” he grumbled and barely ducked out of the way of the swing thrown in his direction, forcing him off the edge of the bed and onto his feet. Osamu snickered all the way to the door and grabbed its frame to swing out into the hallway for safety, peeking back into the room they still shared when he felt sure nothing would get pitched at his head. “I’m gonna go sweep up, come show me what ya pick out.”
“‘Kay,” Atsumu hummed and the warmth in his expression almost wasn’t fair. How the hell was Samu supposed to make fun of him after that?
Osamu tapped his hand on the doorframe once and disappeared down the hall, off to take care of the evidence - at least, the bit of evidence that could be cleared up when Atsumu was going to be the real display. It had taken fifteen minutes to sheer off years worth of growth and Atsumu had still had the nerve to ask if ma would be mad at them, the moron.
A knock pulled Samu’s attention away from the broom and the person standing in the doorway made him smile, slow and unguarded.
“Huh,” he mused, nonchalant, “How ‘bout that?”
“How ‘bout what?” Atsumu asked, uncharacteristically nervous. His hands twisted into the hem of the sweatshirt he was wearing, socked feet crossed one over the other.
“Just come see,” Osamu said and stepped to one side, gesturing for Atsumu to join him in front of the mirror.
Side-by-side with his brother, Tsumu’s face went blank with awe. He reached up to touch two fingers against either cheek, like he couldn’t quite believe they were there, then pushed his hands back through his freshly-buzzed hair.
“I look…” he started, for once nearly speechless, and Samu waited a few moments before finishing the thought.
“Like me,” he said, and he was right. With their hair cuts the same - Tsumu’s messier, of course, having been done by a thirteen-year-old - they were well and truly identical again, for the first time in years. The clothes didn’t help, painfully familiar jeans and a soft, ruddy sweatshirt, and they fit Atsumu close enough to be his own.
“Gross,” Atsumu replied and this time Osamu was the one that took a swing, ending up throwing an arm around his older brother’s neck to put him in a headlock. There was plenty of shouting and arguing, but both of them were laughing too, shaking with it until their ribs hurt and they had to call a truce so they could breathe.
Side-by-side in the mirror, he took a deep breath and looked at Atsumu’s face, saw the tears brimming in his waterline and the flush in his cheeks and then felt them mirrored in his own. Heat poured out of him and he scoffed to cover the embarrassment, reaching over to shove Atsumu once in the shoulder.
“What’re ya cryin’ for, ya baby?”
“Can’t help it,” Atsumu replied, voice wet, and reached up to scrub the back of his forearm across his eyes. When he spoke again it came out quietly against the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “M’ just happy.”
Osamu sniffled, adamant that he wouldn’t cry, and gave his brother another half-hearted little shove. “Then smile, doofus.”
So Atsumu did, big and bright and blinding past his tears, and Osamu did too.
As twins, it was inevitable that they shared things. They shared toys and books and secrets, food and friends, clothes and faces. They shared good days and bad days, hobbies and fights and obsessions. They shared everything and while he might not have fully understood it, might not have known where it came from, standing there side-by-side, Osamu shared Atsumu’s happiness, too.