Chapter Text
Argentinian Date & Time:
Wednesday, 7/15/19, 7:38 P.M
Japanese Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 7:38 A.M
Current Location:
San Juan, Argentina. Tooru’s apartment.
From his apartment, Oikawa had a good view of the city. Granted, it wasn’t the beach scene he had hoped for, but Oikawa thought it was a beautiful sight nonetheless. During the day, the sun would shine through the glass balcony doors by his bed, letting him wake up to the sun and birds happily chirping away. He would usually drink a cup of water and sit outside for a while, calming himself and his anxieties down before he starts the day.
After he drank the cup of water, he would get changed into the appropriate jogging outfit for the weather and take a jog around the block. If he was lucky, he would see the stray dog people love to pet and play with as they pass by. If it storms, he will sometimes take the dog inside his home and wash him- the dogs stay to be temporarily though, his apartment does not allow pets.
His jog was a moment of peace for him. Exercising got his mind off of the things that make him worry and helped him to stay in shape for volleyball.
He did his routine as usual when he woke up this morning, but he did it all with a little more bounce in his step. Courtesy of the knowledge that his three best friends that he hasn’t seen in person for whole years are coming down to see him for his birthday. (He has seen one of them- ‘them’ being his boyfriend- but that’s expected.)
He got his glass of water, as usual, went on his jog, petted the dog, and went home to get ready for practice. He usually liked to walk to the gym where it would be held to remind himself of what home life was like in Japan. (He would walk everywhere and take public transportation to the places that he didn’t want to walk to. Argentina's culture was very different from Japan, and he loved Argentinian culture, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want to be reminded of his ethnic culture sometimes as well.)
Practice that day was brutal as it has always been. He chatted a bit with Matías and Alvarez about their spiking technique and he also served up some extra balls for their libero James when the practice was over.
“Wow Toto, your jump floater serves are getting better every day,” James commented. It was just him and Oikawa left in the gym with a few janitors, “is there any reason for that?”
Oikawa thought about the question a bit before replying, “what do you mean?”
“I mean- you just get this sort of glow about you whenever you do it. You weren’t recording any videos to show to your boyfriend, so I’m just curious.” Oikawa began to ‘glow’ a bit more after James spoke.
“Well, that boyfriend of mine is coming here to visit me tomorrow! He’s coming with two of my other friends that I feel like you especially would get along with-” He began to go on a bit of a tirade about how similar James was to Makki and Mattsun, not at all noticing when James was done getting dressed and he had placed himself against the doorway wearing a smirk. When Oikawa realized this, of course, he stopped talking, picked up his bag to hang it on his newly dressed shoulder, and squinted his eyes a bit, “why are you looking at me like that?”
“Nothing, nothing,” he replied smoothly, walking Oikawa out of the building with him, “it just amazes me how excited you can make yourself look. You seriously look like some sort of puppy being offered treats, Toto.” This earned him a swift swat on the head and a few good laughs while they parted ways.
The walk home is always one of Oikawa’s favorite times of the day. The city is bustling with life still- though significantly less than during the day- it’s the time when the lights come on and the people become a bit livelier. He smiles a bit at the people he passes by on the street and waves to a few small children who smile and wave back at him. It’s a good experience overall, and it smoothly paves the way for an even better experience which is calling his boyfriend. Although for tonight's call, it won’t just be him and Hajime on the phone, it’ll have Hanamaki and Matsukawa there as well.
He walked a bit faster to get home and got a second, shorter shower in to rinse himself off of the extra sweat that had gathered on his walk home before laying in his bed with his laptop propped on his lap ready for the call. It connected for a few brief seconds that shamefully felt like hours before coming up with a clear, slightly pixelated screen showing three smiling faces.
“Hey babe!”
“Hey, Oikawa! Hanamaki was wondering if there are any hot chicks he can pick up when we get there but was too afraid to ask-”
“Oh my god- I told you not to ask that- why did you even- You dumbass! Shut up before I strangle you to death-”
Oikawa laughed at their antics and sighed fondly, “You guys are idiots. I can’t believe we used to even play together.”
“Well too bad, you did and now you’re stuck with us,” Matsukawa said with a sleazebag type of smile.
