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Shouyou was dozing softly at a desk, head pillowed in his arms, when the rap of someone’s knuckles on the back of his head awoke him with a start. He twisted around quickly, and felt a grin take over his face, unrestrained and bright, as he met the eyes of the culprit. It was a knee-jerk reaction, unmarred by the clarity that would’ve come with full consciousness. A frowning, and inexplicably flushed, Tobio stared back at him.
Tobio. What was he doing here? What time was it? It had to be past midnight – Shouyou remembered giving up on his Transfiguration essay (The Five Exception’s to Gamp’s Law, and the Exceptions to These Exceptions) around eleven, and deciding to rest his eyes for just a moment. The empty common room and doused fireplace hinted that it had been longer than that. Shouyou shifted his focus back to Tobio. He looked tired, yet restless, like he’d jump easily at small noises. His hair was sort of mussed, and a little flattened on one side. If he’d been trying to sleep, it didn’t look like it had been working.
“I’m going to the astronomy tower,” said Tobio, derailing Shouyou’s lazy train of thought. He blinked up at Tobio.
“Okay,” he replied with a small smile. This doesn’t seem to placate Tobio, as he continued to stare back expectedly, seemingly waiting for more of an answer. When none comes, his mouth twists in annoyance.
“Yeah. Like – right now. I’m going.”
“And you came all the way up here just to tell me that. Hold on – how did you even get in here? The password changed, only a few hours ago.” Shouyou always told Tobio the new passwords, even though Tobio consistently rolled his eyes and retorted that he didn’t need it. Still, he would turn up at the Gryffindor common room later that day without fail.
“Oh, um, the Fat Lady, she just let me in. When I told her – when I said I was coming to see you.” The portrait guarding the common room was generally very strict in performing her duties, but seemed to have developed a soft spot for Tobio over the course of his many visits (he seemed to get embarrassed whenever this fact was brought up, and would deny it vehemently).
“Did you… want company, or something?”
The twist to Tobio’s mouth disappeared, and he scoffed.
“You can tag along if you want, I guess,” he muttered, and turned to go with the air of someone who had achieved exactly what they had set out to do. Shouyou smirked and scrambled after him.
“Where on earth are you boys off to at this time of night?” the Fat Lady asked disapprovingly as the portrait swung open on their way out.
“Stargazing, I think,” Shoyou grinned at her.
"Dumbass! Who the hell said anything about that?" Tobio snapped. Shouyou couldn’t tell for sure if it was embarrassment or the common room candlelight filtering into the hallway making the tips of Tobio’s ears look red, but he counted it as a win anyway.
"Well, don't expect me to be awake to let you back in!" the Fat Lady called after them, tapering off into a spiel about youngsters these days.
"If we're not gonna look at the stars, Tobio, what are we doing at the astronomy tower? You do know what astronomy means, don’t you?" Shouyou asked as they climbed a particularly steep flight of stairs. He still wasn't quite sure if it was very late or had become very early. He did know that if they were caught out of bed it would mean detention for both of them, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to care about either of these facts. He was going to keep following Tobio to the tower regardless. After all, Shouyou had realised by second year he was going to follow Tobio anywhere he went, and had become resigned to the fact at this point.
Tobio turned to glared at him.
“Shut up! Of course I do! And we’re not doing anything. I’m going there, and you decided to follow me.” He skipped a few steps, his long legs allowing him to leap up a couple at a time.
Shouyou inwardly cursed his own shorter legs, and tried to mimic the other anyway.
Shouyou knew he had a crush on Kageyama Tobio, and probably had for a long time now. Of course, he wasn’t aware of it from the beginning. His fourth year had been quite the milestone for him, when Tadashi had pointed out the possibility, and he’d spent the first semester denying it and the second grappling with how to deal with it (on this point, he still wasn’t totally sure).
