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Kenma is five, and he is being taken next door to visit their new neighbours. He is small, head down, chin tucked to chest and he does not want to leave the safety of his room because he doesn’t have to, so why should he?
“They have a boy about your age, maybe older,” he is told in gentle tones and gentle glances, and even at five he can see that there is something in his mother’s face that says she hopes it will be good for him. He goes because yanking his hand away and stubbornly shaking his head would be cruel and would make his mother’s brow crease and that small frown would appear on her face and it would be bad. He trails after her, one hand in hers and one fisted in the fabric of his trousers and he hopes that the other boy is quiet too. That they can sit together and enjoy the silence if nothing else. His wish isn’t granted. Kuroo Tetsurou is a year older, a year bigger, and a year brighter and louder and bolder and it is he who opens the door to them and grins so wide it makes Kenma wince.
“Ma!” he calls, eyeing Kenma as he shrinks behind his mother’s legs, “the neighbours have come to say hi!”
His mother rushes to the door and welcomes them in, asking if they’d like a drink or something to eat, thanking them for the gift basket and saying how lovely their house is, the neighbourhood is, their garden. Kuroo watches Kenma avidly, black hair a mess on his head and picking at a hole in his shorts.
“Say hello, Kenma,” his mother says softly, urging him forward. “Kenma’s five,” he hears her tell Kuroo's mother. “Painfully shy.” The conversation picks up too fast for Kenma to follow, and he eyes Kuroo instead.
“I’m six,” the other boy says proudly, cocking his head, “I don’t get how being shy can hurt. It can be nice sometimes.”
Kenma blinks at him and nods. He likes the quiet. He likes being by himself. Other people scare him a bit, and he’s never seen anything wrong with that.
“If we’re friends I can be quiet when you’d like it to be quiet, and we can do stuff when you want to do stuff.”
Kenma nods again before he can really think it all the way though. Before he realises that this some kind of promise that he might not want to or be able to keep.
“Awesome! You’re my first friend here. I think we’re gonna be here for a while, too, so I guess you’re gonna be my best friend!” Kuroo beams at him, and it startles a smile out of Kenma before he can stop it. His mother laughs and he looks over at her. Her smile is wide and she looks so happy she could cry. He cocks his head and she waves at him. He waves back before Kuroo grabs him by the wrist and drags him towards the garden, saying something about forts and ‘hey have you ever seen volleyball?’
Kuroo loves school and Kenma despises it.
“It’ll get better! I promise!” Kuroo spins as they walk back together, their mothers huddled behind them gossiping about this and that. “I didn’t like it much when I first started either, but then I made more friends and it got a lot more fun!”
Kenma bristles. He doesn’t want more friends. He’s content with Kuroo and his games and that’s that.
“I don’t like them,” he mumbles, fingering the Gameboy in his pocket. “I don’t like any of them and I don’t want to be friends with them.”
Kuroo gives him a look and bumps him with his shoulder. “They’d like you if you gave them a chance to get to know you.”
Kenma wants to believe him. He really, really does. But for every kind word Kuroo says Kenma’s mind comes up with twice as many horrible ones.
“I don’t want to know what they think.” Not knowing if they’re saying something nasty is better than hearing it outright. “I didn’t want to know when I was six and I don’t want to know now.”
Kuroo’s frown is small but it’s enough to make Kenma huff and glare and hunch his shoulders up around his ears.
“Okay,” an arm curls around Kenma’s shoulders, Kuroo stares very determinedly ahead when Kenma glances up at him, “I just don’t want you to be lonely when I leave next year, is all.”
Kenma’s demand for Kuroo to get off of him dies in his throat and everything seems far heavier. “Oh.”
“I know you don’t like me worrying about you,” Kuroo sounds so much older, and Kenma wonders when eleven became such a profound age to be, and a small flare of intrigue burns in the back of his brain, “but I do.”
“Thanks,” Kenma says to the pavement and Kuroo squeezes him a little, making him yelp.