“They’re going to be even worse on the flight tomorrow.” Hajime pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes in feigned disappointment, “that reminds me though, can you tell your friend- who was it, Alvarez I think- I can’t remember, but tell him we said thank you for paying for the flight tickets. It is great how we went from a full day of traveling to just ten.”
When Iwaizumi had brought up the idea of coming down to Argentina for Tooru’s birthday, Matsukawa and Hanamaki’s only objections to the vacation were the money issue. Tickets cost thousands of dollars, and they were already struggling with money as is, it didn’t look like they were going to be able to come down for his birthday at all.
This, of course, put Oikawa in a bit of a mood for a few days. It didn’t interfere with how he played (he wouldn’t be able to be a professional volleyball player if he let his feelings get in the way of his career), but it did interfere with how he interacted with his teammates. Alvarez was the first one to approach him about it, and after getting a bit of a lengthy rant about it all he decided to offer up his credit card to them so they could pay.
Oikawa told this news to Iwaizumi who was ecstatic at the idea of being able to see him, so Tooru accepted it right away. (He wouldn’t ever admit it, but he did view Alvarez as one of his friends.)
“He doesn’t deserve my thanks! Need I remind you how he made fun of me for not being able to pronounce his name when I first got here?” Oikawa said exasperatedly.
When he first met his new teammates during tryouts, the first person he met was Alvarez. The name had given him extra trouble due to the ‘-z’ sound only being able to register in his brain as a ‘-su’ sound, so instead of pronouncing it as it was supposed to be pronounced as he had pronounced it as Alvaresu. After exchanging a bit of arguing over how it was supposed to be pronounced, Matías just told them to let Oikawa learn how to pronounce it as he got more experienced in the Spanish language.
It was a good compromise, but once Oikawa had been able to speak Spanish fluently and could pronounce it as it is supposed to be said, he was due for lots of teasing. (James says it’s because it’s funny to joke around, but Alvarez says it’s payback for all the times Oikawa had teased him for not being able to pronounce his friend’s names the correct way.)
“Can it, Tooru. You know it was nice of him, especially since you didn’t have to pay for anything.”
“Hajime, you know how insufferable he is!” Oikawa whined, much to the enjoyment of the two other perpetrators that were in the room with Hajime.
“You both are still arguing every second, it’s a miracle neither of you have forehead wrinkles right now,” Hanamaki said.
“I will never get wrinkles! I have a good and pure facial routine that is recommended by multiple dermatologists-”
“Yes, yes, we know about it very well. You have literally done multiple interviews on the topic.” Iwaizumi laughs at what Matsukawa says, so much so that his face turns beet red and his breaths go from just erratic to bordering on what sounds like an asthma attack.
The laugh attack is very contagious, infecting everyone in its vicinity. Soon enough, everyone was laughing. The atmosphere was light and airy, nothing could break it.
The call ended just like that, with everyone smiling and high off with excitement. On the following day, Hanamaki, Matsukawa, and Iwaizumi were going to get on a plane to see their best friend. Iwaizumi would finally be reunited with the man he loves most in less than two days.
Life was good.
Argentinian Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 7:00 P.M
Japanese Date & Time:
Friday, 7/17/19, 7:00 A.M
Location:
Tokyo, Japan. Iwaizumi’s apartment.
To say Iwaizumi was excited to finally see his boyfriend would be an understatement. He hasn’t seen Oikawa in two years, but it never did cause a strain on their relationship. They both knew that whether or not they would be boyfriends wouldn’t be a factor in how often they communicated with each other. Even oceans apart, nothing could stop them from being together.
Hanamaki and Matsukawa both knew this, and despite being complete assholes, they respected the both of them. Neither of them would step over their boundaries and they even vowed to give them their ‘private time.’
“Iwaizumi- Hajime, we’re just saying that a happy couple should have some happy sex! We’ll give you both some good time alone before we leave the capital for where Oikawa lives,” Hanamaki says from his spot under his covers. He and Matsukawa chose to both sleep on futons on the floor in a lame attempt to find some nostalgia from high school.
“Theoretically, neither of you would be there for us to have some happy sex, but you see how that’s turned out.” Hajime scoffs a bit at the end of his sentence but is soon making incoherent noises when Matsukawa throws a pillow directly to his face.
