Archive of Our Own

He was probably checking out his phone more often than usual—probably smiling like an idiot too. It wasn't really a problem for anyone. Or at least that was what he told himself as he tried to ignore the questioning looks from the other third years, especially Suga.

“I can hear your questions from over here, you know,” Daichi finally said out loud, looking up from his phone to grin at Suga.

“I didn’t say anything,” Suga said defensively.

“That’s the point,” Daichi hummed, knowing it would irritate Suga more.

True to his words, the second Daichi went to check on his phone again, Suga hissed, making Asahi jump from his feet. “Fine!” he yelled. “I’ll bite! Who is it?”

In the mood for teasing, Daichi feigned ignorance. “Who is what? You gotta be more specific, Suga.”

It was rare to finally have the chance to tease Suga back, even Asahi was smiling in amusement though Daichi can feel his curiosity as well—the teen had also been glancing his way. Suga, unamused, glared at them both.

“The person you’ve been texting since practice was over!” Suga said, a little louder this time. Asahi was leaning in, wanting to know the answer as well.

“Oh, I wonder who it is.”

Daichi quickly avoided a dangerous jab to the stomach from Suga. Wow, okay. That was life-threatening. Asahi let out a sigh of relief like he was the one in danger. Daichi snickered at him.

"You know," Suga started, "I don't like it when you decide to be a little shit."

Daichi grinned wider. "I don't know what you are talking about."

"Just tell me who it is! I'm dying out of curiosity here!"

"Eehh?!" A sudden exclamation from behind them interrupted their conversation. They turned to find Hinata jumping up and down and hands flailing. "Sugawara-san is dying?!"

"Don't take things out of context, boke!" Kageyama nudged him, for once using his brain cell to think.

While calming down the first years—no, Suga is not dying, Hinata and he's fine, Yamaguchi, you can stop trembling and Tsukishima, you are not helping—, the second years finally went down from the club room.

"What is it? What is it?" Noya asked, curious by whatever was going on.

"Sugawara-san is going to die!" Hinata answered at the same time as Suga yelled, "Daichi got a girlfriend!"

"Suga," Daichi sighed. He didn't need the extra panic of the second years from his non-existent girlfriend. Tsukishima, the unhelpful brat he was being, just smirked into his hand. Asahi looked like he was close to erasing himself out of existence.

"Is it true, Daichi-san?" Ennoshita asked calmly as he passed the club room's key to the captain, completely ignoring Noya and Tanaka screaming in surprise. Kinoshita whispered something that seemed to trigger them both even further much to Narita's amusement.

"No," Daichi answered, glaring daggers at his vice. 

"But it's true that you are texting a lot with someone!" Suga defended, blowing raspberries at Daichi. Real mature, Suga.

"And?"

"You are being so secretive about it! Asahi, back me up!"

Asahi jumped again in surprise when his name was brought up. He slowly inched away from Suga's grasp. "But…"

Thankfully, or not, a cheerful voice interrupted the chaos. "Yahoo, Sawamura-chan!"

"Ah," Daichi breathed out in relief when he saw the person he was waiting for was there, on the school gate, "Oikawa!"

There was a few seconds of blessed silence before the chaos erupted once again.

"GRAND KING?!"

"Daichi-san?! Are you defecting from Karasuno?!"

"Oikawa came to kidnap Sawamura-san."

"What."

"Don't let him!"

Oikawa just grinned cheerfully at the rest of Karasuno, but perked up even more when he spotted Kageyama.

"Tobio-chan!" he waved at the shocked first year. The rest of Karasuno gawked again, as if hissing at the Seijoh volleyball team's captain.

"Okay, okay, calm down," Daichi said, although he was silently snickering. "It's just Oikawa."

Said teen was absolutely having the time of his life watching them losing their shit. Well, at least it wasn’t added with some fangirls loitering around him. It was a good thing they agreed to meet up after practice.

"It's more than okay. I love this."

Daichi sighed. "Of course, you do."

"How— What— No?" Suga sputtered, refocusing Daichi's attention. "Daichi, what?"

"I'm just meeting up with a friend," Daichi shrugged nonchalantly.