“Anytime, kiddo,” Kuroo teases and Kenma digs his shoulder into his ribs.
“I’m not a kid,” he insists, “you said you’d stop calling me that when I hit double digits.”
“Well I lied, kiddo,” Kuroo’s grin is filled with mischief as he dances ahead, “gotta catch me if you want me to stop.”
“Kuroo,” Kenma whines while Kuroo laughs and runs ahead, and the rest of Kenma’s class is forgotten, left on the corner of the street. “You’re only a year older than me!”
One year, he learns, is a very, very big deal. And Kenma refuses to go to school on his final day as a second year in junior high.
“Are you sick?” Kuroo’s voice rattles over the phone. He sounds excited and it makes Kenma’s chest ache.
“Yeah. Flu,” he hopes the dejection and disinterest and quietness of his voice comes across as ‘I feel like crap and it hurts too much to talk any louder’.
“That sucks,” Kuroo isn’t buying it and Kenma can tell, “I guess I’ll see you later then?”
“Sure, sorry I couldn’t walk with you on your last day,” Kenma curls further into bed, burying his head under a pillow as he hangs up and sighs. He feels guilty and alone and he hates it. Can’t bring himself to move to get his games or go watch television or anything. He lies there in silence, willing himself to go back to sleep, when the door creaks open.
“I told you I’m fine, mum,” he grumbles, and yelps when the covers are yanked back. “What’re you-” the pillow’s removed and Kuroo grins impishly back at him. “Kuroo?”
“Yupp!” He practically chirps as he clambers into bed beside Kenma, “It’d be weird if this was your mum, huh.”
Kenma glowers, rolls onto his side to face Kuroo even though he ends up staring at the hem of his shirt. “Why’re you here? You’ve been looking forward to your last day all week.”
He feels Kuroo shrug, “It would’ve sucked if you weren’t there.”
Kenma glares. “I’m not in your class, Kuroo.”
“No, but I would’ve snuck you out of yours and into mine. And spent lunch with you. And I would’ve wanted to walk home with you for the last time and maybe go to a convenience store for food on the way back. I figured that yesterday can just be our last days of school for the year, and today can be the first day of summer and we can spend it together.”
Kenma doesn’t know what to say to that. It makes him squirm a little and want to hide underneath the covers because he knows he should say something. A thank you or an apology, or a weird mixture of both that falls somewhere in between. But he just feels warm and weird and he kind of wants to cry. Kuroo must see it on his face because he tugs the sheets up and over their heads even though it’s far too hot and they’re both flushed already, and just says “I know.”
Kenma doesn’t doubt it. Kuroo always knows.
They fall asleep like that for a while until Kenma wakes up gasping for air and practically boiled to death. He shoves the sheets off and lies there panting, the tail end of a horrific dream still curling around his ankles and threatening to drag him down, down, down.
“You okay?” Kuroo sits up bleary eyed, but once he gets a good look at him he snaps to attention. “Kenma, what happened?”
He doesn’t realise he’s crying until Kuroo tugs him closer and grabs a tissue from the nightstand, dabbing at his face. “Bad dream?”
Kenma nods and Kuroo’s lips purse and concern looks so strange yet so familiar on him. It’s the hair, Kenma decides. The hair makes him look like couldn’t ever be sincere or considerate and yet he is. Incredibly so.
“D’you want me to go get you a drink? I think I saw some iced tea in the fridge.”
Kenma shakes his head, curling up against Kuroo’s side and closing his eyes, focusing on the thump thump thump of his heart and willing it to slow down.
He feels Kuroo’s fingers card through his hair, push it away from his sweaty forehead. “Are you sure? You don’t look so good. Maybe you really do have the flu.”
Kenma huffs a laugh and cracks an eye open, “I’m fine. Just stay here.” Kuroo blinks at him and Kenma wrinkles his nose, closes his eye again and presses a little closer. “Please.”
Kuroo’s silent for a beat and Kenma feels inexplicably tense until Kuroo’s fingers start moving again and he hears a quiet ‘sure’, nearly lost to the quick thump thump thump of Kuroo’s heart beneath Kenma’s ear. He wonders if the “don’t leave” part got across okay.