“I kind of wished I had spiked that.”
“Ah, the true high school nostalgia.”
“Both of you just shut up!” Saying this, Iwaizumi stomped up and left the room to go get a cup of coffee, leaving behind his snickering, unashamed friends.
A few minutes later, an alarm broke the serene silence that wafted throughout the apartment. The alarm was to signal that they had thirty minutes left before they had to leave to head to the Tokyo airport. Thankfully for them, they had the foresight to pack before they went to bed that night. Now, the only thing they had left to do was load up Matsukawa’s car and get on the road. This step would be easy, and if it were a perfect world they would be at the airport within twenty minutes like they should be, but even at 7:45 in the morning, the roads were packed.
“Are you serious? I know we’ve been here before to visit Hajime, but the traffic is just ridiculous.” Hanamaki groans in the back seat.
“We’ll still be there in time to get through security, Makki,” Iwaizumi says. In reality, they should've left the house an hour earlier than they have to so they can get through to their gate on time, but there’s nothing they can do about it now other than sitting back and hoping for the best. “We should get there on time. Our plane won’t leave without us.”
At this, Matsukawa takes his turn to tiredly put in his two cents, “Need I remind you of that time you called us crying because you thought you missed your flight to Argentina that one time.” All Hajime has to offer as a response is a self-deprecating groan and the two other men in the car laugh softly; their laughter is heavy with exhaustion despite the rowdy way they began the day.
No sooner than later, they finally arrive at the airport at 7:59 in the morning, which is amazing considering how awful Tokyo traffic is and the time it took them to find a good parking spot to put their rental car. Getting into the actual airport itself was also no problem, the problem though, lies within one malfunctioning machine.
“Are you sure you put in the code correctly? Maybe we should see if we can scan what’s on your phone or ask one of the workers for help.” Matsukawa supplies, noticing just how badly Hanamaki is struggling to get the code inputted into the machine to get their boarding passes.
Makki makes a few frustrated noises before slapping his hands on his face, “I put it in correctly five times!> I just don’t understand how this won’t work-”
“Um- Do you guys perhaps need any help?” A female voice asks.
At the sound of the voice, both Matsukawa and Hanamaki turn their heads faster than the speed of light to get a look at the girl. She seems like the average height for someone who is around 20 years old, and she has brown eyes that could rival a cute puppy dogs. Her outfit is one that they’ve seen other workers in the airport wear and is one of the details that they most certainly don’t fail to make note of. Her hair is a sleek black color with a blue tint in it and she seems to be a bit timid or on the shy side of things despite working in a job where it's essential to converse with strangers. Her build is unlike one of most Japanese models, having a bit of pudge in her belly and bigger thighs than what someone would call skinny. Those attributes don’t stray their gazes away though, in fact, it just draws their attention even more-
“You have got to be kidding me.” Iwaizumi interrupts.
The attention of three other people there immediately turned to him.
“I am not going to miss this goddamn flight because you two knuckleheads can’t stop ogling at the workers!” He says with his face looking a tinge bit of red. He looks for the woman’s name tag before he begins his next sentence, “Minako, I’m sorry for how they’ve acted, but we can’t get the code to work from Hanamaki’s phone into the computer to get our boarding passes and luggage tickets. Do you mind helping us out a bit?”
The woman- Minako, laughs with an amused look on her face, “It’s no big deal. I’d be happy to help you boys out!” She cheerfully adds. After a bit of awkward laughing and apologetic murmurings, she takes a hold of Hanamaki’s phone and fixes where they went wrong.
“The reason it wasn’t working was that you selected the email option instead of the code one. The email process is for people who don’t have their codes. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, I used to do it all the time too, but it saves a lot of time if you check what you select.” Minako says and takes her leave, already set on helping out another person.
The silence after she had left is palpable and could be cut through with a chainsaw.
“Iwaizumi-”
“We’re sorry!” They both say it at the same time and look so genuinely apologetic that Hajime just can’t resist taking his phone out of his back pocket and snapping a few photos.
