Chapter Text
Shouyou's decision didn't change anything, Tooru had tried to tell himself. He'd tried to convince himself it was just one of their falling outs, that Shouyou just needed some time alone, that everything would get back to normal once Shouyou got whatever had been bothering him out of his system.
But then a week passed. And another. And then one more. And Tooru finally began to realize that this time things were different, this time Shouyou was gone for good.
He pretended, even to himself, not to care. It was Shouyou's decision, it had nothing to do with him. Yet the feeling of emptiness and cold that had suddenly gripped his heart after Shouyou had left didn't want to let go. It stayed, the suffocating tightness around his chest, and Tooru quickly learned to hate it. To loathe the icy numbness on the tips of his fingers, resent the frigid helplessness that took him by surprise at strangest of times, and abhor the chasm that split open his heart, leaving it bare and unprotected.
The only thing that could relieve this strange illness was the feeling of someone else's skin, the warmth chasing the cold away; the void filling with another's voice, eyes, laughter; and the tightness of his chest expanding with the gasps and moans of pleasure. Tooru drowned himself in it, drowned all of himself, every day in someone different. No one person could soothe the chill of his limbs twice, nothing he ever did alone helped, so he gave up on trying and sunk even deeper into the maddening race against time and cold.
Somewhere inside, in a dark, usually hidden place, he knew it was wrong. He was aware that this was only going to pull him in, instead of lifting him up and out of it. He was getting sick of finding a new partner night after night, disgusted with the frivolity of choosing them, tired of each day waking up to a new face in his bed and not even remembering their name. Yet his desperation for a remedy was still stronger than any morals he might have had.
Tooru struggled and pushed onward, trying and trying and trying. He refused to submit to that overwhelming cold. But even his tenacity and strength of will seemed not to be enough.
No matter how fast he found a new partner to fill in the void Shouyou had left, none of them were a cure for his heart. The comfort of another's touch was only temporary, and the frosty pit opened up in his heart again and again, as soon as he realized that it wasn't Shouyou he held in his arms. No amount of sex or sweet caresses and gentle words could ever compare to Shouyou's presence. His warm smiles, shining eyes, expressive voice, blushing cheeks, and arms - arms that held onto Tooru for dear life, comforting not constricting, reassuring not binding.
He missed him, missed all of him. Tooru was becoming painfully aware of that at the worst possible moment - when Shouyou had already left.
Empty apartment, cold bed, faces that he didn't even care to remember the morning after. Was this all worth it? Was it worth giving up Shouyou? No. Now he knew it wasn't. He finally realized what a big mistake he had made when he let Shouyou go. Probably the biggest of his life.
Shouyou's words rang in his mind with an arduous echo: I'm in love with you.
He knew this. He'd known it all along. Long before Shouyou voiced it, Tooru had already been aware of those feelings. And yet, he'd done nothing. He'd waited, hoped they'd pass, hoped Shouyou wouldn't bring it up. But he did, as always doing something Tooru hadn't expected, and everything they stood for had collapsed. He hadn't been ready then, and he wasn't ready now, but if Shouyou was the only one who could disperse the icy clouds around his heart, he would do everything in his power to get him back.
Tooru had thought they'd never see each other again, not after how their last conversation had gone, not after so many weeks without a word exchanged between them. But now, looking at his empty bedroom, so dark and devoid of any and all light, the light that Shouyou had always brought along with him, he made his decision.
He picked up his phone.
"Iwa-chan," he said after the person on the other end picked up. His voice wasn't what it used to be, not the melodious teasing tone, but the dry tiredness of a man brought to his knees. "You have Shou-chan's address, right? I want to see him again."
Not even for a second did Tooru think that Shouyou might have already moved on. Looking at the passing landscape through the train window, he was so full of hope he almost forgot about the emptiness and cold that haunted him for the past month. If just making up his mind and boarding the train to Tokyo made such a change, Tooru was sure that seeing Shouyou was the right decision.
And then when he finally saw him, after hours of waiting in front of Shouyou's apartment door, Tooru's heart clenched. Partially in pain, partially in expectation, his breath whooshed out of him in one go. He realized that what had thought he couldn't do, thought he couldn't offer Shouyou before, it had been right there all along. The feelings he'd believed he couldn't return – they burned through him suddenly, quickening the blood coursing through his body.
He loved him. Maybe it wasn't the usual kind of love, maybe it was twisted and dwarfed, maybe no one other than him would even call it that, but in his own way...
Tooru loved Shouyou.
"What do you want, Tooru?"
The full guard in Shouyou's voice hurt, Tooru had to admit. He smiled at him anyway, simply – and truly – happy to see him. He reached out to envelop the smaller man in a crushing hug, a hug that would clearly relay all his feelings, show Shouyou how much he'd missed him, maybe even give him a hint about why Tooru was there in the first place; but Shouyou stepped away. Just like on the platform all those weeks back, he fled from his touch. Cold spread over Tooru's heart, the last remnants of the warmth that looking at Shouyou brought were disappearing like whips of smoke in the wind.
Tooru's eyes suddenly caught a movement behind Shouyou and he cursed himself a little for being too absorbed with Shouyou to notice the other man. By any standards, he wasn't a bad catch. Suit and tie, handsome, with the dangerous air of a predator around him – Tooru knew Shouyou's type well and this man was exactly that.
"You work fast," Tooru said to Shouyou, honestly impressed by the other's skill.
To catch a man like that wasn't easy, and his being here only served to show that Shouyou hadn't really changed much.
"Thanks to you," Shouyou bit back, his voice roughened a little by a growl of anger.
