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Atsumu really should have known better than to push his luck.
Despite training his ass off before Nationals, they’d still lost their first match there. That match could have gone either way, and maybe, if Atsumu had just been a little better, they could have defeated Karasuno. As it was, they had to return to Hyogo, defeated. That was the last official match of Aran and Kita’s high school careers. Kita wasn’t planning on playing again. Aran’s reputation would be tainted by the results of that match.
Atsumu… didn’t know how to deal with that.
Technically, they were now in a bit of an off season. There were no more practices scheduled in preparation for final exams. Atsumu had always performed exceptionally with little effort. He was a genius after all. It really wasn’t something he stressed about. In all fairness, Osamu was also somewhat of a genius, but he did have to work to maintain his grades. Most of the Inarizaki Boys Volleyball Club were considered part of the Smart Kids Brigade™ so they theoretically shouldn’t have been all that concerned either. But Inarizaki cared a lot about academic success.
They were from a small city in Hyogo and basically nobodies. If they wanted to get into a good university, they needed to be incredibly high achieving. To be part of a club. You had to merely maintain passing grades, but it was seen as shameful to be barely passing. The general consensus was that you shouldn’t be in a club unless you were smart enough. Otherwise, you were just a dumb jock. Atsumu took supreme satisfaction in surprising people with his intelligence. Most people figured that he would be on the dumber end of the Smart Kids Brigade™ since he appeared to be so dedicated to volleyball. He loved proving them wrong.
That only made him more disliked. No one liked an arrogant ass. Atsumu’s philosophy was that if he had the skill to back up his arrogance, then people really shouldn’t judge him for being arrogant. He was that good, after all.
That didn’t mean it didn’t suck when people really put effort and ‘oomf’ into the vitriol they filled their hate notes with. Well, they were going to hate him no matter what, so he might as well give them a reason to, right?
The point was, Atsumu didn’t necessarily get why everyone was making such a big fuss about exam period. If you did your work and brushed up on things, you should be fine, right? Nonetheless, there were no schedule practices for the rest of the school term. That didn’t mean that Atsumu wasn’t going to practice. It just meant that he would be alone while he did so.
He needed to be better. What happened at Spring Nationals couldn’t be allowed to happen again. He wouldn’t be able to handle that. He had to be better.
It was going to be his last year playing with Osamu. It was going to be Osamu’s last year playing. He was only going to play casually in university.
Atsumu couldn’t be the reason that Osamu’s final year ended as a disappointment.
He leapt up his normal practice schedule, despite almost every club taking exams off. He showed up before classes, setting up the net and then cleaning all by himself every morning. Then, after classes, he’d repeat the process. It got a bit tiring practicing just serves, but he couldn’t just not practice. He needed to do something. He needed to keep working.
Osamu called him an idiot for overworking himself and not focusing on his studies, but Osamu had just broken the news to him that he wouldn’t be playing after high school. Atsumu did not want to spend anymore time at home than he had to. He knew that he was going to say something that he would regret and he just didn’t have the energy to try and fix it.
He needed time. What better thing to clear his head than practicing for hours on end?
He even went to study at internet cafes and the local library. He knew things were tough for Osamu right now, but Atsumu being there just wasn’t going to help. Not the way he was. He was better off just staying away until he had his head on straight again.
So, Osamu wasn’t exactly expecting him home. In hindsight, that was a bit of a poor decision because that meant that no one was going to notice if he didn’t head home on time. For all Osamu would know, Atsumu might crash at ‘a friend’s’ place for the night. Somehow, Osamu was still under the impression that Atsumu had friends.
Today, Atsumu stayed later than before. It hadn’t really been any more of a bad day than any other day of the week, but he’d just walked into the gym and didn’t have it in him to stop. It wasn’t like there were any particular things he was working on or he was in any kind of role. He served until his hand throbbed past what he was comfortable putting up with and then he served some more.
He wasn’t ready to stop. He had to keep going.
At one point, his hand was bright red with ugly bruises beginning to set in under the irritation and Atsumu had been forced to switch hands, lest he truly injured himself.
Doing anything left-handed was difficult enough, but Atsumu really hadn’t considered everything that went into playing left handed. For the first time in a long time, Atsumu was confronted with something that he wasn’t able to do right away. He was in the process of training himself to write with both hands and he’d managed to become passable at using chopsticks, but those actions were very different.
By all logic, it should be easier because it involves gross motor functions instead of more delicate motions. That was not true for Atsumu. The motions just felt all wrong. His aim was shot, and he’d somehow gained and lost power. He hit a lot of ‘home run’ balls. This only made him angry, and he trained harder. If he could serve left-handed, he could spike left handed, and any kind of edge could be useful.
