Work Text:
(How long does it take, Hajime wonders, to miss someone so much that the ache inside him never leaves?)
Another day, another practice with the national team. Volleyballs slam against wooden floors worn down by the passage of time and maintained by careful hands. Hajime presses a pen against the calendar and pauses, wonders.
(How long until the ache becomes a part of his anatomy, intertwined with his ribcage and infused in his lungs?)
They take pictures for the national roster, which will be released sometime later that day. Somewhere, eighteen thousand and fifty-nine kilometres away, a brilliant smile accompanies a peace sign and the flash of a professional camera. When it's his turn, Hajime looks at the camera and imagines. Childhood paper cranes, volleyball posters, eyes so full of stars that they shine under the bright stadium lights.
Hajime’s smile is wider than it has ever been.
(Some days the ache is unbearable. It pierces into his ribcage and presses against his lungs until air is scarce, and then some, until Hajime gives in with a shudder and a gasp. It's then that he wonders, with the cool press of a sink against his bare back at 3 in the morning, whether it was all a mistake.
His mind knows that it wasn't. Nevertheless, his heart betrays him.)
There's a break in the monotony, a breath of lavender and stars in what has become a perpetuum of sweat and sports drinks. Oikawa calls, if only for half an hour, and Hajime ruthlessly tamps down the voice in his heart begging for just a minute more to hang up with a short goodbye.
("Is everything okay, Iwa-chan?"
Yeah, everything’s fine. Why?"
"Just wondering. You sounded off today. Missing the great Oikawa-sama?" His tone turned teasing. "I know I brought light and life to your dull existence, Iwa-chan, just say you miss it."
Hajime's breath catches.
"...Iwa-chan?”
He clear his throat. "I'm here."
A pause. "Are you, though?")
He visits his parents during the break, accepts his mother's admonishments for missing her calls and tells his father about his job. Throughout dinner, the empty fourth seat at the table glares at him- a constant reminder of what he can't have.
(He's become thinner, he knows that. More frustrated, too. Sometimes the anger is hard to tamp down, and then the washcloth comes out. The night masks his insecurities, provides a blanket of comfort until the first slivers of morning steal into his room.
How long does it take, Hajime wonders, to become so good at pushing back the pain until it’s nothing more than a steady ache at the back of his mind?)
Passing days turn into passing months turn into a year interspersed with incomplete dinner tables and the sight of a strange-yet-familiar blue flag beside his own. Hajime pushes himself into his work like never before and is rewarded with little to no free time. He can't remember the last time he spoke to Oikawa. (He’s lying.)
(From Oikawa: I found Godzilla!! *Image attached*
He's so cute and spiky, just like my Iwa-chan~~
From Oikawa: We went to the best café today and OH MY GOD THE ALFAJORES IWA- CHAN IS THIS WHAT HEAVEN TASTES LIKE
*Image attached*
From Oikawa: Iwa-chan!! Okaa-san called saying that you don't call her anymore!! I'm appalled |('0')/
From Oikawa: Iwa-chan, is everything okay? Are you mad at me?
From Oikawa: ...Hajime?)
Everything’s fine, Hajime says, when even Sakusa inquires into his wellbeing. He deletes all of Oikawa's messages without reading them. A week later, he receives a message from Oikawa, a single picture.
Hajime deletes that one without looking too.
(Sometimes when it's impossible to contain the feelings in his chest, he allows himself to sink into the murky depths of an ocean laden with promises and fragments of stars. Unbidden, he allows his mind to show him a kaleidoscope of memories – a paper crane here, a flash of warm brown eyes there – and lets the pain was over him like the tide: reassuring, omnipresent, all-encompassing.)
It's nearly eleven in the evening when the doorbell rings, a sharp, shrill sound that echoes against the walls of the apartment. Hajime groans when it rings again, insistent, and when Hajime throws open the door without thinking, he's met with dishevelled hair and wide star-laden eyes.
"Oikawa?"
(He's imagined this countless times: meeting Oikawa, after almost five years' worth of phone calls and text messages and late-night tears after Googling the distance between Argentina and Japan. At the airport, in the doorway of Oikawa’s luxurious apartment in Argentina, under the Japanese flag at the Tokyo Olympics. He still doesn't know what he'd say.)
"Iwa-chan," Oikawa says, and that's all it takes for him to reach forward and let Oikawa break into pieces in his arms.
(How long does it take, Hajime wonders, to miss someone so much that the ache inside him stays even when they're reunited?)
Oikawa sobs like he's never heard before, and Hajime's heart breaks into a million pieces, and in that moment, Hajime knows what he needs to say.
"I'm sorry."
(It's a long road to recovery, Hajime learns. One littered with thorns and barbs and shards of glass, with cold breakfast eaten separately and accidental eye contact that burns and the sound of Oikawa's muffled gasps at 2 a.m. Hajime can't say it becomes easier with time and passage, but it does become more bearable, as breakfast is eaten together and Oikawa's eyes slowly lose the redness they seemed to have taken on permanently.)
Hajime still feels his heart break at Oikawa's tears, and he clenches his fists until his fingernails leave marks on his palms. One night, he slips into Oikawa's room to with a glass of water.
They fall asleep holding hands, and although Oikawa pretends it didn't happen, Hajime feels something dangerously close to hope unfurl in the depths of his heart.
(A week and a half later, Hajime finds it in himself to say something. It comes out as a weak sniff, and turns into the longest he's ever cried for. Oikawa doesn't say a word, but his hand stays on Hajime's forearm throughout, a solid anchor.)
Hajime can't say it's okay. Far from it. But every passing day brings a spark of something, and for now, it's enough. It's all he needs to try.
(How long does it take, to love someone so much that it overwhelms the ache inside him until it's not suffocating anymore?)
Hajime plans on finding out.