The two of them indulged in a bit of a staring contest. After a few seconds, Suga broke first.

"Daichi," he said, sweetly with malicious intent, "you owe me an explanation after this." Which he was thankful for because he didn't want to describe to all of his teammates the disastrous event of meeting with Oikawa that involved a wild ball and a bunch of fangirls. If he could, Daichi would totally erase that memory from his brain.

"Yeah, yeah." Daichi rolled his eyes before turning to Oikawa again. "This is what you want when you say you will wait for me here?" he accused.

"Your team is entertaining, Sawa-chan," Oikawa winked. "And, hello again, Refreshing-kun!"

Daichi managed to wrangle Oikawa out of Karasuno afterwards, not liking that his team was reduced to a screaming chaos after knowing they were friends, much to the dismay of Oikawa. He was having fun aggravating the others further. Like how he subtly told them that he would kidnap Daichi to Seijoh to switch teams. Or how he started resting his weight on Daichi's intentionally to provoke more reactions.

"Remind me to never hang out with you again," Daichi grumbled as they walked down the streets towards the cafe they were going to.

"Mean, Sawa-chan!" Oikawa gasped in mock-hurt. "You wouldn't dare!"

"Test me."

Oikawa laughed when he saw the near pout on Daichi's lips.

"You love me too much to do that," he whined to Daichi. "Admit it!"

Daichi rolled his eyes again, also smacking Oikawa for good measure.

"This is the last time I'm ever inviting you to hang out," Daichi repeated, this time louder as if that would convince himself to do so.

"Or," Oikawa sang-song, looking unaffected by the shorter teen's words or smacking, "you can invite your other friends to see what your team will do."

"Hm, Ushijima is a good option."

"Sawa-chan!"

It was Daichi's turn to laugh at how offended Oikawa looked. The grudge Oikawa held for the stoic teen was understandable, yet childish. It was a running joke in the volleyball's captain community.

"That's for another time," Daichi said, taming his laugh to a grin. "Now tell me about your week, Oikawa."

Oikawa's smile appeared again as he started regalling the tale of the insane practice his underclassmen managed to pull, looking proud the entire way.

“Where are you?” Daichi asked to the call. “Three-way junction?”

He was aware that he was being stared at by Suga again. They were out of the gym only to fill their bottles with water after all, not for a call break. He tried not to meet his eyes. 

“Just go straight up the hill,” Daichi continued. He said a few more affirmations before hanging up.

“Who is it?” Suga asked as soon as he pocketed his phone and walked back to the gym together. “Everything okay?”

“Yep. Just a friend, don’t worry.”

Now he could see the suspicion swirling in Suga’s eyes.

“You know,” he started, “the last time you said it was just a friend, the Grand King ended up here.”

“It’s not Oikawa this time,” Daichi sighed. He was about to say another explanation when he spotted Nishinoya using his rolling thunder again, but this time crashing with Kinoshita and Tsukishima simultaneously. 

For a few minutes, his mind was taken away from the phone call, as well as Suga’s, thanks to their teammate’s antics. He didn’t know if it was a good thing or not, especially when he heard the surprise yell from Yamaguchi a few minutes later.

“Excuse me,” Ushijima said in his usual tone of indifference, standing on the gym's doorstep, “I’m searching for Sawamura.”

Unlike the Oikawa incident, this time there was no quiet before the chaos. Everyone just started yelling in confusion, drowning Ushijima’s words.

“JAPAN!”

“Boke, that’s Ushijima.”

“What is he doing here?!”

“Daichi, is this your plan all along?”

“Yes, yes!” Daichi raised his voice to be heard. “Calm down. He is here for me.” Which may be his fault for the poor word choice because Yachi went into full panic.

“Is he hunting you down?” Yachi yelled in panic, which just added to the chaos. Now there were even accusations of murder going around. It was a good thing that Coach and Takeda-sensei weren’t there for clean-up.

Ushijima turned towards Daichi. His face might be the same as usual to other people, but Daichi can see the question of ‘how do you deal with these people daily?’. It was kind of hilarious to see the helplessness in his face.

“Was it hard to find the way here?” he asked instead, ignoring his teammates.

