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When Tooru reaches the third floor of his apartment building, the first thing he notices is a mountain of cardboard boxes trailing into the previously unoccupied unit next to his. Tooru is fishing his keys out of his pocket when someone strides out of the no-longer-empty apartment, then freezes.
Tobio looks at him with wide eyes. “Oikawa-san?”
I’ve been cursed, Tooru thinks immediately.
Oikawa Tooru has been alive for 26 years. He’s been back in Japan for four, and hasn’t met Kageyama Tobio for seven. He never anticipated his Tobio-free life ending so soon. Or ever, for that matter. Passing by each other in their hometown didn’t count for very much.
“Tobio-chan, helping a friend move in?” Tooru asks hopefully.
Tobio, of course, shakes his head. “No— uh. I live here now.” Maybe that apothecary part-timer with the bed head put another experimental hex on me.
“I see,” Tooru says.
“Um…”
Tooru paints his best smile over his face. He finally gets his keys out and opens his door. He isn’t seventeen any longer, he’s going to be mature about this. “Well then… goodbye,” he says, and lets the door fall shut behind him as he steps into his apartment.
Tooru sighs. That went well enough. At least it’s a nice day outside, with daylight pouring in through the shutters on the opposite wall. When he pulls them up, the sun flutters, it seems to be smiling over his misfortune. The light wakes the wild larkspur plant Hanamaki gave him, which actually does laugh at him.
He’ll have to get Semi to check for curses tomorrow.
Tobio remains rooted to his place in the hallway, only distantly registering what sounds to be maniacal laughter from Oikawa's apartment. He's snapped back to reality when Miwa calls for him from inside his new apartment.
“One sec!” He shouts back.
Tobio has imagined meeting Oikawa again a thousand times over. He never anticipated it happening like this. The last time Tobio saw him was two years ago, at a convenience store in Miyagi. Tobio caught the shape of him through the gap in a shelf of instant-ramen. Oikawa had looked impossible then, checking out a pack of milk bread and canned coffee. Stark under the white, fluorescent lights. By the time Tobio rounded the corner to the cash register, he was gone, like a trick of the light Tobio's traitorous mind had conjured up.
He doesn’t look all too different now, older with shorter hair, just as handsome and so— impossible.
“Tobio!” Miwa yells again, startling him into knocking over a box of his books. He curses softly.
“Coming!”
He sets his books down on the living room floor when he enters, then finds Miwa in the kitchen, arranging his sparse fridge. She looks up at the sound of him approaching, then frowns.
“What happened to you?”
Tobio frowns back, he doesn’t look that out of sorts, does he? “I just ran into someone.”
She picks out one of his yogurt drinks, and leans on the fridge as she sips at it. “So vague, Tobio. Who was it?”
“A senpai. He lives next door.”
“Oh? That’s funny.”
Funny? Tobio thinks, and then— what the fuck, when he hears the sound of something shattering from his bedroom. Atsumu appears in the door with his hands raised apologetically.
“Don’t be mad! I’ll buy you a new photo frame, Tobio-kun.”
Tobio just stares at him, long enough that he knows it’s making Atsumu nervous, then deflates with a sigh. “Don’t touch my scrying globe. It’s not as easily replaceable if you break it.”
Atsumu gives him an offended pout. “I’ll go get the other boxes.”
Miwa snorts next to him, then chokes on her stolen drink. She takes a minute to recover, then asks, “Why didn’t you bring Wakatoshi to help instead?”
“He was busy.”
She hums. “When won’t he be busy?”
Tobio frowns at her. “You’ve been asking about him a lot lately.”
In lieu of an answer, she raises her brows, so will you tell me or not? There’s no danger in telling her, but Tobio is weary anyway. He doesn’t want to see Ushijima Wakatoshi stare at his sister all night, while also missing the fact that she’s been watching him as well for the better part of a month.
He wavers under his sister’s silently hopeful gaze. “We’re all having movie night next week, you should come.” He doesn’t say that Ushijima had asked if Miwa would be there.
Miwa finishes his yogurt drink with a cheerfully loud slurp. She ruffles his hair as she walks past him. “Come on,” she says. There’s a pleased lilt to her voice. “I’ll help you with the boxes. You’re too slow anyway.”
“I am not.”
“Are too.”
“Am not.”
“Shut up and help me lift your books.”
Tobio doesn’t think about Oikawa again until he tells Yachi about it, during their shared shift at work the next day. Yachi is artfully arranging the second batch of pastries in the display case next to him. Tobio leans over the counter, barely watching the door for customers. It’s one of the warmer Wednesdays in March, and slow at that. Only a handful of regulars are here.
“You know,” she says thoughtfully. Yachi's hands are busy placing the café's signature charmed sugar cookies out on a tray. “If Tanaka-san were here, he’d call that fate.”
Tobio smiles, shaking his head. “He thinks everything is fate.”
She shrugs. “It could be.”
Tobio has never extensively considered things like destiny. There’s no real meaning in it for him. Everyone he knows forged their lives bare-handed. What use is fate, then?
Tanaka, tipsy off his engagement to Kiyoko-san — and the drinks at the celebration for it — had told him, “So unromantic! Fate isn’t about inevitability, Kageyama!” Tobio remembers him looking across the room at his fiancé, face flushed, eyes glittery. “It’s just potential.”
He knows the only reason Yachi brought it up is because he had made the deeply inadvisable decision of getting drunk with his friends during their first year of college, and spilling his guts about an old crush… or something. Either way, Tobio still doesn’t really understand what Tanaka had meant. Maybe he’s not supposed to understand the ramblings of a drunk man. Maybe it means nothing. Still, he turns the words over in his mind, with little left to do on a slow day but wonder.
Amanai Kanoka arrives while he’s thinking. She’s another regular, and also Yachi’s senpai from her post-graduate creative writing class. Tobio takes the liberty of abandoning the register to uselessly take stock, so Yachi can chat with Kanoka a little longer. It doesn’t matter how persistently Yachi says that Kanoka isn’t interested in her.
“Was that fate, then?” He whispers to his friend, when Kanoka leaves.
Yachi’s face colours, but she glares at him valiantly. “That’s just routine.”
Moments later, the reason behind their earlier conversation opens the door. Oikawa is wearing slacks, a sensible sweater for the spring, and glasses. Tobio has never seen him wear glasses before and he feels— dumbstruck… or something. Even dressed so simply, he makes Tobio somehow resent his well-worn Tokyo Conservatory for Mystic Arts hoodie.
Yachi looks at him meaningfully. ‘That’s fate,’ she mouths, eyes full of laughter. Tobio ignores her.
“How is it that you’re suddenly everywhere I go, Tobio-chan?” Oikawa asks, when he reaches the counter. There’s no bite to it, which is almost more startling than the sight of him.
Tobio manages to frown. “You’ve never come in here since I started working.”
“Yes, well.” Oikawa clicks his tongue. “The coffee shop across from the apartment building closed down the other day.”
Fate, Tobio thinks again. He can feel Yachi’s amusement from where she’s pretending not to eavesdrop. Suddenly the shape of Oikawa in front of him is made infinitely more unbelievable. Just coincidence, he assures himself.