“It’s fine- really. But you two should just see your faces!” He breaks into boisterous laughter, laughter so loud and big that he starts to tear up and turn beet red in the face
To Iwaizumi’s ever-growing amusement, the other two look thoroughly embarrassed. Hanamaki’s face hasn’t changed from its bright red, apple color, and still hasn’t changed as he does the rest of the process in the computer machine to get their boarding passes and luggage tickets.
After a few short minutes of clicking and waiting, the machine finally spits out what they need.
“That felt like it took years off of my lifespan.” Matsukawa groans.
“Well, time goes by slower when you make a fool out of yourself.” Iwaizumi snickers.
Hanamaki takes his turn to groan, “Will you ever let us live this down?”
“Nope!” Iwaizumi says gleefully.
After a bit more teasing and banter from the three of them, they walk over to where the airport workers are stationed and hand their luggage over to them, purposefully leaving out their carry-on mini backpacks to take with them on the plane.
“Have a nice day!” The worker says to them, pointing to the direction of the security line where they need to head next.
“We have around,” Iwaizumi pauses, checking the time on his phone, “we have around roughly an hour and 45 minutes left. It’s 8:!5 right now and our plane leaves at 10. We should get there on time.”
“That’s good. I’m ready to just be in Argentina already. Couldn’t he have chosen a country at least a little bit closer to Japan?” Hanamaki whines.
They all move to stand in the long line in the ‘general boarding’ section of the security area, “Well, it’s not like he can move anywhere else now, he is an Argentinian citizen after all.” Iwaizumi huffs out a chuckle.
“Yeah, it makes me feel so small and unaccomplished.” Both Hanamaki and Iwaizumi laugh lightly in agreement, “I’m happy for him though. I still can’t believe that he’s not even a citizen of Japan anymore. He seems happier than he would have been if he had stayed here.” Iwaizumi hums in response.
“Argentina is a much more... up to date country, if you get what I mean,” Hajime says, stepping forward a few spaces to fill in the gaps between him and the person ahead of him in line.
Neither Hanamaki nor Matsukawa have to ask what Iwaizumi means when he says that Argentina is ‘up to date.’ If Argentina and Japan were to be compared, Argentina would certainly be the country to win in terms of being more accepting. Oikawa, being gay himself, did consider this when becoming naturalized and traveling there. He felt it was a good decision to move to a country where gay marriage is legalized.
Without realizing so much time has passed, the three men find themselves in front of the security guard who's there to check their IDs. They each hand theirs over; once they get approved, they get in line for the body scan and begin to take their shoes off to put in the bins.
Iwaizumi goes through the security line first, he’s not carrying anything dangerous on him, so he gets in pretty easily.
Hanamaki goes in second, he has to get a pat-down, but other than that he’s free to go.
Unfortunately, for Matsukawa, it seems as if their luck has run out. When he gets in the body scanner, the security personnel see a piece of metal in the waistband of his black sweatpants.
“Sir,” one of the female security guards calls out, “I’m sorry but I’m going to need you to please pull down the waistband of your pants.”
Matsukawa steps out of the scanner looking dumbfounded, “you want me to pull down my pants?”
“Yes sir, please step out of line. If you want, we can go to a room.” She offers, though she doesn’t look kind or sympathetic in the slightest.
“Uh- which would take shorter to go through?” He stumbles out. The words seem a bit discombobulated, his nervousness showing predominantly now. Unfortunately for them, the nervous look paints the wrong impression of the security guards working. Hajime and Takahiro take note of this and begin to feel the anxiety bleeding from Matsukawa begin to show on them as well.
“Sir, this would have been over by now if you would have just pulled down the waistband of your pants so we can identify the piece of metal in them,” she bites out scathingly.
Afraid of what might happen next, Matsukawa pulls down the waistband of his pants just enough to see the seams that reveal a metal paper clip inside of them.
The security guard raises an eyebrow at it, “Please remove that then get back in the scanner.” Her tone is cold and leaves no room for negotiation.
A few minutes later after a body scan and an embarrassing pat-down later, Iwaizumi, Hanamaki, and Matsukawa are all able to finally leave for their gate.
Hanamaki is silent for a few moments before speaking again, “Matsukawa,” He says slowly, “how did you not know there was a paperclip in your pants?!”