He lost track of time.
Eventually, Atsumu had to stop. He needed water and to check the time. Despite his less than healthy practicing habits, he wasn’t out here planning on ending his career by acting like an idiot.
As soon as he stopped, he realized that he made a big mistake.
The ball slipped from his numb fingers. He didn’t even hear the tap of the ball on the ground over the sound of his own breathing in his ears. How long had he been breathing so hard? He was trembling, his knees weak with fatigue after being overworked. He took a single step towards the walls of the gym where he’d left his water bottle, but even the small motion caused black fuzzy dots to dance across his vision.
Now, Atsumu was no stranger to blacking out. When he wasn’t paying attention properly, he forgot to eat and his blood sugar dropped, causing him to black out when getting up from a seated position. As an athlete, he couldn’t afford unhealthy nutrition habits, so Atsumu made an effort to nip that in the bud quickly. All the same, sometimes he’d get into a slump and things would happen.
He hadn’t thought he’d fallen into that habit again, but it was usually Osamu who noticed he was forgetting to eat. He wasn’t really talking with Osamu at the moment, so it was entirely possible that he had and just forgotten about it.
Usually, the black spots would fade after a few seconds. For the most part, he could literally walk it off. He tried taking another step but quickly regretted that when he careened to the side and had to stumble before regaining his footing.
He felt woozy and instead of going away, the black spots only seemed to grow.
Okay. Staying put then.
He stood his ground, hands out slightly as if to catch himself against a wall that he couldn’t see. By now, his entire vision was black and he didn’t know where in the gym he’d ended up. He didn’t feel anything around him and was sort of just swaying back and forth. He wasn’t feeling any better – he just felt like he was floating, which he knew from experience was not a good thing.
The ground just seemed to disappear from under him and everything went silent.
Before he even really understood what those loss of senses meant he knew no more.
“–what should we do? Do you think he just fell asleep?”
Atsumu’s return to consciousness was slow. His head felt cloudy, like it was stuffed with cotton balls, all thick and heavy. His mouth was both uncomfortably full of saliva and dry, because the universe was throbbing slightly, but he was able to ignore it in favour of the pain in his hands returning with a vengeance.
He was laying on his back with his head lolling to the side slightly. His bones ached in a way that even the cool feel of the gym floor wasn’t helping. The sweat had cooled on his skin, leaving him feeling sticky and his frame wracked with light tremors. All in all, he felt like shit.
The voices were coming from right next to him, so he made the monumental effort to open his eyes.
He peeled them open, squinting due to the bright overhead lights of the gym. “Hell?” he croaked, his tongue thick and swollen in his mouth and his voice raspy from disuse.
Opening his eyes revealed that he was laying pretty much in the middle of the gym, a couple meters away from the net. Beside him were two girls still in Inarizaki’s school uniform. One was sitting on the ground, playing nervously with the edge of her skirt, her legs tucked to the side beside her.
The other was squatting. They were both rather plain in appearance with no true distinguishing features – well, not ones that Atsumu could see from how he was currently positioned. It certainly didn’t help that his vision was still a bit blurry. Either way, he definitely didn’t recognize them.
“Miya-san? Can you hear us?” one of the girls asked softly.
Atsumu groaned softly before making an attempt to heave himself into an upright position.
For a moment, he regretted that, as not only did the quick motion manage to make him feel nauseous, but he also blacked out for a moment again. He swayed and slumped to the side only to be steadied by 2 pairs of gentle hands.
He regained awareness and control quickly (thankfully) and was able to hold himself up. Opening his eyes again proved to be more successful this time.
He turned slowly to get a better look at the two girls who were now kneeling at either side of him.
Now that the lights didn’t seem as bright, he was able to see that his initial observations of the girls weren't entirely accurate. While they were ordinary, Atsumu was still able to make out distinct features. The one on his left hand shoulder length hair that was left loose. Like most girls at Inarizaki, she didn’t wear makeup. Inarizaki was less conservative concerning dress code and far less strict than most other schools in the prefecture. So while makeup wasn’t strictly allowed, that didn’t mean that girls didn’t push boundaries. Hell, even Atsumu had entertained the idea of pushing his luck and putting on mascara or eyeliner. He’d only done so a handful of times, but he’d gone for much more conservative makeup. Only Osamu had actually commented on it, and it was to express confusion.
The girl’s looks were pretty enough that she wouldn’t need makeup to attract people. She held herself demurely, but the hard line of her mouth belied a quiet confidence. She had large brown eyes, and her eyebrows were furrowed in concern.
