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1
Suna Rintarou is not self conscious. Honestly, he couldn’t care less about how people perceive him. If they see him as lazy or ‘chronically online’ – who cares?
Well, he’s not self-conscious until he is. If it’s something he can control, chooses to do, then fuck everyone else for thinking bad of him. It’s his choice to be lazy or apathetic. But when it’s something he can’t control, something his body makes him do without permission or warning, that’s when the insecurities seep in.
There’s teal running through his veins, and as much as he tries not to care, he still makes an attempt to tuck it in and hide it from view as much as he can.
2
In his first year of highschool, a couple months into volleyball season, the teal leaks out.
He messes up.
It’s only one point lost during a practice game, but there's ink splattered on the floor that only Rintarou can see and it's dripping from his wrist guiltily.
For as much as Rintarou doesn’t take volleyball too seriously, he still loves his team, and a wrist tic coming out during a game and causing him to lose them a point on what should've been an easy block is embarrassing. Shameful. He blinks, stretches his arm, and stares at his wrist in irritation.
There's a whistle blown and the first set is over. He still walks to the bench and hits his wrist on the metal purposefully as he sits down, hoping he can knock some sense into it.
There's a shuffle next to him and the bench bends below him ever so slowly – he doesn't look over at them. Kita lightly grabs his wrist and pulls it towards them, rubbing circles into his joints with their thumb. Rintarou hisses when they press down particularly hard on a joint and Kita lifts their hands up, letting his hand fall to his lap.
“Sorry if I hurt ya-“
Rintarou sniffs, blinks, “No it’s fine.”
It’s silent for a moment.
The thing about hands and wrists and joints — and, well, every other thing in his body that has the possibility to ache — is that as it gets better, it can also get worse. The static running throughout his arms that stretches his fingers too-far-apart for far too long might drift to his toes or eyes or mouth, but it still has a tendency to stay.
(Tourette’s is like a never ending puberty: there are good days, there are bad days, and there are days where he’s just simply existing — hoping no one notices the way his eyebrows raise and chin stretches.)
He sighs. “I don’t want to play anymore.”
Kita looks over at him, squinting with an attentiveness he sees on the daily, whenever they’re looking at the team practice. Whenever they’re trying to figure out how to help. “You don’t want to, or you don’t think you can?”
Rintarou blinks. “It’s not middle school anymore. You could lose your chance at nationals if I fuck up.”
They roll their eyes and lean back on their arms. “You’re not the only one on the team y’know.”
He pauses, sucks in a breath and holds it. “Well. Hm. Yeah, but still.”
“What do you think Atsumu would say if you quit?” They raise an eyebrow.
“She’d call me an idiot. Or something.” Rintarou scoffs.
They nod. “And Osamu?”
“I can only imagine.”
“And-“
“Okay okay I get it.” He leans back and throws his arm to the side. Stretching it for one, two, three seconds before relaxing.
Kita grabs his wrist again and starts massaging it more gently this time. “Then you understand why you’re important to the team too, right?”
He sighs and leans on their shoulder. “Yeah.”
3
(He’s eight and wonders why his body won't listen to him. Why he always feels weird – off. His parents tell him to stop humming already and he doesn't know how to choke up the words to tell him that he can’t.)
-
By the time he’s home from school, Rintarou falls on his bed and proceeds to pass out for the next five hours. He chalks it up to just being lazy and not getting enough sleep the night before.
When he wakes up he doesn't feel like he can do his homework, so he stares at his backpack in contempt for ten minutes – ignoring the ache swirling in his stomach – before laying back down and doing, well, nothing. He’s just really, really tired.
4
“Hey,” Osamu catches up to him as they’re walking to school.
(Well, ‘catches up’ may not be the right term, because he ran up to Rintarou as he passed Osamu’s house and is now trying to catch his breath with a bag slung halfway over his shoulder.)
(Rintarou waits for him.)
(Reluctantly.)
“Hi.” He kicks at the sidewalk and Osamu looks up.
“You ready?” For the game. Rintarou blinks one, two, three, four times and then nods.
“Yeah.” He breathes.
Osamu smiles and stands up, stretching his arms lazily before patting Rintarou’s shoulder and walking past him. “Good.”
5
It should be clarified that although Rintarou is the king of building walls in volleyball, that skill transfers over to his life outside of the sport as well.
6
He’s on the bus, the team is on their way to a game, and he can’t stop.
It’s blink- after scoff- after tear in his shoulder’s- stability- and he’s this close to crying and the team is trying to be polite and not stare at him but he can see them looking out of the corner of their eyes and-
A hand lands on his shoulder.
He shrugs it off without telling his arm to and his hand hits the persons arm and he wants to let out a sob but all that comes out is a ‘fucking shitfuck huh-’
And he’s tired when he hears the person, who he now thinks he recognizes as their coach, apologize.
And he just wants this to be over. Maybe, he thinks, I could just fall asleep. Then the tics will go away. Then I won’t have to feel this anymore.
Of course, he’s on the bus to a game and he can’t afford to sleep because he needs to be awake when they get there or else-
Kita sits beside him as he knocks his knees into the seat in front of him and his head hits the bus window. They don’t touch him or interfere with the energy he can’t describe but if messed with will make everything even worse and- all they do is set a blanket on his lap and tell him it’s okay to go to sleep.
“You’re no use as it is right now anyways, right? Might as well try to sleep it off, maybe you’ll feel better when you wake up.”
7
And he wakes up.
And he feels better.
And he knows it’s only a matter of time between his eyes opening and a tic occuring, but he also knows that he has gone through this for so many years and survived. So, even if it doesn’t feel like it at the moment, he’ll make it through again (and again, and again, and again).