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Aran Ojiro was not entirely sure if he was being stalked. At first, he didn't think much of these colorful papers popping up sporadically in his locker at school.
He even believed himself to be somewhat popular in school, not that he cared about it. It came naturally with being a nationally recognized athlete.
Popularity was a blessing, sure, but many of these admirations and confessions of people he had never met before felt weird, empty almost. He didn't pay much attention to the neatly folded origami cranes that made their way into his locker.
He didn't have the heart to throw them away too. Actually, he didn't even open them. Somehow, Aran thought his large hands might be too clumsy and accidentally ripped the intricately folded papers.
"That's beautiful work," Shinsuke said one morning, watching him put the newest crane into the small box at the end of the locker, where he kept them safe.
"Why don't you open them?" Shinsuke asked bluntly, looking over to the group of second and third girls coming into the school chatting up the Miya twins.
"Someone put their effort into this and it's not nice to know that you don't appreciate what's written there…give it a thought."
"I don't want to rip them," Aran confessed.
He paused and followed Kita's gaze, resting on you, squeezing your way through the crowd carrying a stack of books for the first period. He considered for a moment, helping you carry them for you, despite being in different classes, but Atsumu was quicker.
"I'll help you L/N-senpai," he said eagerly like a puppy and hurried to his locker to change his shoes. You tried to protest that you were able to carry them by yourself.
Aran shook his head, glanced at the box, and resumed answering Kita.
"You know… I really do appreciate the cranes…but like I really don't want to rip them…so I don't know…would it be rude of me to want an additional note to them?" Aran pondered.
His train of thought then was interrupted by Atsumu's curse as he tripped over the stack of books he just had dropped on the floor, yelling, "Sorry L/N-senpai."
The next day Aran found another note, neatly handwritten, attached to the daily crane. He believed destiny was playing a joke on him.
"I think someone is pranking me," he said to Shinsuke over dinner. Ren and Michinari listened to what had riled their wing spiker up, "I think it's the twins…."
"You are sayin'…." Kita picked up a pickled plum with his chopsticks, "Ya believe Atsumu or Osamu are sendin' you letters of admiration. Neatly folded, origami cranes every day…just to play a prank on ya?"
"Look, yesterday when I was saying something about me not opening the cranes because I don't want to rip them, Atsumu was there…Osamu was also close…they heard, and now a day later, there is an additional letter?" Aran wildly gesticulated with the crane between his fingers. "Coincidence? I think not?"
Kita blinked at the spiker, looked at Ren, and sighed, not wanting to say anything.
"What letters are we talking about" Michinari interrupted the silence with his loudly placed question and snatched the crane from Aran's hands.
"Ohh…this is cute…" he read aloud, "Ojiro-kun, I admire how you always help out people in need."
"I helped out Atsumu after he fell yesterday," Aran said, "The twins are clearly mocking me…."
"Clearly," Kita deadpanned, and Ren showed a rare twitching of the corner of his lips.
"Only weird thing is that the twins managed to write this neatly…." Michinari pondered, "Usually, you can't decipher either one of their chicken scratches…it kinda looks familiar."
"Excuse me…" your voice reached their ears. The four third-years swirled around for you to stand there with a clipboard, "I just wanted to make sure if I have written down the correct number for the people you want at the graduation ceremony, the student council is arranging the seating……."
"L/N," Akagi smiled at you and took a look at the handwritten clipboard with their names and number of seats. "Always a pleasure…."
He paused, noticing the similarity between the word on the clipboard and the letters, and glanced up at Kita, who nodded in affirmation. His eyes glanced at Aran, reading over the clipboard, trying to find his name.
Clueless.
Michinari then looked back at Kita and Ren, who nodded again, reaffirming. All three sighed.
"L/N-san, I hope Atsumu didn't give you too much trouble yesterday?" Aran inquired, giving back the clipboard, his hand brushing yours, and he wondered why your hands were nervously fumbling all of a sudden. Maybe you had to use the bathroom?
"No…um, Ojiro-kun…no trouble at all…" you stuttered, "After you helped him up, he really behaved himself carrying the books for me…."
"Ah…okay… that's good to hear."
You turned around, almost ready to go, before glancing back at him and gulping down whatever was stuck in your throat. "I heard that the Red Falcons recruited you… "That… that's great. I think you'll make an amazing addition to their team."
"Oh, you heard about that?" Aran rubbed the back of his head, "Yes, I did…thank you…I still can't believe it, actually."
"Well, I think it's no surprise, you have always worked very hard at your craft…its…admirable… I am sure in like two years we'll see you with the National Team…."