Shouyou liked everything about Tobio. He liked the colour of his hair, and the shape of his nose (once, when venting, he described it as 'elegant' to Hitoka, and she’d laughed out loud before clapping a hand over her mouth apologetically, and patting him on the back in sympathy). He really liked watching Tobio play Quidditch, and he liked beating him at Quidditch. He liked when they played on the same team, practicing together in between official games, and they would throw the quaffle back and forth seamlessly, snatching a goal from right under the keeper's nose (usually Tsukishima, whenever they could convince him to join their game). He simultaneously loved and hated the look on Tobio face when they played against each other and Tobio won (hated it because it was always accompanied by the feeling of loss, loved it because it made Shouyou want to work even harder to win next time, loved it because it made Tobio look kind of gorgeous. More gorgeous than usual.)
Shouyou knew he had a crush on Tobio, but he also knew it was a lost cause. No matter how much Hitoka wheedled, he didn’t plan on confessing uselessly. Although it was inconvenient, sometimes, he could deal with liking Tobio secretly, and quietly. He didn’t think he would be able to stand losing his best friend. He wasn’t sure how Quidditch would feel without Tobio out there on the field somewhere, and he absolutely, one hundred percent, did not want to find out.
It was cold at the top of the astronomy tower. The breeze wasn’t too strong, but it was chilling, and they were clad in nothing but pyjamas and jumpers.
“Did you at least bring a blanket?”
“Did I- no, idiot, I didn’t know it would be cold,” Tobio scowled. “Don’t be a baby.”
“You didn’t know it would be cold? In the middle of the night, on the highest tower in the school?” Shouyou widened his eyes mockingly. “Wow, Kageyama.”
Tobio shoved him, and they tussled for a minute.
“Maybe we can conjure something. Do you know how to conjure a blanket? I bet Tsukishima does. Last week, he conjured a teacup because Bokuto kept complaining about how difficult it was. I think Tadashi keeps it on his bedside table.”
Judging by his deepening scowl, Tobio was not interested in what had provided Shouyou a great amount of entertainment during lunch last Thursday.
Despite Shouyou’s whining, the cold wasn’t really unbearable. Especially because, when Shouyou sat down, back against the wall, Tobio sat close enough that he could feel the warmth of his body along his side. Shouyou stared up at the clear sky, and even though Tobio had specifically denied that they were here to stargaze, Shouyou was pretty sure that this was, by definition, stargazing. He wondered briefly if he would be able to see the stars in the sky reflected in Tobio’s eyes if he looked, and was then quickly annoyed at himself for thinking something so cheesy in the first place.
"Tobio. Why couldn't you sleep?"
Tobio was silent for a while before he spoke.
"Y'know, I don't get letters at breakfast anymore. not since- not since my grandpa died."
Shouyou’s eyes widened; it wasn’t really like Tobio to talk about anything slightly personal with so little prompting. Shouyou had assumed he would have had to chip away at Tobio for a while to get any explanation for his weird mood tonight, or a real explanation for their coming here.
"My mum, she... you know, I guess." Tobio glared stonily at the sky, not making eye contact.
Five years of being acquainted with someone, even someone as antisocial as Tobio, would allow you to glean at least a little information about them. That wasn’t even taking into account Shouyou’s unique and relentless drive to gather every bit of information he could about Tobio, even when he insisted they were nothing but rivals (and, maybe, it might have helped that over the years Tobio had probably come to trust him more than some random stranger. At least a little).
Shouyou knew that when they reached second year Tobio had started spending almost every school break at Hogwarts. Tobio didn’t actively hide the fact that his father had never been around, and Shouyou eventually found out that Tobio’s mother wasn’t home much either. She was some big-shot ministry official, her work taking her all over the world. When she wasn’t away, Tobio had his sister, Miwa, and he had his grandpa. Until second year, when he didn’t.
“I guess,” Tobio gritted out, “I was just thinking about that. And I wasn’t tired, anyway.” His gaze was now fixed on the moon above them, but Shouyou could tell he wasn’t really seeing it.
Shouyou felt he had become quite well-versed in understanding Kageyama Tobio. It hadn’t been easy, considering Tobio’s outward emotions most often ranged somewhere on the spectrum from ‘vague apathy’ to ‘violent rage’, but Shouyou was probably one of the few who had been able to learn to decode Tobio’s harsh words or brooding silences. Right now, he was very proud of Tobio for managing to spit out three whole sentences about his feelings.
