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prologue---
He couldn’t remember a time when he didn’t know Oikawa, and that was starting to get to him.
As long as he could think back to, Oikawa was always there, with a simpering, “Iwa-chan, that’s so mean!” or a plastered on grin, faker than the ‘diamond earrings’ his mother would buy at primark.
It wasn’t that Oikawa’s presence annoyed him, oh no- as much as he would never admit it, (And he means that, as Oikawa would never shut up about it) he’s gotten used to the brunet constantly by his side. There’s a fragile uneasiness that settles like a deep weight in his stomach when the other isn’t around, cracking unfunny jokes, and flirting with every living object he sees. (And with some inanimate ones as well- “honestly, Iwa-chan, i was just practicing with the pillow- Iwa-chan, are you recording this? Hey, give me that phone! Give me that, seriously, you meanie!”)
It was the fact that he couldn’t imagine a future without him.
He woke up to Oikawa’s sleeping face each morning- Ever since they moved in together, Oikawa insisted they slept in the same bed, claiming, “It’s too cold in mine, Iwa-chan, honest! You’re always so warm, what am i meant to do, freeze? You don’t want me to freeze, do you?” (He knew Oikawa had precisely 17 blankets on his bed, 5 of them electric, so there was no way in hell he could be cold, but his throat always froze up and he let him in, each night, without fail, Oikawa sliding freezing hands up the back of his shirt and resting them against his bare skin, and the tingles that electrify his torso are because of the cold, okay?) Ate breakfast with Oikawa, walked to school with Oikawa, ate lunch with Oikawa, Practised volleyball with Oikawa, walked home with Oikawa, ate dinner with Oikawa, went to bed with Oikawa.
Oikawa, Oikawa, Oikawa. He was like a broken record, spitting out the same out tune every day and by god, he loved it, and he never wanted to stop.
And that scared him, because he knew Oikawa would choose one of the throng of girls throwing themselves at him, and they would get married with two kids and a dog and live in a perfect little house that didn’t have a room where Oikawa and him snuggled into bed together, or a room where Oikawa would try (and fail) to cook and Hajime would have to come grumbling to his rescue with takeout and a fire extinguisher. (“My hero, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa would exclaim, batting his eyelashes in a way that shouldn’t be as cute as it is, and Hajime would accuse him of being an idiot who couldn’t even microwave rice, trying to fight down a blush that never should have fought it’s way up in the first place.)
And maybe Hajime would get a pretty wife and two sweet kids and a loyal dog as well, and the name ‘Oikawa’ might not even mean anything to him in twenty years.
It’s only a matter of time, he thinks to himself, watching Oikawa’s face soften into sleep, mouth parted in hushed breath, E.T plushie clutched to his chest like his lifeline, before he forgets me.
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“Iwaaaaaa-channnnn!” is the first thing he hears when he wakes up, and an excited Oikawa is straddling him, dressed in an too-tight- is that Hajime’s t-shirt?- and greasy red running shorts.
“Too early,” he says, rolling over, the thought of his shirt clinging softly to Oikawa’s muscles, blasting them into high-def like it was made for amplifying them, and that alone, and the soft splay of peaches-and-cream legs wrapped around his waist definitely not on his mind.
“It’s never too early for pancakes, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa says cheerily, and Hajime jolts up, sending the other a wide-eyed stare like he just announced he was pregnant with Kageyama’s child.
“You didn’t” he says, sitting up, Oikawa sliding lower down his waist.
“I-” Oikawa paused, playing with his bottom lip in an entirely on-purpose seductive way, before giving a small pout. “Tried to.”
“What the hell possessed you to attempt to cook anything more than toast, you absolute moron, if i have to call the fire department one more time, Asskawa, things will not be pretty.” he babbles, cuffing Oikawa round the head, the smoke curling from the kitchen finally noticed.
“But Iwa-chan, how are things not pretty when i’m around?” Oikawa quips back flawlessly, breath warm and batter-scented (he’s been eating it again before it's 'cooked', the bastard) and prickly on Hajime’s face, before he slid off his waist, grinning cockily like he’s just won the lottery and not damaged their kitchen for the 3rd time this month.
(And it’s only the eighth, he notices later, with only sparks him to angrily sock Oikawa in the arm with no explanation.)