For the first time in his life, Kenma hates Kuroo. Hates him, loathes him, despises him, and thinks he’s a massive dick . He feels tired and humiliated and his face hurts from crying and it’s never done that before because when has he ever cried enough for his face to cramp up and feel tight and horrible? Never. Until today. And it’s Kuroo’s fault.
Kuroo and his parents had held a party and, naturally, Kenma and his parents had been invited. He’d hated it. He was sat next to Kuroo whilst his parents chatted and steadily got more intoxicated, and Kenma was a bit confused because, as far as he was aware, there was nothing to celebrate. And then Kuroo’s dad had said, “Congratulations, son! Engineering at a top tier university!” and Kuroo had stiffened beside him and Kuroo’s mum had burst into tears and cried about how “this time next week my baby boy will be gone” and Kenma had gone cold. It felt like death had patted him on the shoulder, the chill down his spine had been so intense.
“Will you miss him Kenma? Of course you will, dear, I don’t know why I asked, but you’re proud of him, right?” Kuroo’s mum was peering at him all rosy cheeked and he forced a smile as he stood hastily, nearly tripping over his own feet as he moved towards the door.
“I am, yes. But it would’ve been nice if he’d told me himself,” he’d managed, before turning and fleeing, Kuroo’s shouts for him to “wait, Kenma, please, I was going to-” cut off by the slam of the door. Kenma couldn’t decide if he loved or hated that they were neighbours because it wasn’t a long walk home at all, but Kuroo could follow so easily and oh god he was crying. Great hiccupping sobs that made it hard for him to open the door because his hands were shaking and he couldn’t see for the tears. He stumbled up the stairs and for the first time in his life he locked his bedroom door and his window and made it impossible for Kuroo to follow.
He actually cried himself to sleep, he realises upon waking. His nose is blocked and his shirt and pillowcase are damp and it’s disgusting. There’s still a hole in his chest that makes breathing hard and it takes all his self-control to not start crying again. He clambers out of bed and opens the curtains, wincing at the intensity of the summer-soon-to-be-autumn sunlight. He grabs a towel and unlocks his bedroom door and it falls open under the weight of Kuroo.
He curses lowly and Kenma stares at him for a moment, before stepping over him and heading towards the bathroom.
“Kenma, come on, we have to talk about this. You can’t just-”
The bathroom door slams in his face, and this time the swearing isn’t as quiet.
~
It goes on like this for the entire week, and before Kenma knows it Kuroo’s entire life has been packed into his parent’s car and he’s leaving. He’s stood on the front porch, half hidden from sight, and his parents are stood by the front gate. His mum’s hugging Kuroo tight and Kenma can tell she’s as upset as Kuroo’s own mother. His dad shakes Kuroo’s hand but it’s trembling a little when he lets go. His mother glances over at him and she looks so distraught that it makes him feel ten times worse. Kuroo follows her line of sight and his eyes widen a little when he spots him. He freezes, says something to Kenma’s parents that make them nod and move to the car where Kuroo’s mum is wringing her hands and probably fretting about the fact they’ve forgotten something, and Kuroo’s dad is anxiously smoking. And then Kuroo’s suddenly halfway up the front path and has stopped, staring at Kenma like he’s a skittish cat.
“Kenma?” his voice is scratchy and it makes Kenma’s skin itch, “are you-” Kenma fills in the “Are you still angry? Are you okay? Are you going to say goodbye?” and all he can do is shrug horribly, awkwardly, unevenly as he clutches at his sleeves and stares at Kuroo. He feels so small and unimportant and like there’s something living in his stomach that’s eating him alive. He takes a shaky step forward and suddenly Kuroo’s there, strong arms tight around him, holding him up as he slumps forward, near crying again.
“You didn’t tell me,” he says into Kuroo’s shoulder, “you should’ve told me, you’re going to be so far away and it’s not fair, Kuroo.”