The other girl had longer hair up in a ponytail. She’d removed her blazer and rolled up her sleeves. She was slimmer than the other girl and appeared a bit more athletic. Her face too, was devoid of makeup, although she had much sharper and shrewd features. He didn’t recognize either of them. Not past maybe seeing them in the halls or at a school event or festival.
“Are you back with us?” ponytail girl said. Despite her harsher facial expression, her voice was gentle.
“Um… yeah,” Atsumu responded awkwardly. “Who are you?” his voice cracked slightly; his throat was dry and achy.
Ponytail girl smiled wryly at him. “Ah, I really shouldn’t have expected you to recognize me. I’m Haruka Junko. I’m in your brother’s class. That’s Shindou Yuka. We’re both in the marching band.”
Atsumu’s brows furrowed. “Marching band? I thought we only had an orchestra club,” he said, puzzled.
Haruka rolled her eyes at him. “You sports nerds,” she grumbled. “We do have an orchestra, but do you really think that we lug out an entire orchestra whenever you have a game?” she asked rhetorically, going into a small rant with a pout. “We have a marching band division of the club. Yeesh, shows how much you pay attention.”
Atsumu winced sheepishly. “Ah, I’ll admit I didn’t really know the difference,” he admitted.
“Sorry?”
Haruka sighed but let it go. This time it was Shindou who decided to speak up. “Are you okay? We were walking past when we saw the gym lights still on but didn’t hear anything. We found you laying on your face out cold!”
Atsumu winced again. Yikes.
So he had passed out again. That explained the ache in his cheek and why in particular he felt like shit. And not only had he been unconscious for an unknown amount of time, but he’d also been found. His only solace was that it hadn’t been anyone from his class or the volleyball club. He’d never live it down if they found out. That is, if Osamu didn’t kill him for overworking himself first.
“Ah, I’m sorry you guys saw that.”
Shindou quickly backpedaled, looking flustered but still concerned. “Oh no! It’s no problem! I just didn’t think that you volleyball boys practiced this late. We’re usually the last ones on campus.”
“Oh, we’re on break for exams, right now,” Atsumu assured her. “I just like to stay in shape.”
Haruka raised an eyebrow at him, clearly unimpressed. “No offense, Miya, but even I wouldn’t consider working until you pass out as a respectable practice – especially in high school.”
“I’m just dedicated,” Atsumu insisted. “It’s exam season, so I’ve been stressed.”
Haruka was still unimpressed with Atsumu. “Even I know that you blow through exams with the same ease as Kita Shinsuke without even studying,” she said, calling him out on his bluff. Atsumu internally cursed but held his ground.
“I’m fine,” he said. “I probably just didn’t drink enough today.”
Shindou looked relieved. “Well that’s good,” she smiled softly before becoming flustered again as she realized what she said. “Not that you passed out!” she hurried to say. “You really need to take care of yourself! We can’t have our star volleyball guy out of commission.”
Aw shit.
Atsumu let out a bark of laughter that sounded fake even to his ears. “Really, it’s fine. I just need to drink some water and then I’ll be fine! Thank you for uh… staying with me until I woke up… I guess.”
Shindou nodded with such enthusiasm that she looked a bit like a bobblehead. “Oh it’s no problem at all! I just wanted to make sure everything was okay! It was scary finding you.”
Ah. Yeah. Atsumu had to finish this up quickly.
“Ah. Everything’s fine,” he repeated. “If you wouldn’t mind excusing me, I really should clean up. Like you said, it’s late.”
Luckily, the girls took it as the dismissal that it was and scurried to their feet.
“Come on, Shin-chan,” Haruka said softly with a side glance to Atsumu. “I’ll walk you home. Have a good evening, Miya.”
Atsumu nodded in return, heaving himself up with great effort. His knees were a bit shaky, but they supported his weight and he began slowly cleaning up the volleyballs strewn across the court.
The girls had begun whispering to themselves, believing they were out of hearing range. Atsumu could still hear them – he had pretty keen ears, although sometimes that worked to his disadvantage.
“–think he’ll be alright? He was practically all alone. And he’s so pale!”
“It’s none of our business, Shin-chan. He’s his team’s responsibility, not ours.
“But… should we tell them anything?”
“Miya’s prideful. He wouldn’t appreciate us sticking our noses in any further than we already have. We’d be overstepping. They’re his team… they’ll notice if he continues acting like an idiot.”
“Hmmm. He does have a twin after all. I heard they live in the same room–”
Atsumu clenched his teeth bitterly. Osamu would never know about this if Atsumu could help it. At the very least, it seemed like the girls wouldn’t say anything.
He grimaced at his hands, displeased with the rapidly forming bruises along his palms and forearms. They were going to be a bitch to hide.
He had to do better.