Matsukawa looks miffed for a moment, and Iwaizumi just laughs in cheerful agreement, “He has a point. Did it not even poke you?”
“Oh, shut up! It was embarrassing enough!” Issei exclaims, making an even bigger scene than he did when he was in the security line.
The other two just continue to laugh at his expense, but once they reach their gate, he can already feel himself begin to join in on the laughter.
Overall, it’s a good and positive way to ease into the next part of their travels, the flight.
Argentinian Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 9:43 A.M
Dallas, Texas Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/20, 7:34 A.M
Location:
San Juan, Argentina. Men’s Sports Recreation and Training Facility.
Though Oikawa has been recruited on Argentina’s National Volleyball team for a few years now, he still has to practice with his team from the The Liga Argentina de Voleibol, or the Argentine equivalent of the Japanese v-league.
His teammates are all very capable players who are good enough to cause a huge storm for the other teams. Oikawa remembers what it was like when he first appeared as a pinch server for his team, his serve had already gotten better with just one year of professional practice. If it was a monster before, then it was a mutant now. He has poured his blood, sweat, and undoubtedly his many tears into mastering it. Consequently, to that, his serve is still his favorite thing to do in volleyball. Now that he has both a jump floater serve and a diabolic serve, he’s nearly impossible to stop. He makes sure to mention all this information in his interviews whenever he gets the chance. He worked this hard for years, how can he not mention it?
Oikawa loved serving especially because it meant that it was his own time to shine on the court by himself. He loves playing as a team, but he has always loved being in the spotlight, and volleyball is no exception to that. The serve is the one time when a player can score a point solely based on their own skill sets and strength, a good serve is the start of a building built on a foundation of basic skills that come together to birth amazing players. If he could have a superpower, it would be super strength. Not because he wants to be able to fight villains, but so his already demoniacal serve can be even bigger than it is now.
So, maybe his boyfriend wasn’t really that far off when he would call Tooru a guy with volleyball for brains.
He was working on one of his perfect serves in practice when someone approached him during his two-minute break, (their coach arrives at 10 A.M, so he wasn’t there to begin to organize the practice yet) “Hey Tooru,” Alvarez walked over to where Oikawa was standing drinking his water, being obviously exhausted from channeling his excitement into volleyball, “have your friends made it to Dallas yet?”
Oikawa checked his phone as he hummed in a type of tone indicating to him to wait a minute, “they said they landed around ten minutes ago. Their layover is just under two hours, so I think they’re going to try to sleep for a bit longer. The jet lag will probably have killed them by now if the number of hours they have to stay sitting down doesn’t.” He says to which Alvarez just laughs lightly at.
“Did they get to go through Immigration yet? I don’t know first-hand how strict Americans are about it but I’ve heard that it’s terrible.” Oikawa hums in acknowledgment, understanding just how awful they can be from his own time flying.
“Did you really have to throw my stuff around? I spent hours packing that!”
He shivers a bit.
“I’m not sure. I think they are just going to have to go through immigration when they arrive here.”
“Well, I’m glad they’re on their way here, even if they have to go through that. You seem happier whenever you’re with them.” Oikawa seems to be startled a bit at this declaration which causes Alvarez to clarify what he said, “Not that you don’t look happy here, there’s just this look you get on your face when you talk about them.” He finishes off.
Oikawa takes a minute to process this information. It makes sense, after all, Hajime has always been his main source of happiness. Wherever Hajime is where home is.
Though Oikawa is dead set on his love for Iwaizumi, he still has to take a moment to think up a response before he responds to Alvarez, “Well, once you’re in love with someone, they become your world. Hajime is like that for me; Hajime is my world.”
Alvarez doesn’t even seem fazed by this in the slightest. He instead had seemed rather pleased at it. “Tooru, I am going, to be honest. We don’t have the friendliest friendship out there, but I’m glad to have you as a member of the team. You deserve this happiness.”
Oikawa takes this moment to look stunned for a second time, something only to be described as being a ‘shell shocked’ expression shown on his face. Alvarez seems to permeate the reaction.
“You little shit,” Oikawa says menacingly, but it’s said all too playful to be taken seriously. The blush on his face is all but a bit too telling as well.