But then things go back to normal, Oikawa puffing out his (pretty muscled, to be fair) chest and strutting around like a peacock, and Hajime slouches behind him, shooting out rapid-fire insults to make sure Oikawa’s ego doesn’t completely take over his soul. And that morning with the heavy weight of the other pressed against his chest and his soft breath fluttering (Like the wings of the butterflies he used to be so eager to catch.) against his face is nearly forgotten.
(It doesn’t cross his mind once that Oikawa pressed himself against Hajime like that to hint at something)
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“I don’t get it, Makki!” he says suddenly, carding his hands through his sweat-soaked hair. “I just realised that Oikawa never dates. Never! The entire school throws themselves at him!” He doesn’t know where this outburst came from, or why it’s bubbling up in the middle of volleyball practice, but it’s been bugging him all day.
Makki stops so suddenly a volleyball slaps him in the face, but he ignores it, a delightful grin stretching violently across his cheeks. “You don’t know?” he asks giddily, like a small child telling santa what they want for christmas.
Hajime blinks in response, and the grin somehow stretches wider. He’s half worried that it’ll split his face right open.
“Oh!” Makki practically purrs, staring at an increasingly uncomfortable Hajime, and he’s pretty sure he’s never seen Makki this excited about, well, anything.
“I thought it was obvious,” Makki continues, still with that cat-like grin.
Hajime assures him that no, it is not obvious, before moving away, silently vowing never to talk to Makki about Oikawa again. (He didn’t really mean to in the first place, anyway, he was just kind of there)
He doesn’t notice the pair of chocolatey eyes following him around the gym with a slight hint of jealousy.
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“Iwa-chaaaaaan!”
Oikawa is swathed in blankets, clutching his E.T plushie, bundled up on the couch with a bowl of popcorn balancing precariously on his lap. A glittery child’s tattoo of a UFO has somehow found itself onto his cheek, and he’s grinning brightly as if it’s his life’s purpose to be coated in sparkly, alien-related temporary-tattoo’s. “Iwa-chan!” he clamours again when Hajime appears in the doorway, practically vibrating with joy. “The latest season of Aliens- The ones beyond is out on netflix!” he sticks a slippered foot out of the covers, using it to pat the extremely small sliver of couch he’s not taking up. “Join me! The popcorn is buttery and salted, just how you like it!” he says proudly, and Hajime is impressed that a) he remembered, and b) he managed to make it without burning the apartment down.
He grumbles, squishing himself next to the mass of quilts. “We’re not staying up all night to watch every single episode again, Oikawa. It’s bad for yo- ahem, our, health.”
Oikawa pouts, and he looks so damn disappointed that Hajime nearly apologises. But then that blinding grin is back, and Oikawa teases, “Fine, mom. Just three episodes?”
“Two,”
“Great! Glad we’ve come to an agreement,” Oikawa smiles, and Hajime tries to ignore the way his heart speeds up a little. (It’s just the anticipation of probably having to stay up all night, he tells himself. That’s all.) “Three episodes it is, then.” he finishes with a flourish, clicking play, and as the eerie theme tune starts to play, all warbling voices and off-key piano notes, all he can think of is how pretty Oikawa looks with his cheeks flushed in excitement and his hair tousled with bedhead.
(He like to pretend he is completely oblivious to how drop-dead gorgeous Oikawa is, but we all know that’s not the case.)
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“You’re- gay?”
Oikawa stamps indignantly. “Bye-sex-yoo-al. Bisexual. I thought you knew this. It’s pretty damn obvious.”
Hajime scratches the back of his head, pulling his bottom lip between his teeth. “Is it?” he thinks, suddenly, of all the times Oikawa has let his eyes linger on a man longer than socially acceptable, how he’s always talking about how, “Oh God, Iwa-chan, Matt Smith’s cheekbones are to die for. Hold me, i think i’m having a heart attack over his glory, oh my,” and that “Even though Kageyama is a literal bag of dicks he had pretty sexy deltoids, don’t you think?”
“Oh,” he says, trying to ignore the twist of jealousy and hope that twists in his gut. “Man, am i an idiot. Sorry, it is obvious.”