"Tobio. Come over again this Christmas. Miwa’s overseas, isn't she? You can stay at my house. The castle... it'll be too big when everyone goes home. It's too big for you to stay here, without– well, by yourself."
Tobio's eyes finally snapped over to Shouyou’s face. The usual hardness of his eyes seemed softened in the darkness, and the moonlight cast gentle shadows across the planes of his face.
"Yeah?"
Shouyou wanted to touch his hands to Tobio’s cheekbones just like the moonlight did. He wanted to know how it would feel to card his fingers through his dark hair. Instead, Shouyou swallowed, and whispered back.
"Yeah, of course, I– anytime."
Shouyou couldn’t pinpoint the moment this feeling had come to life within him, the exact day or hour something new awoke nestled behind his ribs, foreign and welcome, terrifying and comforting all at once. It could’ve been second year, it could’ve been third. Maybe it was the very first moment he watched Tobio soar into the air on one of the school’s beaten-up broomsticks in first year, and the wind had pushed his hair back and his face was clear and open. Shouyou had just admired him so much, more than he knew what to do with, and simultaneously couldn’t bear the idea of losing to him. He hated Tobio’s infuriating personality and the way Shouyou would have to look up so meet his eyes when they were back on the ground.
They stayed as long the biting chill let them, in the kind of easy silence they sometimes shared. Shouyou didn’t want to be the first to succumb to the cold, but when the tip of Tobio’s nose started turning pink Shouyou decided that he’d obviously won and dragged them back down the stairs.
“She really is asleep!” Shouyou said, dismayed. The Fat Lady was notorious for being a deep sleeper; once she was out, you weren’t getting in.
Tobio sniffed. “I guess you’ll be sleeping in the corridor tonight. She did warn you.”
“Oi! You’re the one who made me come with you!”
Tobio turned on his heel, Shouyou immediately following close behind. “As if. you basically begged to come.”
After turning a couple of corners, Tobio stopped and pushed through an unassuming tapestry hanging halfway along the corridor wall. It was one of many concealed shortcuts throughout the castle. They’d found the tapestry shortcut a couple of years ago; located conveniently close to the Gryffindor common room, it somehow bypassed the countless flights of stairs between the tower and the dungeons, and shot them straight out of a broom closet near the Potions classrooms (unhelpfully, the broom closet pretended it was a completely normal broom closet if you tried to take the shortcut the other way round). As long as there weren’t any professors stalking around, they could sneak the rest of the way to the Slytherin common room quite easily – and they did, taking turns hissing at the other to shut up. They really quieted down when they reached the door to Tobio’s dormitory; they’d woken his dormmates up with their squabbling once before, and Shouyou had no desire to repeat that experience. Afterwards, he’d made fun of Tobio for turning bright red as he stuttered out some excuse, but Shouyou probably hadn’t looked any better.
“D’you want to go flying in the morning?” Shouyou whispered as they shuffled in the direction of Tobio’s four-poster blindly. He gripped the back of Tobio’s jumper.
“Yeah,” Tobio said, reaching the edge of the bed and crawling onto it. Shouyou followed, pulling the curtains shut behind them before casting a silencing charm.
The sleepovers weren’t new. They started happening almost naturally; somewhere from third year to fourth year, maybe. Rarely, at first; they’d stayed out past curfew and Shouyou didn’t want to risk the trek up to the tower alone, or they were studying late in the Gryffindor common room and it just made sense for Tobio to stay there. Any sense of awkwardness was completely gone, years later. There was still an unspoken agreement between the two of them that they didn’t really mention it outside of the quiet confines of the curtains around the bed, but it was an undeniable part of their friendship.
Now, as they lay down facing other, Shouyou gazed unabashedly at Tobio’s face. Tobio scrunched up his nose.
“What are you staring at?”
Shouyou didn’t know how to answer that and keep his dignity intact, so he didn’t. He just closed his eyes.
“I’m sleeping. Go to sleep.”
Tobio scoffed at that, but, when Shouyou squinted one eye open, he could see that Tobio had obediently closed his eyes. Shouyou, as he always did down here, fell asleep within minutes.