“Wow,” James claps, “I want to say that was touching, but it was just sappy and gross.'' He fakes disgust by sticking his tongue out and pointing to the back of his throat as he gags.
“Be quiet, James. You know you’re not any better than them,” Their captain- Acquiles- says as he lightly hits James on the back of the head. James, the ever dramatic one on the team, cries out loudly and falls to the floor; it earns laughs from their teammates and one long glare from the coaches, but it’s worth it to see everyone joyful.
It’s at these times when Oikawa loves being with his team. Sure, playing with them is nice and exhilarating, but it’s their dynamic and the way they interact with each other that really makes him feel elated.
“Come on Toto, ignore James. He’s just jealous that he’s not involved in something for once in his life,” their captain strikes a blow at James’s head again, earning another loud cry and a bit of a scolding from the coach who looks like he’s also holding back giggles.
The atmosphere is light and almost makes Tooru forget that his friends should be here in no less than ten hours.
Argentinian Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 9:59 A.M
Dallas, Texas Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 7:59 A.M
Location:
Fort Worth International Airport.
To say that they were tired would be an understatement.
Their whole bodies were sore, ranging from the pain in their toes, feet, and legs from not having to use them for eleven hours and twenty minutes straight, to their heads and their necks that hurt from the uncomfortable general boarding plane seats they had to sit in.
“Iwaizumi, how long is our other flight?” Matsukawa says, his voice sounding soft and full of sleep.
“It should be about 4 hours and 30 minutes. Do you have your boarding pass?” Iwaizumi asks.
“I held them for us so he could sleep not having to worry about it falling out of his pocket- hey,” Hanamaki stops walking and pulls on both Iwaizumi and Matsuakwa’s sleeves to get their full attention, “do you think we could stop and get something to eat? It says on our passes that we have until 8:55 to board, so I think we have some time for a burger or something.”
Matsukawa chimes in after this, “Yeah, while we’re here we should enjoy some good, cultural American food.” Iwaizumi rolls his eyes and grumbles an insult as a sign of acknowledgment.
“Americans don’t have a set culture. We can eat these in Argentina-” Hajime gets cut off by Hanamaki whining.
“Really? Not all of us have gotten to eat American food before because we lived here!”
“I didn’t live here specifically, I lived in California, which has a different culture.”
“S-Sir, could you please move out of the way? We’re trying to get through and you're holding up the line.” A third voice cuts in. It’s distinctly female and anxious sounding; so, when they all turn to look at her, they don’t expect to see one kid hanging on her hip, another nearly falling asleep in her arms, and a different child following behind her with two suitcases trailing behind him. Also, behind her is what seems to be twenty other tired adults and children who all look like they’re about to murder them if they don’t start moving.
“Sorry,” Hajime says. He is the only one there who understands English, so he turns around to translate to his friends in Japanese, “she said we’re holding up the line and that we should go. You said you wanted something to eat, right?” The corners of his mouth turn upwards a bit to either smirk or sneer at them as he leads them over to the food court, “If you guys want some ‘cultural American food’, then we should get going to Whataburger. Their grilled chicken sandwiches are my favorite.”
Hanamaki perks up at the mention of food and walks himself over to hold a place in line. Matsukawa and Iwaizumi follow him, slower than they might like, but they still get in line, nonetheless. Both Hanamaki and Matsukawa let Iwaizumi decide the food they were going to eat for them. They’re too tired to try to look at the menu and decipher what the letters in English mean.
“Ok, I ordered you both a grilled chicken sandwich and a salad with unsweetened tea,” Hajime says. He has already led them to a table that’s most likely too small to fit three adult men.
“I thought you were an athletic trainer, not a nutritionist.” Hanamaki mocks, grinning despite looking like he’s seconds away from passing out.
All Iwaizumi does is roll his eyes as he takes a bite out of his sandwich. “I took a few extra classes for more credits. One of them was on nutrition and dieting.”
“Ah, we should’ve expected it from someone who’s dating the only other person who constantly is doing too much.” Matsukawa is smiling cheekily, and it looks too big to fit on his face, so Iwaizumi slaps him upside the head making sure to ruffle his hair a bit for extra measure.
