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I studied the price difference between the two items, internally debating with myself. After a moment I shrugged, grabbing the cheaper of the two, and placed it into my basket. I just had to get a couple of items that had been forgotten earlier.
I didn’t usually like being out at night by myself but when your parent asks you to do something, it’s hard to say no. At least it was for me.
I sighed, glancing into the basket. That was the last thing. I headed towards the checkout, noticing that I was one of the last customers in the store. The quiet was kinda unnerving.
As I walked through the exit, I heard an odd thumping noise from the side of the store, causing my heart rate to speed up. Half of me wanted to investigate and the other wanted to quickly walk back into the safety of the lit store.
My curiosity won out, even as the more disturbing thoughts flashed through my mind as remembered moments in horror movies and games flitted through. I pushed them down, internally lecturing myself about the stupidity of what I was doing.
I felt my heart hammering as I heard voices floating toward me and I peeked around the corner, trying to be as quiet as possible.
I felt my eyebrows rise to my hairline as I recognized the freckled boy that was speaking to a man that worked in the store. Yamaguchi, the pinch server for the boys Karasuno volleyball team, and my crush.
We had quite a few classes together, but it wasn’t until we had been paired for a class assignment that I started to nurture a crush on him. He was just so sweet and kind. Not to mention that his freckles made him absolutely adorable.
I floundered between saying hello and just leaving when the decision was taken from me as the guy who worked for the store noticed me.
“Oh, hi! I’m sorry if we were being disruptive.”
I quickly stepped around the corner and shook my head profusely, “No! I’m sorry for being nosy.” I bit my lip as I made up my mind to speak to Yamaguchi, “Uh, hi, Yamaguchi. Um, well, I’ll- uh, good night.”
I spun around, intending to leave as fast as possible when I heard Yamaguchi call out, “Oh, hey! Wait up a sec!”
I felt like my stomach was trying to drop through the floor with all the nerves that I had. I slowly turned back around, praying that my smile didn’t betray my inner turmoil.
“Yeah?” My voice sounded weird and I winced but as I watched the two of them, it didn’t seem that they noticed. I swallowed, taking a deep breath in order to calm down.
After some mumbled words, a few goodbyes and thank yous, the guy from the store waved him off and Yamaguchi began walking towards me, a sweet smile on his face.
“Hi! What are you doing here?”
“Oh, I’m just getting a couple of items for my parents that were forgotten. Umm…” I looked around his shoulder, “What were you doing?”
He scratched the back of his head nervously and I finally noticed a volleyball in his other hand.
“Well,” I snapped my eyes back up to his face when I heard him speaking, “I’m actually practicing.”
I blinked, confused, “Practicing?”
I watched as a blush rose onto his cheeks, making his freckles stand out. He looked away from me and after a moment, “Um, yeah. I’m trying to practice a jump floater.”
“Oh…is that a type of...serve?” I racked my brain trying to remember the terms of volleyball that I had started to learn so I could talk to him about it.
“Yeah!” His eyes lit up, “It’s, well, it’s a type of serve that kinda floats instead of, you know, slamming down? Most people don’t know that there are different types. It’s cool that you do, though. You must like volleyball too, huh?”
I felt the blush rise on my cheeks, “Oh…um, yeah? I only recently started getting into it though.”
“Really? Well, it’s still cool that you know stuff.” He gave me a small smile, “Um, would you like, uh…would you like some company on your way home?”
I snapped my eyes to his. He was looking down at his feet, but there was a hint of a blush returning back onto his face.
I felt my heart squeeze happily in my chest, “Are-are you sure?”
I knew that he lived in the same neighborhood as me, we had talked about it when we were paired up, so I knew that we would be going in the same direction.
He looked up at me from under his lashes, “Yeah, we, uh, we live in the same neighborhood, right?”
“Yeah, we do,” I could feel the sting in my cheeks, even as my heart was beating rapidly in my chest. “I would love some company.”
