Chapter Text
It took all of her courage for Yui to ask out the boys’ volleyball team captain — a boy she’d been interested in since middle school and had dreamed of dating on multiple occasions, sometimes in the middle of class just as the teacher called on her to read a passage from the textbook. And when he actually said yes, she could barely contain her jitters when she arrived at their meeting spot early.
So when he finally turned up and a familiar, silver-haired setter trailed after him, her heart understandably sank all the way to her stomach.
“Sawamura,” she greeted him casually, trying not to let the crippling disappointment show on her face as her eyes strayed over his shoulder. “…Sugawara.”
“Yo, Michimiya.” Daichi grinned his usual, easygoing smile, holding up a hand as he caught up with her. “I hope you don’t mind that I invited Suga? When you said you wanted my help buying new supplies for the girls’ team, I figured he’d be a big help. He always helps Shimizu buy the supplies for our team, so he’ll know better than me.”
“Good afternoon, Michimiya,” Sugawara greeted her cheerfully, waving an enthusiastic hand. Much like Daichi, he had his own signature smile; it was wide and bright and welcoming, and like a majority of the student body and even a few faculty members, Yui had never been able to refuse it.
Trying to pull her heart back up to her chest, she did her best to grin wide as she exclaimed, “Of course! The more the merrier!”
Suga was, after all, a good friend of hers as well, one who had helped her strategize often for the girls’ team, or had helped her clean up after practice when the other girls high-tailed it out of the gym with excuses on their tongues. Even today he’d taken time out of his day off and come specially to help her buy supplies for her team, and as disappointed as she was that Daichi had completely misunderstood her intentions in asking him out, she was also touched by Sugawara’s thoughtfulness.
Still, she felt silly that she’d spent the past hour trying to tame the rat’s nest that was usually her hair, or that she had even pinned a clip on the side of her head. The T-shirt she was wearing was new, and last night she had carefully cleaned off all the mud and grass stains from her sneakers. It all seemed so pointless now.
“Well, shall we go?” Daichi suggested cluelessly, gesturing towards the nearby sports shop they had agreed to meet outside.
“Sure,” she agreed, averting her eyes. She didn’t think she could meet his gaze without feeling disheartened, and then he would know and she didn’t think she could stand that.
Shoving her fists into her pockets and pouting at the ground, she followed her would-be date.
.
Sugawara fell into step beside her as they wandered through the crowd and towards the shop. He was silent for a while, glancing between her and Daichi’s back contemplatively but not saying anything, but eventually he sighed loudly.
“This was supposed to be a date, wasn’t it?” he asked her quietly.
“Eh?” Yui was so shocked that she almost tripped over air. As it was, in her shock she completely did not see the man coming towards her from the opposite direction and rammed right into him. She would have bowled over and fallen flat on her face if Sugawara and the stranger hadn’t both reached out to steady her at the last second, and she righted herself with a flush on her face.
“S-Sorry!” she apologized furiously to the man, her cheeks burning from embarrassment, as he chuckled and assured her he was all right before heading about his way.
Sugawara raised an eyebrow as he let go of her shoulder. “I’ll take that as a yes?”
“H-H-How…” She swallowed thickly, unable to get the words out. “How did you know?”
He smiled. “Well, I can’t say I haven’t been waiting for this day to come.” Her red cheeks must have darkened, because he flashed her a sideways glance and couldn’t stop himself from laughing softly. “And you do seem a lot more fidgety than usual.”
She exhaled loudly, berating herself for not managing to keep up an act of nonchalance. He’d seen right through her, and now he knew just how pathetic she was for possibly being the only girl who could screw up something as simple as asking a boy out on a date. She wasn’t sure how she’d even look him in the eyes after today.
“It’s not your fault, you know,” Sugawara piped up thoughtfully beside her. Perhaps he’d seen the mortification on her face and was attempting to cheer her up about her failure. “Daichi is…” He sighed again, unable to stop himself from lightly rolling his eyes. “Daichi is just very dense when it comes to this stuff. I don’t think he’s even considered the possibility of any girl liking him that way.”
Her eyes widened, and she hopped a bit in her next step as she burst out vehemently, “How can he think that! I mean, he’s so…”
She caught herself just in time, before her unfiltered mouth could embarrass her by blathering out the gooey, romantic things she often thought about the boys’ team captain in the privacy of her own mind. Still, her face had always been an open book — a fact she absolutely hated — and she couldn’t keep her face from burning at the words she’d been about to say. And judging by Sugawara’s telling smirk, he knew exactly the kind of poetry she’d been about to gush.
“Should I find some excuse to leave you two alone?” he suggested, just a hint of slyness in his tone that she’d never even imagined he would be capable of.
“Of course not, Sugawara!” she denied, her voice only a little more shrill than usual. “Even if today’s not turning out as I’d hoped, I’m still happy that you’re here and I’m thankful you came just for me. Don’t think otherwise, silly!”