Doing this doesn’t earn any positive reaction from anybody in their close vicinity when Matsukawa starts to whine loudly and annoyingly. Maybe it’s because they’re three adult men acting like toddlers, or maybe it’s just them being foreign in a country where everyone is impolite, but they start to get weird stares from the patrons around them who’re just trying to eat their food.
Hanamaki basks in the attention, though, and even begins to record a video of the two arguing. This is done much to the displeasure of everyone else in their vicinity which (albeit, unfortunately) included a rather irritated Taco bell manager.
“Excuse me, gentleman,” the manager says scaldingly, “if you would like to continue this… scuffle in your own time when you aren’t at a public airport, that would be very much appreciated.” He ends his sentence with a smile that holds less friendliness and more malice behind it. Glancing at his nameplate they can see his name is Adam.
When Iwaizumi and Matsukawa caught sight of the smile, they slowly, but efficiently got untangled from each other and stood up from the floor. By now, the spectators around them had begun to laugh it off and leave the area. The laughing could’ve been used as an attempt at salvation against the humiliation of being yelled at by somebody in public, but instead, it just fed into the embarrassment.
“Guys- Oikawa is going to get a kick out of this!” Hanamaki says between breaths of bated laughter. His left hand is still holding his now-shaking phone and his right is being used to be put over his mouth in a vain attempt to keep the laughter in.
Iwaizumi groans miserably and puts a hand over his forehead, “Let’s just get to our gate,” he grumbled. By now, the manager was long gone, satisfied that the two rambunctious men and their friend with the stupid hair had finally stopped being rowdy.
Both Matsukawa and Iwaizumi join Hanamaki’s laughter as they collect their bags and food so they can get where they need to be.
“Shit, come on guys, our plane leaves in twenty minutes!” Hajime says. He begins to rush which sends Hanamaki and Matsukawa into their flurries of panic as well, but they had no idea why they were hurrying.
Hanamaki voices this, “If we have twenty minutes then what’s the big rush?”
“Because we don’t know if there were any updates on our plane! We could be boarding early for all we know,” Iwaizumi sounds out of breath as he talks. He even begins to go to the gate by himself without checking to see if Hanamaki or Matsukawa are following him.
The two (obviously) find displeasure in this act of ‘betrayal’ as Matsukawa had worded it.
Once they finally get to their gate, Iwaizumi heads to the nice-looking woman behind the desk to ask her if there were any updates on their flight. She looks a bit miffed answering three men who look like they have no idea what they’re doing (she technically isn’t even wrong to assume that) but she still answers them politely and gracefully.
“Your flight is going to be on time for 8:55, sir. We will start boarding here in a few minutes.” Iwaizumi nods and looks around for a seat.
“She said we will begin to board soon,” he translates for Hanamaki and Matsukawa, “It looks like there’s no real good place for us to sit, so let’s go ahead and sit by the window.” The two of them nod and follow Iwaizumi.
The only thing they have left to do now is to board their flight and hope for a safe trip to San Juan.
Argentinian Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 2:46 P.M
San Juan Date & Time:
Thursday, 7/16/19, 1:46 P.M
Location:
Club Sirio Libanes
After practice was over, a few of Oikawa’s teammates invited them to go out to eat in celebration of his birthday the following day. Oikawa had cheerfully accepted but said he would only go if someone would give him a ride to the airport located 30 minutes away from the restaurant they were at. Alvarez had offered to give him one, and since no one else could do it Oikawa agreed. (read: stubbornly begged if there was anyone else left to take him and feigned disappointment when he found out nobody else could take him)
They ate happily and ate even happier when Oikawa got embarrassed being sung Happy Birthday to.
“You guys really didn’t have to do that!” He exasperated.
Matías clapped Oikawa hard on the back as he spoke, “Cheer up, Toto! We did it out of love!” He drapes the arm that he used to hit Oikawa with over his back.
Another teammate rolls their eyes, “Shouldn’t you and Alvarez be getting ready to go, Tooru? Your boyfriend and friend's flight should be here in about thirty minutes, no?”
Oikawa checks his phone briefly to survey whether or not he has gotten any messages, as he does so he checks the time, and Matías is right about them only having thirty minutes to get there. “With traffic, it might take us a bit more time, but most planes hardly arrive on time, so I think we are going to be ok. Alvarez, are you ready to go?”
