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Kageyama was in love.
He was sure of it, more than positive actually.
He has been since high school, maybe a little bit before that even. He’s spent countless nights and mornings starting his day with this person in mind. In the 19 years he’s spent living, the only people he’d loved so dearly were his grandfather and his older sister. In the 19 years he’s spent, he’d only loved volleyball, with all his heart and soul, it was his life, his only purpose for living, he’d breathed it since the day he’d held it for the first time as just a couple-month old infant.
So the moment he woke up one day, he knew that something, something, was different when excitement flowed through his body, and it wasn’t just because they had practice that day. He was stooped, laying in his bed with his volleyball in his hands as thoughts ran in his head, filling every bit and crevice of his head.
After countless minutes spent at 5 in the morning thinking, he’d come to the shameful conclusion that it wasn’t because he had practice that day, it was because he would be practicing with someone that day. He was excited, to practice with him.
Weeks followed that day and this person never left his mind. Months followed and he still couldn’t stop that feeling in his stomach and his chest whenever this person would so much as even look in his direction. He eventually confided in his sister, visiting her during her break to ask her what the hell was up with him.
“You’re in love Tobi”
Miwa’s laugh fills the employee room, followed by the sound of a chip bag being ripped open. Kageyama tilts his head to one side, a confused expression on his face. He looks down at his lap, fumbling with the volleyball in his hands. He was confused to say the very least, the statement didn’t click in his head. At his obvious display of confusion, his sister laughs again.
“You said that you only think of him right? You wake up every day and go to sleep with him being on your mind, you look at something that you would usually turn a blind eye to but now it reminds you of them? You’re in love Tobi”, she says, getting up from her chair and throws the empty wrappers into the nearby trash bin.
Kageyama thinks of the girl’s statement over and over.
There’s no use in denying it.
He smiles to himself.
He was in love.
He was in love with Hinata Shouyou.
Now that he’s thought about it, there were a couple of instances where he’d just… stumble a little closer to the endless pit called love. One of those instances being that time during Interhigh when he was feeling the overbearing pressure of being in an official match with Aoba Johsai. When Hinata had noticed his anxious twitching and pressured plays, sure he was being obvious but Hinata had been the only one to encourage him to reach out whenever he’d gotten to that state of pressure.
Not to mention how Sugawara said that "Hinata just lights up whenever you toss to him".
That reassurance of having someone next to you on the court was more than he could ask for.
Even as he enters his second year of high school, his feelings never changed, he still starts his day off with hopeless daydreaming, which brings him back to the day he was about to face. His second year of high school meant that he was considered an upperclassman now, he was looked up to by newcomers, his new teammates, and he took pleasure in teasing Kageyama about it whenever he got the slightest chance.
“Kageyama-senpai huh?”, the ginger laughs, resulting in a smack at the back of his head. The setter clicks his tongue, proceeding to walk ahead, leaving the middle blocker to scream and run after him.
“What?! You don’t like being called senpai?”, Hinata presses him on, Kageyama’s patience was running thin. He looks down at the middle blocker, a murderous glare practically piercing through Hinata’s soul. The shorter of the two holds his hands up in surrender.
“It’s not like I don’t, I just don’t prefer it”
Hinata makes a teasing humming noise, but he leaves it at that. Proceeding to run to the gym, excited to meet his new teammates, leaving Kageyama to catch his breath because shit, Hinata calling him ‘Kageyama-senpai’ was a whole other experience.
Even when they graduate, his eyes were only on him, his crystal-like blue eyes watching as Hinata steps up the podium, receiving his diploma and congratulations. Even as he eats his dinner surrounded by his former seniors, his eyes are still on him. He’s shamefully confident that he could say that he’d spent a good amount of time just staring at Hinata Shouyou as much as he practices volleyball.
When he watches Hinata board the plane for Brazil he felt empty. There was a pull in his chest that was incredibly uncomfortable, he watched as the plane took off, and even more than before, Hinata felt so far away. Years of loving him and now he was off, to the other side of the Earth.
When he played for the Schweiden Adlers as a setter in the starting line up, his mind wandered back to Hinata, wondering what he was up to, or how he was doing, he could easily pull his phone out and text him, just a click and they could talk again, but he pushes it aside.
Stop being so damn clingy, he told himself often.
One thing’s for sure though.
He missed when Hinata would spike his tosses.
Which also brings him back to his high school days.
“Nothing’s scarier than tossing, and finding out no one’s there”, he admits, dead silence following his voice, the gym is quiet, making him feel worse. He hated attention like this, he absolutely despised the pitiful looks the others were giving him.
“But that was junior high, I stand by you, so don’t worry”
Kageyama looks up, bangs moving aside as he meets Hinata’s reassuring gaze, a genuine expression on his face. Kageyama was stunned, beyond stunned even. His bewildered gaze stares at the serious look on Hinata’s face. He was serious, and that made Kageyama’s heart do flips upon flips in his chest.
He’d been scared.
So fucking scared, he spent months trying to recover from the stunt that his former teammates pulled. He was alone, and he wanted to keep it that way, he’d held a grudge for months and he couldn’t perform well. Because of the realization that no one was there to spike his toss, nothing could be more painful, betraying, trust-shattering, than being a setter who stands alone on the court.
But there he was, standing in front of him.
There he was, calling for a toss.
There he was, perfectly hitting his toss.
And when Kageyama found out that Hinata’s eyes were closed, when he found out that Hinata trusted him as a setter, oh Kageyama was done for. Months of training, competing, losing, crying and hardship had passed, and Kageyama could’ve never been more in love.
“Hinata’s coming back”, he reads on his notifications, eyes widening.
He’s loved him.
He’s loved Hinata Shouyou through it all.
Since High School, since the hardships and hours of training, since their fight, since their growth as people and players. He’d loved him through it all.
He’d loved Hinata Shouyou all this time.
Through the wins and losses, through the fights and arguments, through the nights of endless crying, through the days of mourning their relative’s death anniversaries, through comforting each other after a horrible defeat, he’d loved him through thick in thin.
He’s loved him, and he will continue to love him.
Even as he’s on the ground, one knee on the sand as he holds a small box up, teary eyes meeting Hinata’s close-to-sobbing one’s. The boy threw his arms around the setter, both of them crying into each other’s shoulders. Their friends cheer from the background, but all they see and hear is each other. This was the day they both got recruited as official players for the team of Japan, a life-long dream but at that moment they didn’t care.
They were engaged.
After dating for four years since their second year of high school, they’d finally tie the knot.
And now, here they were, engaged and playing for Japan, as number 9 and 10 like when it all started.
Kageyama loved this boy with all his being, and Hinata reciprocated it in the very best way.
“Toss to me a lot today okay?”