For a second raw relief flashes through Oikawa’s eyes, before he masks it quickly. “Good. I was worried you had amnesia for a second, Iwa-chan” he chuckles pleasantly to himself, and Hajime feels like there’s an inside joke here that he’s missing out on.
“I’m okay with this, by the way.” he says suddenly, and then Oikawa laughs, really laughs, head thrown back, mouth parted, eyes shining with joy. “Well, duh!” he says teasingly between gasping breaths. “Otherwise- otherwise, we wouldn’t be da-” he breaks into raucous laughter again, and Hajime joins in. He doesn’t get the joke, but Oikawa’s laughter- his real laughter, mind you- has always been infectious.
It isn’t until they’re snuggled up in bed together, Oikawa’s face smushed into his armpit, snoring softly, E.T plushie tucked firmly into his hands, that Hajime wonders what the other was going to say earlier.
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“I think i should get a girlfriend,”he tells Oikawa one day. Its said randomly, absent-mindedly, as Oikawa’s sitting across from him at dinner, playing some jumping app on his phone.
Oikawa freezes, head snapping up in an instant. “What?” he says, a slight tremor in his voice, and It’s so sudden Hajime actually has to think for a few seconds to remember what he just said.
“That i should get a girlfriend?” he tries again, his voice uncertain and hoarse.
Oikawa’s hand clenches on the table, and he says in a small voice, “But- but you’re dating me.”
his voice is so small and confused that Hajime’s heart breaks a little, but he thinks over Oikawa’s words and realises he’s joking, “Oh,” he laughs teasingly. “I’d be insane to ever date you, Asskawa!”
he only realises he’s crossed a line when Oikawa’s hands start shaking ever so slighlty, and his eyes won’t meet the others.
“Oikawa?” he says softly, and that seems to trigger something in the other, before he stands up, hands slamming on the table, knocking his chair back with a resounding thud.
“You’re an asshole, Iwaizumi Hajime,” Oikawa says, eyes shining with unshed tears, mouth drawn in a tight line.
It’s probably the most real portrayal of Oikawa’s feeling Hajime has ever seen, and it’s the one that hurts the most.
Before he can even open his mouth to apologise, Oikawa is gone, leaving only the echoing slam of a door and the slight scent of salt behind, and he can’t go, because who’ll cook for him now, who’ll warm him up at night now, who’ll knock his ego back a peg now, who’ll watch three shitty episodes of Aliens- The ones beyond with him now, who’ll, who’ll-
He notices the E.T plushie thrown on their table (he supposes it’s only his table now, though), brown-button eyes watching him smugly. He wonders something, suddenly, picking it up and looking at the worn cotton tag between his fingers. It reads, in a barely legible pencil scrawl:
Happy 13th birthday, Asskawa
Love Iwa-chan.
The ‘love’ is written messily over a tippexed-out splotch, and Hajime remembers feeling silly at writing ‘love’ to another boy, but then he realised that Oikawa wouldn’t care, hell, he would love it, so he wrote it over again, having to press the pencil hard into the label for the word to be visible. He remembers grudgingly writing Iwa-chan, because if he wrote ‘Iwaizumi,’ Oikawa would do that thing he always did, looking round wide-eyed, saying “Now this is awfully nice, Iwa-chan, but i don’t know any Iwaizumi’s! Only a little cutie called Iwa-chan!” and Hajime would sock him in the stomach and grudgingly say who it was ‘really from’, as Oikawa put it.
But that doesn’t matter right now, because it’s the same one and Oikawa kept it all this time and Hajime never even realised, because Iwaizumi Hajime- no, Iwa-chan- is the most idiotic asshole this world has ever seen, because finally, finally, he can see.
And the worlds most idiotic asshole is somehow loved by this world’s most perfect, gorgeous creature and he made him cry.
And he loves him back, so much. He can only hope it isn’t too late to tell him that.
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Oikawa is in the park.
Neither have them have been here in over five years. it’s weird to be back, the chipping blue paint on the fence and the rusty red swings, the bright yellow monkey bars that now have a bee nest rested between two of the bars haunting him with old memories Hajime thought he’d forgotten.
Six year old Oikawa, taking his hand, pulling him excitedly to the see-saw. “It’s so fun, Iwa-chan!” he cheers happily. “I went on it mummy! You go up and down, like, wheeee!”