Alvarez looks at his phone as well before he nods and stands up, “Thank you for paying, Matías, I owe you one!” he says before he leaves. Oikawa only has time to snarky grin at the look on Matías’s face until he makes his leave as well.
“Thank you for offering to take me by the way,” Oikawa says as he gets into the car.
“It’s no big deal.” Alvarez shrugs it off much to Oikawa’s internal demise.
“I feel bad though- I mean, you bought their plane tickets, and now you’re taking me to the airport to meet up with them again. It’s a lot to thank you for and I don’t know how to pay you back-”
“Did I say I wanted you to pay me back, Toto?” Alvarez teases lightly.
Oikawa groans and tilts his head back in the seat, “No, but it’s just polite too! Let me pay you back please-”
“You can pay me back by spiking to me more during practice, how about that?” Oikawa looks over at Alvarez with wide eyes that just scream ‘are you serious?’ “I’m not trying to be patronizing or trying to get blackmail material from you, I just want to be nice. You’re a good person, I have no reason to be mean to you or do things like this with malicious intent.”
Oikawa stays silent for the rest of the car ride, he stays wearing a small smile on his face.
“Ok, here is the baggage claim. Do you want to wait here or go further into the airport?”
Oikawa and Alvarez had arrived at the Domingo Faustino Sarmiento Airport about ten minutes ago. As expected, the airport parking lot had been packed full of cars belonging to bustling citizens and tourists who couldn’t find their cars, so it had taken them a majority of the ten minutes just trying to navigate through the parking lot.
“We can wait here so we have a clear view of when they come out,” Oikawa says. He’s subtly shaking a bit from the cold atmosphere inside the airport despite it being nearly 90 degrees outside.
“Let’s check the board for when the flight from Dallas gets here, for all we know they could be arriving later.” Oikawa nods at Alvarez’s suggestion and follows him to the board.
Soon enough, Oikawa sees in big white letters, “Flight #1243 from Dallas Texas - arriving on time.” he points to it and smiles at Alvarez.
“He’s really going to be here soon!” He bounces up in his shoes wearing a practically beaming smile on his face that makes Alvarez chuckle a bit.
“Oh- he’s calling now! Hello- Hajime, where are you guys?”
“We’re heading to the baggage claim area now,” Hajime says, his voice sounding like a mix of exhaustion and excitement- all very prominent emotions and feelings in his mind right now. “We had to sit across from this screaming baby- Tooru, did you know that babies can cry for literal hours at a time? It felt like hell- And don’t even get me started on the fucking customs and immigration services here...” Hajime begins to ramble a bit in what sounds like English and Japanese, although neither are coherent.
Alvarez looks at his phone questioningly which had been put on speaker when the call started, “What’s he saying?”
Oikawa just wrinkles his eyebrows and shrugs his shoulders at the same time when Matsukawa takes the phone out from Iwaizumi’s hands. “We just arrived at the baggage claim- sorry for how Iwaizumi is, by the way, he had to sit in the aisle seat next to the screaming thing and didn’t sleep. Where are you?”
“I’m also by the baggage claim,” his voice carries an edge of worry in it, “are you sure you’re here? Send me a picture of where you’re at.” Oikawa says. He moves his phone away from his face and in between where he and Alvarez are standing next to each other to wait for the picture notification to pop up. Once the notification does pop up, however, it shows a sign that makes Oikawa visibly pale a bit and makes Alvarez gasp a bit.
“Oikawa- What happened?” Hanamaki pipes in having heard the gasp.
“What does that sign say? Get Hajime to answer me!” Oikawa can’t help the slight tremor that laces through his words.
Thankfully- but to the benefit of nobody, it’s Hajime’s voice that comes in through the phone next, “It says we’re in San Juan. What’s going-”
“Read the full thing!” Oikawa demands.
Hajime sighs and tries to will his brain to work faster so he can try to grasp onto the problem of the situation; but to his displeasure, he still can’t find a problem while he speaks to Tooru, “It says we’re in San Juan, Puerto Rico.”
“Hajime- I’m not in San Juan, Puerto Rico! I’m in San Juan, Argentina!”