“I’m sorry,” Kuroo’s lips are pressed to the top of his head, “I didn’t know how to. I didn’t want you to find out that way, I promise.”
“I don’t want you to go,” he says for what must be the fiftieth time, it’s become a prayer now, he says it at night with his eyes tight shut and hopes that in the morning it’ll be true. “Why couldn’t you have been smarter and gotten into Tokyo instead.”
Kuroo’s laugh hurts. A half dead half dying thing that crawls out of his throat. “I’m sorry.”
They stay that way until Kuroo’s parents call for him, tell him they’ve got to go now if they’re gonna beat the traffic. Kenma doesn’t want to let go.
“Can I come?” he asks when they get to the gate, his hand still fisted in the back of Kuroo’s jumper. “Can I come with you to drop him off?”
They’ve a week of time together to catch up on and Kenma hates himself for thinking that sulking it away was an okay thing to do. He sees Kuroo’s parents hesitate, exchange glances with his own parents, the shared “is this an okay thing to do is it the best thing for them will it be okay”.
“Please,” Kuroo says.
~
It’s a long drive to Kyoto. The car is cramped and Kenma ends up halfway into Kuroo’s lap for most of it, but he doesn’t complain and neither does Kuroo. His parents chat in the front seat and they doze in the back, all loose hands and sleepy smiles murmured conversations and it’s nice to be this close to Kuroo again even if he knows it’s going to end. They talk his course, how he’s gonna make friends, he watches Kenma play his game for a while, chin on his shoulder and Kenma can feel his grin against his ear when he beats a boss. I love you, he thinks. But he doesn’t have the heart to say it.
~
The drive back without him is brutal. It didn’t take long to find Kuroo’s dorm and get all of his stuff unpacked. About an hour and a half, maybe even less. Kuroo’s parents were chatty, overexcited and overly happy and Kenma didn’t even try. He carried in boxes of stuff and sat on Kuroo’s bed whilst he unpacked, made quiet, silly little jokes about the stuff he’d brought with him, but that’d stopped when he’d found Kuroo’s old Nekoma jacket.
“Do you want it?” Kuroo had asked, stack of text books in hand. “You can have it if you want. It might drown you a bit, but it’ll be comfy.”
Kenma had shrugged but put it on away, more a dress than a jacket. It made Kuroo smile but it didn’t reach his eyes.
He falls asleep wearing it, curled up in the back seat of Kuroo’s parents car. It smells like him.
~
School is harder than he thought it’d be. He didn’t realise how much time he spent with Kuroo and how few people he knows outside of, well, him. He has the team but it’s not the same. They know him but not as well as Kuroo knew him. They see him but the not the way Kuroo sees him and there’s a gap on the court where Kuroo should have been. Kenma forgets he isn’t there sometimes and his tosses go too high or too close to the net and once, only once, it ends up where he’d imagine Kuroo being but there’s nobody. The loud thwack of the ball hitting the court echoes and everyone stops, stares at him as he stares at the empty space.
“Are you okay?” Lev asks him, padding over and picking up the ball.
Kenma’s eyes slide across the floor and up to meet his. Lev offers him the ball but he just cocks his head. “I never liked volleyball all that much anyway,” he says before he walks to the locker room, shrugs on Kuroo’s jacket and his bag, and leaves.
~
A week after he unofficially quits volleyball, he gets a call from Shouyou.
“What’re you doing?! Lev said you quit!” He sounds so personally offended by Kenma’s actions it almost makes him laugh. He shrugs, and then realises that Shouyou can’t see him and opens his mouth to reply instead but Shouyou beats him to it.
“Don’t shrug at me! So what, Kuroo leaves and your life just falls apart? That’s not fair Kenma - on you or him. You know Lev’s probably told Yaku and Yaku’s probably called Kuroo, right?”
That makes Kenma squirm a bit.