Hajime rolls his eyes, snickering, “You still call your mum mummy?” causing Oikawa to pause and wheel round, shooting Hajime a tearful glare. “Meanie!” he sniffs wetly, levelling a finger at the other, who tries not to feel guilty. “Whatever,” Hajime says gruffly, looking at the ground. “Let’s go on the stupid see-saw then,” as he tried to ignore the blush spreading across his cheeks as Oikawa whooped in joy, all sadness forgotten.
Nine year old Hajime, grumbling as he stuck plasters on Oikawa’s bloody knee. “Idiot,” he says harshly, although there’s a soft undertone to his voice that he knows Oikawa can hear. “Don’t push yourself too hard.”
Oikawa sniffs, shrugging. “You sound like my mum,” he garbles around his lollipop (Hajime’s mum had given it to Oikawa, even though it was meant to be Hajime’s, but he didn’t really mind- he didn’t tell the other boy that, though) He pulls it out of his mouth with a pop, offering it to the other. “Want a lick, Iwa-chan?” he asks, eyes sparkling. “C’mon. It’s raspberry-flavoured. Your favourite.” he waves it tantalizingly in front of Hajime’s face, but the other still hesitates.
“It might have cooties,” he explains to Oikawa’s crestfallen face.
Oikawa blinks. “Only girls have cooties, Iwa-chan,” he says slowly, like he’s talking to an idiot.
“Oh,” Hajime says, and that’s good enough for him, because he plucks the lolllipop from Oikawa’s fingers and shoves it in his mouth.
“Hey! Iwa-chan, you meanie!” Oikawa complains. “I said a lick, not all of it!”
“Oops, sorry,” Hajime replies, taking it out of his mouth and holding it between them. “Could we… share it?” he asks hesitantly. Oikawa eyes them both critically, before beaming. “Sure!”
They both reach for a lick at the same time, and pretend not to notice when their lips brush against each others.
Oikawa’s sitting on a swing, head drooping down, bare feet scuffing the gravel ground. His eyes are rimmed with red and snot dribbles onto his upper lip and he’s by far the most beautiful thing Hajime has ever seen.
“You, um” he clears his throat, but Oikawa doesn’t look up. “You left this.” he holds out the E.T plushie.
Oikawa doesn’t respond, so he sits cross-legged on the ground in front of him, the toy nestled tightly to his chest.
“I’m an asshole,” he says quietly. “I didn’t realise we were dating, until-”
Oikawa hiccups. “Iwaizumi,” he says quietly.
Hajime smiles slighlty, reaching out to squeeze one of the hands that hangs limply at Oikawa’s side.
“I don’t know any Iwaizumi’s, Oikawa,” he says gently. “Only a Iwa-chan.”
Oikawa sniffs, and Hajime holds his hand tighter.
“I didn’t know we were dating.” he confessed quietly. “Now i look back, we kinda were, but I thought- i thought there was no way someone like you would like someone like me. So i persuaded myself that it was just your personality."
“You’re an idiot,” Oikawa sniffles, but there’s a hint of fondness in his voice. “Of course i love you, Iwa-chan.”
(He has never been so happy to hear that stupid nickname)
“I know it might take a while, but can you please forgive me? And start a relationship that we’re, um, both aware of?”
Oikawa stares at him for a moment, and for a horrible second he thinks he’s going to get rejected. Bile is raising in his throat, then, before he can even blink (Oikawa has always had fast reflexes), the other has lurched off the swing and onto Hajime’s lap, and threw his arms around his neck. His breath smelt like saltwater and the lamb stew they’d been having for dinner.
“I always hold really long grudges,” Oikawa admits breathlessly, and Hajime’s heart stops a little. “But you’ve always been my exception. To everything.”
He darts forward and pecks Hajime’s lips, leaving behind the taste of OIkawa, Oikawa, Oikawa.
Hajime pants a little needily, straining forward, and Oikawa laughs. “I’ve wanted to do that,” he confesses. “Since i was 12.”
“Wow. I love you. Wow,” Hajime whispers, pausing in horror when he realises what he just said.
Oikawa doesn’t seem to mind, though, just says softly into Hajime's ear, “I love you so much, Hajime,”
And time stops as they bring their lips together again.
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