“Not really. Thank you for your instruction,” Ushijima replied, also ignoring Daichi’s teammates.

“No problem,” he said, patting his back, before turning to his teammates. “Okay, everyone! Bring back the balls to the basket. We need to lock the gym.”

Fortunately, his teammates calmed down enough to do his orders, although some rumors were now buzzing around. Kiyoko was also successfully calming down Yachi, stirring her to the back of the gym.

"Give me a minute. I'll wrap things up here," Daichi said to Ushijima who nodded in understanding.

Daichi went to clean up the stray balls, checked over the roll of net, and then met Suga, who was smiling. Fakely. 

"How are you friends with Ushiwaka?" he hissed out.

"He asked for my number. I gave him. We talk. The end." Daichi decided to spare the details of Ushijima geeking excitedly over plants when Daichi met him in the middle of his morning jog the same day he asked for his number. He didn't think that would land well. Maybe some other time. 

"I'm growing more and more suspicious each time," Suga said, only half-hissing now. "Who knows. The next time I see you, you will start marching down the hall with the Little Giant for all I know."

Daichi frowned at the thought. "That's a stretch, isn't it?"

"You being friends with a person who seemingly has a volleyball brain and a face as variant as a white wall is also a stretch for me."

"I think you are describing Kageyama."

Suga blinked at this. "Huh," he breathed out loud, contemplating this.

"Listen," Daichi sighed, "I can't speak for Oikawa, that guy is a menace, but Ushijima is a good person. He was also the one who brought up the topic of meeting up together for today. He's a good friend, at least."

They stared at each other in complete silence for a few seconds. Suga was also the one who broke first this time. Kind of a deja vu.

"I swear, you like picking up strays too much," Suga sighed, looking resigned. Daichi chuckled. The image of the giant Ushijima being a stray was kind of funny. "But you owe me another story."

"Yes, yes, I'll tell you later," Daichi rolled his eyes. "Now help me clear them out from the gym. I need to lock it."

Surprisingly, some Karasuno members were getting along with Ushijima just fine. When Daichi finally went out of the gym, he spotted Ennoshita and Narita actively speaking to Ushijima, with Kinoshita nodding along from beside them. Asahi looked skittish around the infamous ace, but Ushijima acknowledged him with a nod. Probably some sort of ace code or something, Daichi didn't know, but it was amusing seeing Asahi stoned up instead of giving a proper nod back. And, well. The loud ones were either ignoring Ushijima or glaring directly towards him. At least it was an improvement from the Oikawa incident.

"Morning practice tomorrow starts at seven as usual. Go home and freshen up," Daichi addressed his team before turning to Ushijima. "Sorry for the wait. Let's go."

After one last 'see you tomorrow' with the team, Daichi and Ushijima finally departed from Karasuno.

"So," Daichi started in the middle of their walk, "what do you think about my team after today?"

"That they are loud," Ushijima answered without missing a beat, making Daichi laugh out loud.

"That's true," he agreed, nodding. That was always people's first impression of them usually.

"But they also seem to care about you a lot," Ushijima added, a ghost of a smile appeared on his face. "I'm glad."

Daichi smiled back at him, humming a bit. "That," he replied, "is also true."

It wasn't how Daichi was expecting the day to go. The gym was apparently going to be used for a tenth grade fair later that afternoon. So all the volleyball team members were ushered out. Now that they were fieldless, Coach decided to cancel the practice and let them have a free Saturday. Which was nice, he could finally relax a bit.

Until he remembered his plans.

"You are texting again," Suga observed as Daichi typed another message. The rest of their teammates were bringing down their things from the club room in exchange of avoiding to help cleaning the gym.

"I do text often."

"But I feel like when you start texting in practice, something will happen. Again."

Fair.

Daichi was about to tell him so when he suddenly realized he didn't have his water bottle with him. Weird. He swore he brought them with him.

"Wait. I think I left my bottle in the gym," Daichi said as he handed Suga his things. "I'll check for them."

"How very out of character of you, Captain," Suga remarked, but still accepted to hold his things. As Daichi jogged back to the gym, their other teammates started to file out from the club room one by one.