Despite the strange warm feeling in his chest after that compliment, Aran frowned. You were hiding your face with the clipboard. The intonation in your voice was high-pitched at the end of the sentence, and you were breathing a little heavily too. He hoped you were okay.
"Thank you, L/N…um…are you okay? You seem a little flustered?" he murmured, glancing at his friends, who looked at him expectantly. Shinsuke and Ren showed slight smiles while Michinari was grinning, chin propped up on his hands.
If you were really sick, they wouldn't be acting like this. But you looked so uncomfortable, so perhaps he should escort you to the nurse's office. Just to make sure.
"I am okay…should go….um…bye."
With that, you fled the scene at a way quicker pace than he had anticipated from you in your state.
"Okay…?" he turned his head to his friends, "That was weird…."
Why the heck did they look so disappointed? Aran felt judged. Heck, even Shinsuke was looking at him like the way he did when the twins were caught doing something stupid.
"Aran…" Michinari shook his head, crossing his arms, "you are lucky you are cute…."
Kita and Ren nodded in grumbling agreement.
What did he miss? Was something going on?
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Several people on campus looked over to their table.
This whole ordeal was strange, Aran concluded. The letters and encouragements didn't stop, even after he told the twins off various times to their dumb-looking faces. He stopped eventually when the end-of-year exams came closer, and those little notes and words of affirmation and encouragement helped him ease his frail nerves.
It wasn't like he needed the best grades for a professional athlete carrier. However, he still wanted to do good. Something in his mind told him that maybe it was not the twins who sent those cranes. Especially on the day of graduation, when he saw Atsumu and Osamu's handwriting on the self-made cards they gifted him.
Sad, he really appreciated the little cranes. Graduation came, and Aran was off to Osaka to join the Falcons by the time the cherry blossoms had stopped falling. It was strange and different, to say the least, adjusting to a strange new foreign place. Being in a bigger city was overwhelming, but Aran reminded himself that there was somewhere out there who had believed in him so much that they had made the little cranes back in his third year. He took the same cranes with him to Osaka in the same box he kept at the end of his locker.
At times, when things got hard. On days when his muscles ached, he took out one or two of them and read them over.
Strangely, a week his first official V-League season started, Aran found himself presented with a box by the team manager. Fan mail. He had accepted a few letters, here and there, but was mildly surprised about someone already sending him a box. When he opened it and exited like his younger brother did with gifts on Christmas, his eyes grew wide
with the assortment of colorful paper cranes and attached notes. Each made up from the day he walked out of Inarizaki High till today.
If one of his gawking teammates hadn't put it to his attention, Aran, maybe a little teary-eyed at the friendly gesture, wouldn't have seen a bigger note attached to the bottom of the box's lid.
Ojiro-kun, sorry that these have taken so long. I kept looking for a way to send you these but didn't have away. When they announced the Falcon's Fan mail address, I finally found a way to get back into contact with you. Keep up the excellent work. You were brilliant at your professional debut.
The boxes full of 30 paper cranes praising his skills, affirming his thoughts, and lightening his moods became a monthly thing.
"You really don't know who they are from?" Hakuba Gao, the newest addition to the falcons, asked finally after Aran smiled over a box he received in his second year with the falcons. "Kinda creepy you know… Ojiro-kun…do you have a stalker?"
"Well…a stalker wouldn't be so nice about the compliments, wouldn't they," their pinch server commented.
It was 2,7 years after the first crane when he found himself close to an answer. It was one of the long press conferences of the Falcons. One of these long, uncomfortable ones where Aran felt like chaperoning his younger teammates' answers.
When he walked onto the stage and sat down at the table, checking his microphone, his eyes darted over the press people, and he was surprised to see you sitting there in the front row. A quick glance at your plaque told him that you were an intern at a local news agency, and he inclined his head to recognize you.
Was it weird that the smile that bloomed on your face made his chest feel warm and fuzzy, or that the eye contact you shared made him feel like no time had passed?
"Someone is very eager to start this press conference," Gao snickered, elbowing him in the ribs, which took him back from the feeling of seeing heart-shaped bubbles and hearing violin music every time he looked into your eyes.
"Old…friend from High School," he managed to press out, rubbing his aching side.
Press conferences went as usual, first the dreaded self-analysis questions about their last game, predictions on their following, the typical questions meant for sports and fitness magazines about workout tips and athlete's diets.
"Now we draw our attention to more personal matters," the mediator of the press conference said, "Yes, Shoma-san from TokyoNews…."
A woman two seats from you asked, "This is a question to all of you… How do you handle fan mail? Do you enjoy them?"