He was visibly taken aback by her words for a moment, but then his expression melted into one of flattered shyness. He scratched the back of his head, and they shared smiles.
“Oi, you two!” Daichi called from somewhere up ahead, waving an arm over his shoulder. “You’re so slow!” He’d already made it all the way to the store entrance while they were still immersed in the crowd.
Yui sighed. This was what her first date with Daichi had become.
.
Just outside the store stood an independent stall that sold keychains and other small trinkets. By the time Sugawara and Yui reached him, Daichi was absorbed in checking out the merchandise. His finger tapped against his chin thoughtfully as he stared at one particular item.
"Is there something you want, Sawamura?" Yui asked curiously, peeking over his shoulder and trying to follow his line of sight so she could see what had his interest.
"Mmm… yeah," he replied distractedly, reaching into his pocket for his wallet. He handed a few bills to the stall owner and then picked up one of the keychains from the line-up. Yui and Sugawara both leaned in curiously to see. It was a simple, silver ring with a tiny, blue and yellow volleyball dangling off the chain.
"It’s so cute!" Yui exclaimed, her eyes lighting up.
Daichi smiled in what looked to be relief. “I’m glad you think so, Michimiya.” And to both their surprise, he held it out towards her.
Yui blinked down at it a bit dumbly, her lips parting slightly in utter surprise. “Eh?”
Daichi had to pick up her hand — not realizing that he practically electrocuted her skin from his touch — and place the keychain in her palm. “The girls have a practice match next week, right?” he asked with a wide grin. “Consider it a good luck charm. You like to hang straps off your gym bag, don’t you?”
She most certainly did, and her ears were already burning at the thought that Daichi had noticed such a small thing about her, but still, she tried to shove the trinket back into his hand. “S-Sawamura, I couldn’t—”
"Consider it pay back," he insisted, fisting his hand so that she couldn’t return his present. "For middle school."
Sugawara immediately perked up, a little too interested for Yui’s liking. “Oh? What do you mean?”
"Once, right before our last tournament in middle school, Michimiya gave me a good luck charm she bought specially at the shrine," Daichi explained cheerfully, unaware that the girl wanted to combust right on the spot at the memory of giving it to him in front of all his teammates. "We ended up winning our opening match for the first time in that tournament."
"It was a coincidence!" she tried to insist, stamping her foot for emphasis.
Daichi chuckled. “Then I hope you coincidentally manage to win your practice match because of this charm, too. Now, shall we go inside?”
Sugawara stared at Yui, who refused to meet his eyes out of embarrassment that he had found out about such an intimate memory, before grinning widely and innocently. “At least something good came out of today, hm, Michimiya?” He wasso obviously trying to hold back a snicker.
"Sugawaraaaa," she whined at his teasing, and after punching him lightly on the arm, she huffed and scurried inside after Daichi.
The gentle setter was humming happily as he followed her.
.
An hour later, Yui had a basket of sports equipment set at her feet, and the three volleyball players crowded around a display of various volleyball pumps. The one the teams used currently was very worn and on the cusp of breaking down completely from overuse.
“I think the black one would be best,” Sugawara suggested, picking it off the shelf and adding it to their basket. “It’s a good brand, and I think Tanaka and Nishinoya would like it. It shows Karasuno pride and all.”
Yui giggled. She’d always been impressed by how proud the members of the boys’ team were of their team, even though Karasuno had fallen so low in the rankings in past years. She wished her girls were half as invested in the team.
She pulled out the crumpled shopping list she had hastily stuck in her back pocket. “I think that should be everything,” she declared, roving her eyes over each crossed off item. “I’ll go pay for these, then.”
Just as she reached for the basket, Daichi’s hand snaked past hers and grabbed the handle instead. Despite her immediate protests, he insisted on carrying it for her.
"Let’s go to the checkout counter," he suggested, easily dodging her swipe for the basket by stepping back. "I’ll pay for half."
"Wha—?" Her mouth fell open. “No way, Sawamura! These are things for the girls’ team! I couldn’t possibly let you—”
"Don’t be silly, Michimiya," he interrupted her, shaking his head seriously. "Our team uses all this equipment, too. It’s only fair. We couldn’t possibly let the girls pay for all of it with their budget."
Behind him, Sugawara, who had up until then only been quietly watching their exchange with a small smile on his face, nodded furiously in agreement.
Yui looked between the two boys helplessly, her hand fisting her hair in her usual bad habit. “B-But…”
"Checkout counter. Now," Daichi ordered authoritatively, very much with the air of a captain, and though she was a captain herself, Yui found that she couldn’t refuse when he used that tone.
"I’ll wait here," Sugawara piped up cheerfully, stepping back as if trying to become one with the shelf and completely disappear.
Daichi frowned, his forehead wrinkling. “What? Why?”