"Where's Daichi-san?" Tanaka asked as he put down what seemed to be Suga and Daichi's bags near him.

"He went to get his bottle at the gym," Suga said, accepting both bags. He could see Kiyoko, Asahi, and the other second years walking towards them. The first years were successfully dismissed by Kiyoko then—they were insisting on continuing practice on a nearby field. 

Nishinoya opened his mouth, probably to remark something about Suga's full hands when Daichi's phone lit up and a LINE notification appeared on the screen, making Suga instantly look down at it.

Oh, well, he thought as his eyes unintentionally read the message.

Deducing that it was from a group chat based on the names that appeared, Suga blinked at it.

Looks like they were getting not one guest today, but more.

Great. Not the Little Giant then.

Before Suga could look away however, another notification popped out, replacing the first one.

Another one.

And another one.

The names 'Bo' and 'Rooster' sounded familiar to him, but he couldn't place exactly where he heard them.

"I found it!"

Suga almost stumbled forward at the sudden appearance of Daichi from his side. He recovered quickly and gave him his things back with a smile. A bad move, judging by how Daichi turned to look suspiciously at him, although he didn't say anything.

Daichi soon got the answer to his suspicion when he saw the notification that was on the screen of his phone. No wonder Suga was acting like that.

"These two are—"

"Hey, hey, hey, Daichi!"

"—them," Daichi finished his sentence with a sigh before turning to find the two teens in question were walking towards him. Of course they would actually go inside when Daichi specifically told them not to do so. How they found the gym that fast or even got in without wearing a uniform, he didn't know.

"Hey," Daichi greeted back, accepting the drink from Bokuto's eager hand, but also silently glaring at Kuroo's knowing smirk. From beside him, Suga grinned.

"Somehow I know you are close friends with them," he said. "This one I approved."

Daichi groaned. Suga and these two menaces getting along was the last thing he wanted. "Just because you three gossiped about me in training camp…"

Bokuto was quick to greet Suga and Asahi, cheerily asking them how they had been since the last training camp, while Kuroo also contributed to the conversation. Tanaka and Noya also seemed to be chill about it, only asking them how they were in Miyagi—Daichi scoffed when Kuroo started telling a dramatized version of the story. The tight-knit trio and Kiyoko excused themselves to Daichi and didn't even question about the two new creatures suddenly showing up.

All of these were going too well. Daichi felt like he was going to make up for it later. At least he didn't have to tell the story on how they got close. Suga assumed it was because of training camp and Daichi would be more than glad to let him think so.

Not too long later, Bokuto and Kuroo finally ended their conversation and dragged Daichi for their plan after saying 'see you later's to the team.

"So we thought we would have brunch in the cafe you told us about," Bokuto started saying when Daichi opened his can drink.

"But then Bokuto had this brilliant idea," Kuroo added, already smirking again.

"Don't worry we will still have brunch! But…"

Daichi glared at them both. "But?"

"Do you want to have a volleyball match?" Bokuto asked eagerly. "I mean, I don't know how it would work with the three of us, but I thought playing around would be fun!"

That … wasn't bad.

Daichi turned his head to look at Kuroo, requesting an explanation as well. While Bokuto's head was full with volleyball only sometimes, Kuroo didn't seem to be that type of guy.

"We can find a field around here. But Bokuto also did some research yesterday and found a good one," he elaborated unhelpfully. The smirk on his face didn't go away, although softened into a smile.

“What do you think?” Bokuto asked eagerly. “I miss playing with you guys!”

It had been a while since their last training camp indeed. Daichi did miss them, but it wasn’t like he would say it out loud.

As they fell into silence, Daichi pretended to think about it, all the while Bokuto was looking at him with puppy eyes and Kuroo slinging his arm around Daichi's shoulders. He didn't have to think long—he wasn't even thinking to begin with.

"Okay, but," Daichi said tentatively, "my practice bag is getting heavier so I need some help."

Kuroo snorted at him. "Aw, Sa'amura is getting so old already."

Daichi swatted him as a reply, but Bokuto beamed at him happily. He took the bag from him as Kuroo stirred them into walking again, sealing his fate for the day.