"Well…we really appreciate them all and take our time to read every single one. So thank you all for the sweet notes and gifts." Hakuba answered for them. "It's funny actually I mentioned like once I loved Riakumma as a child and now I get all of these Rilakumma plushies, stickers, napkins…my apartment looks like a shrine…no, but really don't stop."
He chuckled, shooting the camera a wink, and made a heart out of his hands.
The pinch server smiled, "But kindly refrain from sending us self-made food that can go bad quickly…someone sent our Libero dumplings once, but we got them a month later….they weren't good anymore."
A chuckle rose through the rows of journalists until one of them asked.
"Were the dumplings the weirdest thing you received in fan mail?"
"Actually…" Hakuba side eyes Aran. The grin on Hakuba's face scared Aran a bit. It was so full of mischief he should have known what was coming, "It's not necessarily weird…but…peculiar…. Ojiro-kun always gets a monthly box of 30 paper cranes. Handmade cranes…funny, isn't it?"
"Paper cranes?" A shift went through the journalists as they scribbled, "Who from?"
Aran scratched the back of his neck, eyes darting through the first row of press people, and strangely found you looking up at him expectantly.
"I don't know, actually….they were never signed…" he murmured, then added, "But I like them very much… I've been getting them for a while now…actually…."
He saw that you shifted a little in your seat, noticed your jaw-dropping, shook your head with a smile, and chuckled into your hand before raising it.
"Yes, Y/n-san," he blurted out, giving the mediator no chance to mediate the interview.
The room turned to look at you, a little flustered at the attention, but Aran saw that the past years had made you more confident. It was evident in your clear voice as you spoke up.
"Ojiro-senshu…so you're telling us someone has been sending you paper cranes for a while…can I ask you if you are aware of Senbazuru?"
"Senbazuru?"
"The art of folding one thousand paper cranes, so one is granted a wish by the gods….perhaps someone," you paused at the word, smiling, "Is just wanting you to have that one wish."
"Yeah…" Aran's throat felt strangely dry. Something about how you had expressed this was strange, "Actually…that might be true… I've been getting those cranes since…. High School…"
"Well…you are a lucky person then," you smiled, "How many you think are left…from the one thousand?"
Aran tried to calculate the boxes and boxes of cranes in his apartment. He had almost 33 boxes….so he must be close. "I think it's almost a thousand… I am not sure… I have to count…."
"Well…good luck on that Ojiro-senshu, let's hope you get your thousand crane and note and can make a wish."
It hit him there. Nobody had ever said something about the notes attached to the cranes. He had to talk to you. The warm feeling in his chest had spread and was now burning in his fingertips, twitching to move out to reach out to you to just…talk.
How could he be so stupid? The handwriting seemed so familiar because he had seen it plenty of times, the book incident you had been there too.
"Y/N…" he said as the press conference was dismissed," Can we have a word…?"
You turned to your superior, exchanging a few words with them and promising that you'd catch up before approaching Aran.
"Ojiro-senshu…you look well…long time no see" you smiled up at him, eyes playful, "are you okay, you seem a little flustered…?"
It was the exact words he'd asked you that day. You had approached them, telling him good luck with the Falcons. The day Shinsuke had declared him a fool, while Ren and Michinari dared to laugh at him. He maybe was a fool back then.
"Tell me about Senbazuru…" he murmured, and you chuckled.
"Well, one folds a thousand paper cranes to make a wish, and legend says the gods will grant it…." you said, pulling out a small red crane from your pocket, "This is your thousand one, I suppose. I counted them myself…."
"So it was you…" he flabbergasted but beamed, "and the notes too….all these encouragements and affirmations…you did…."
"Yes, Kita-kun once told me that you like compliments, but back then, I was too shy to verbalize them, so I started making little notes and distinguishing them… I folded them," you laughed, smiling at them, "By the way, one of the first cranes had my name on them, but I suppose you never opened them?"
"No," Aran admitted, "I was afraid of ripping them…."
"You're too gentle for that Ojiro-kun….here….please accept this…your last crane…so you can make your wish…" you took his hand and laid the little bird into his palm, "Perhaps you can wish for that spot on the National Team?"
"No silly," Aran laughed, "I already got the spot….this is not yet known by anyone so you might not want to tell your boss…but I got the call a few days ago."
"Congratulations!" you beamed, "I always knew you would make it…so…what do you want to put that wish towards."
"Perhaps I can wish for a certain someone….to join me on a date to dinner?" He smiled, and you realized that time had made him a little more confident, just as it had made him more handsome.
"No, silly," you laughed, mimicking his tone from before, "You shouldn't waste a good wish on something like that…I would go on a date with you either way…."