"You should figure it out for yourself, Daichi," he replied vaguely, the bright grin still on his face. When the captain shrugged and faced away, he quickly turned towards Yui and flashed her a very unsubtle wink.
Spluttering at his intervention, she just pretended she couldn’t see the conniving little smirk on his lips as she hurried to the counter.
.
By the time the two returned, Sugawara was nowhere to be found.
Frowning in concern, Daichi pulled out his phone when it buzzed and saw a message from the setter flash across the screen.
"Suga says he forgot to do something and had to rush home," he told Yui in worry. "Do you think he’s okay? He was acting strange just a while ago."
Yui had a pretty good idea of what had really pushed Sugawara to rush home, but she bit her tongue and simply nodded. “I’m sure it wasn’t anything serious,” she assured him. “Sugawara isn’t the type to forget things if they’re serious.”
"I guess you’re right…" he agreed, though he still looked a bit concerned as he returned his phone to his pocket. Clutching the bags in one hand — he had practically wrestled them from her at the counter, to the clerk’s amusement — he gestured towards the exit with the other. “Should we go, too, then? I’ll walk you home.”
"Sawamura, you really don’t have to—"
"Don’t argue with me, Michimiya," he said in a final sort of voice, and Yui’s protests stammered off.
"Well… all right. But I wanted to drop this stuff off at school first."
He shrugged. “That’s fine with me. Let’s get going.”
She exhaled slowly and unevenly, attempting to calm her heart by reminding herself that this hadn’t been a date at all, so there was no need to be so nervous about being alone with Sawamura. It just wasn’t working one bit.
.
Yui was proud of herself for managing to act fairly normal on the walk to school. She and Sawamura had been friends since middle school, so talking to him was something familiar to her, no matter how fast her heartbeat was strumming in her ears through the entire exchange.
One of the things she liked most about Daichi was how easy it was to talk to him; he was easygoing and listened attentively and made her feel like she mattered to him. And any time she made him laugh, it made her heart sing.
She was even a little disappointed when they reached the school. Her house was very close, which meant their outing together was almost over.
As captains of the volleyball teams, both of them had keys to the gymnasium, which was how they managed to reach the storage room even when it was a day off and the entire building was locked up.
"The gym is a little lonely when it’s so quiet, huh?" Daichi said offhandedly. "We have Nishinoya and Tanaka, who are always noisy, and Hinata and Kageyama, who are always fighting. It’s been a while since there’s been any peace in the gym."
His words were so affectionate and fatherly that Yui marveled at how much he loved his teammates. She loved her teammates too, but they never showed up for practice and a quiet gym was something she had long since gotten used to. Whenever she talked to Daichi, it made her yearn to be a captain for a team like his; it was just too bad she was no good at disciplining her girls or even just asking them to come to practice.
As Daichi began shelving away the new equipment they had just bought, Yui looked out at the giant, empty gymnasium and thought about his words, as well as the opportunity Sugawara had so obviously tried to present her with.
Her date with Daichi hadn’t turned out exactly as she’d expected — it hadn’t turned out at all, in fact — but he was here and she was here. All she needed was to find her courage again.
"Say, Sawamura…" she began hesitantly, tugging at her fringe. The hair she had so carefully combed and tamed was once again curling haphazardly, but she didn’t really care anymore.
"Hm?" he mumbled thoughtlessly, replacing their old pump with the new one.
"What do you say… to getting some one-on-one practice in right now?" she suggested, slanting her lips and scuffing at the ground with the sneakers she had cleaned last night.
He looked back at her in surprise. “Right now?”
"Why not?" She shrugged, flashing him an encouraging grin. "No one’s here. We could just toss a few balls back and forth or something."
Though he visibly hesitated, she could also see plain as day on his face that he was sorely tempted and didn’t want to refuse at all. It gave her the courage she needed to grip his arm and eagerly tug him towards the gym — anything to prolong their time alone together.
"Come on! Just for a little while!" she egged him on, grabbing a nearby volleyball.
He saw the excitement lighting up her face and it made him chuckle. “All right, all right,” he caved easily, shrugging out of his jacket. “I can’t resist. You know me too well, Michimiya.”
She almost beamed with pride at his words.
As they began volleying the ball back and forth, Yui thought about how she’d wanted today to go — she’d wanted him to understand that asking him out had been her way of confessing, and she’d wanted to spend the day alone with him, and she’d wanted to feel jitters in her stomach every time their hands accidentally brushed, and she’d wanted him to see her like she saw him, like the way she’d seen him since middle school.
But then she thought about the way they were now — lazily tossing a ball back and forth, playing a sport they both loved, with easy conversation and laughter between them that she hoped he didn’t have with just any girl. They were comfortable and familiar with each other, and it warmed her all the way down to her toes.
Yui decided that, even though things hadn’t gone the way she’d planned, today couldn’t have turned out any better.