“Exactly. He’s gonna be ringing you up or texting your or skyping you demanding to know why you’ve quit and he’s gonna feel so guilty if he thinks it’s ‘cause of him. And was it really, at the end of the day? It’ll take a while to get used to him not being there, but he didn’t make the game for you. You’re a good setter, Kenma. Kageyama’s totally jealous of you a-” There’s a scuffle, some shouting, and a lot of friction. “He wasn’t happy I told you that,” Shouyou sounds breathless, but there’s an undeniable smile in his voice. “But he is. You know your team, Kenma, even if you don’t think you do. And if you can get to know someone on the court, what’s stopping you from getting to know them off of it?”
There’s some more yelling, and some static as Kenma guesses that Shouyou presses the phone to his chest as he yells back.
“I gotta go, Kenma. Meat bun time with the new first years. I’ll call you again sometime soon, yeah? And if I hear anything about you not coming back or quitting again or whatever, I will be getting a train to Tokyo and paying you a visit, you got that?”
“Yeah,” Kenma says softly, “thanks, Shouyou.”
“Anytime! Bye, Kenma!”
He hangs up and rolls onto his stomach, fishes about under his pillow for his DS and opens it up. He’s playing through Fire Emblem for the third time, and he’s mostly playing on autopilot but it’s still entertaining. He barely notices that lights dimming, and before he knows it it’s nearly nine, and his phone vibrates twice.
From: Kuroo（ΦωΦ）
Skype?
To: Kuroo（ΦωΦ）
Two seconds.
He scrambles out of bed and over to his laptop, curling up in his desk chair with a blanket and starting up Skype. The minute the window opens Kuroo’s ringing him, and it makes him jump. He pick up and it takes a moment to connect, but Kuroo’s there and he’s pixelated and grinning and Kenma can’t help but grin back.
“Hi,” he says softly, almost shyly.
“How’re you doing?” Kuroo’s voice is tinny and it strikes an awkward chord with part of him. It doesn’t sound right.
“Not bad, you? How’re your dorm mates?”
“Okay. And they’re nice enough,” he doesn’t even pause before he sets Kenma with a stare, “Yaku rang me, said you walked out of practice and all but quit the team.”
Kenma wriggles in his chair, “um.”
“I know you were never volleyball’s biggest fan, but I thought you had some appreciation for it and at least enjoyed it a little. When he told me that I felt horrible, like I’d forced you into this sport for all these years.”
“No!” Kenma yelped, scrabbling forward a little and he wants to touch Kuroo so badly it hurts. He grips the edge of the desk instead, biting his lip hard. “I just-” he glances out the window before looking back at Kuroo, “I don’t like you not being there, is that so bad? You’ve always been there, Kuroo. And I thought you always would be. And getting used to you… not. Being there, that is. It’s hard. And literally everything in that gym reminds me of you and it sucks, okay?”
Kuroo’s silent and his image flickers a little. “But you’ve got to work through it, even though it sucks. You can’t be alone for the rest of the year, Kenma. I hate that I left you behind, but I’d hate it even more if you just fell apart without me. Eat lunch with the team, invite Shorty and the Karasuno lads up, get in touch with Akaashi and discuss training weeks and stuff. Do it online; chat with them over email or LINE. It doesn’t have to be face to face, but please don’t just stop functioning without me there.”
“Okay,” Kenma’s voice is a whisper, “Okay, I’ll try.”
“Good,” there’s genuine pride in Kuroo’s voice and it makes Kenma roll his eyes, “Anyway, I best get going. I’ve got an assignment due and then I’m coming back for a weekend. Need to pick up a few things I forgot.” Kenma sits up a little straighter and Kuroo laughs. “I suppose I could make some time to see you too.” Kenma grins for the first time in what feels like forever. “It’s good to see you smile, you know.”
Kenma flushes, can feel it up to his ears, and covers his face with the blanket. “Shut up.”
“Hey,” Kenma peeks over the top, glaring, “I love you, you know that?”
Kuroo looks so serious yet casual, and the pixilation destroys any would-be blushing, and all Kenma can do is blink.
“Kenma?”
“Yeah. I love you too.”