I watched as his eyes widened and then lit up, a smile forming on his face. He turned and waved one last time to the other man and motioned for me to walk with him. I looked down hoping to hide how pleased I was at the turn of events.
Although, as we walked, an awkward silence seemed to encompass us. I peeked at him, he seemed to be feeling just as uncomfortable as I was. I rapidly tried to think of something to talk about.
“So,” I cleared my throat, “uh, has Tsukishima been practicing the jump floater too?”
A relieved look passed across his face at the break in silence, “Oh no. He’s, well, he’s more interested in learning better blocking, you know?”
“Oh. Right. Cuz, he’s a, um, middle…blocker?” I asked hesitantly. I only learned a handful of terms, most of them having to do with Yamaguchi.
Yamaguchi seemed to be impressed nonetheless, “Yeah! Most people don’t know the positions if they’re just casual watchers…oh! Didn’t I see you at a couple of the games?”
I felt my heart stutter in my chest, “You saw me?”
His eyebrows drew downward, confused, “Was I not supposed to?”
“No! I mean, you weren’t not supposed to- I mean, I wasn’t hiding or anything-” I closed my mouth abruptly. The words had tumbled out, too fast to stop them and I knew I was blushing again, it stung my cheeks and the top of my ears. If a hole would just open up and swallow me now, it wouldn’t be soon enough. I took a deep breath and tried again.
“What I meant was that I didn’t realize that you had seen me at the games,” I bit my lip, debating quickly if I wanted to drop a hint here or not. I shot a glance at Yamaguchi, he was watching me with his head tilted slightly, a patient look on his face. I swallowed, “After we got paired up for our class project, I uh, I decided I wanted to learn more about y-volleyball.”
“Really?!” He sounded so excited that I quickly looked back at him again, only to see that he was blushing furiously. He cleared his throat and looked down at his feet before he asked softly, “Can I…can I tell you something?”
I swallowed, my heart hammering in my chest and I nodded. I doubted he was going to magically say that he was enamored with me, but I could hope.
We had reached the edge of a small circle of light from a streetlamp, the glow just enough to illuminate his features. I watched as he seemed to be struggling with whatever it was that he wanted to say, he kept switching from watching my face to quickly staring down at his feet.
I tried my best to not let my imagination run away from me and instead waited patiently for him to speak.
“Umm,” he bit his lip and looked back down at his feet before letting his gaze land on mine, “Tsukki gets annoyed with how much I talk about you.”
I felt like all the air had been sucked out of my lungs. I struggled to think of something to say to that.
“Oh?” That was good. Nice and neutral.
Yamaguchi kept his eyes on mine, a small smile tugging on his lips, “Yeah, actually. I mean, he gets annoyed by a lot of things, but, um, lately it's because of me talking about you all the time.” He reached up and scratched the back of his head again, looking away shyly.
I had to say something, anything. No, not anything. My tongue didn’t want to work as my mouth had suddenly become dry.
“And what-” I licked my lips and tried again, “and what are you saying exactly?”
He looked back at me, that adorable blush making his freckles stand out again, and said, “Well, that you’re really smart and, uh, funny, and,” he swallowed, “cute.”
All the air came rushing back into my lungs and I felt my own blush rising, even as my heart started beating a thousand miles an hour in my chest.
“Oh…I, uh…”
His eyes went wide and his words came out really fast, “You don’t have to say anything! I just, well, I uh, I wanted to tell you, I mean, I thought that you- that I should-”
It just kinda happened before I even realized what I was doing. I closed the distance between us, went up on my toes, and kissed him softly on the cheek.
Yamaguchi froze under my lips, his words abruptly stopped. I very slowly pulled back, looking up into his face. I could only describe it as a look of pure shock, his mouth was hanging open and his eyes were wide.
I took a breath and said softly, “I like you too.”
His eyes snapped back to me, and for a moment I thought he wasn’t going to say anything until he breathed out, “Oh…uh, then, could I ask, I mean…” He swallowed, “Will you go out with me?”
“Yes,” I felt the smile as it spread across my face, “I’d love to.”