If the situation was different, Tooru would rejoice to hear it. He'd heard it before, that voice of an infuriated Shouyou, of a Shouyou who was about to strike and show Tooru how he wasn't just a thing for him to play with, but that he was a player in his own right. It usually ended up with them both arguing to the point of hoarse throats and panting breaths, glaring daggers at each other, before the tension bubbling in the air won and they lost their minds between the sheets.
But now, along with the cutting words and the man behind Shouyou's shoulder, it felt like a perfectly measured slap in the face.
He tried to mask it, laughing a little. There was some truth in it, after all. It had been him that had pushed Shouyou away, he couldn't voice any objections if the other needed a rebound or two.
"I guess I did deserve that," he admitted openly, scratching the back of his head.
"What do you want, Tooru?" Shouyou repeated, losing patience, and for that, too, Tooru could not blame him.
"I came to talk," he replied, glancing briefly at the man who had been curiously – and threateningly, judging by the glint in his dark eyes – studying him all this time.
"And what are we doing?" was Shouyou's obstinate reply, and Tooru's narrowed his eyes at him. Anger was good. If Shouyou was angry, it meant he was still holding onto him. And that was all Tooru could have asked for at this point in time.
"Alone, Shou-chan," he said much firmer, hoping he hadn't crossed the line.
Shouyou only shook his head. "We can either talk here, or you can go back to Nagano, Tooru."
Tooru watched him reach into his pocket and take out his keys. It was now or never, Tooru swallowed thickly, he wouldn't get another chance at this. Or rather, he won't be able to gather enough courage to try it ever again. Quickly, before he could think himself out of it, he choked out:
"Okay, fine."
Shouyou turned to look at him, and for a second all Tooru could see was his eyes, those gentle amber eyes that he'd come to miss this past month, those gentle eyes that made him feel at home. Those gentle eyes that he loved... They'd known each other for so long, so many years they'd spent coming back to each other like magnets, drawn by some invisible force. Tooru was not ready to let go of this, to let go of Shouyou. And looking into the other's eyes, he saw a glimpse of something that made his throat tighten. Maybe... Just maybe... Shouyou wasn't ready for that either.
Amber eyes blinked then, and the spell was broken. Tooru took a shaky breath as he watched how Shouyou handed the keys to the man he was with. The hope in Tooru's heart rose like a phoenix from the ashes as he watched the stranger disappear, leaving them alone. Could this be a sign...? Could he really believe that they would mend their hearts back together...?
"I'm sorry I let you go like that," Tooru quickly said, opting for honesty instead of his usual teasing. He wanted Shouyou back and this was the only way. He had to lay himself bare before him, just as Shouyou did back then on the platform. "It was stupid, I was stupid, and I should have never done that. Please give me another chance, Shou-chan."
"Another chance to do what?" Shouyou asked bitterly.
In the way Shouyou's eyebrows knit tightly together, Tooru could briefly see how much damage he had to repair before they could even consider getting back together. But he was ready. He could do it. At least that's what he'd thought before he heard the rest of what Shouyou had to say.
"To hurt me? To sleep with someone else in our bed?" Tooru couldn't help but grimace, which in turn made Shouyou glower with dark satisfaction. "Or maybe another chance to tell me that I would never be enough for you?"
"I won't do it again," Tooru denied, voice quiet and slightly shaking. "Never again."
He knew he had hurt Shouyou a lot, but this? This had never been his intention. He'd never meant to send him that kind of message. Seeing Shouyou like this, hurting, broken, was worse than the month he'd spent trying to fill the gash left on his own heart. He stepped closer, hands reaching out to Shouyou, who only looked at him, motionless. As pitiful as it was, Tooru tried to take solace in the fact that at least this time he didn't step away.
"I'll stop sleeping around. I'll commit to you, to us. I'll be only yours. So just please... come back home?"
He pleaded. Hands gripping Shouyou's shoulders, the warmth seeping through the fabric, creeping up his fingers and melting the cold chains around his heart. Tooru didn't care if he seemed weak, he didn't care about his dignity anymore. He just needed Shouyou back.
"It's too late, Tooru." Shouyou removed his hands. Tooru tried to swallow the sudden pain as the chains tightened. He tried to hide it, but Shouyou must have seen through him, because amber eyes softened. And somehow that hurt even more. "I've already moved on. And so should you."
"That was him, wasn't it?" Tooru asked sourly, nodding his head towards the door of Shouyou's new apartment. "I've seen you sleep with guys like that before, and you've always come back to me, Shou-chan. Why would this time be any different?"
He desperately wanted to find something, anything, to hold onto, to give him that one ray of hope, that one sign that maybe, maybe if he didn't give up, Shouyou will change his mind. But what came out of Shouyou's mouth next destroyed any inkling of hope left in Tooru's heart once and for all.
"Because I fell for him, it's as simple as that."
He couldn't help the flinch. It hurt, more than he could have ever imagined. This is exactly why I never believed in love, Tooru thought bitterly to himself, hands fisting at his sides while Shouyou continued:
"I've already tried it, you know? Sleeping around. And it was him I came back to, not you."
Tooru took a step back as if slapped. No mercy for the fallen, he could understand that. Yet understanding did nothing to lessen the blow.
"I'm sorry, Tooru, but it's over between us. Once and for all."
He watched Shouyou turn away, he watched his small shoulders sag, he watched him look over his shoulder, amber eyes filled with sadness and pain, and steely determination...
"Don't ever come back for me, Tooru. Goodbye."
The door of Shouyou's apartment closed after him, leaving Tooru alone in the corridor. Broken, empty, cold and alone. More alone than he ever felt before. He lingered there for a moment, staring at the brown wood of the polished frame. It was all over, the door had been closed to him, and it would never open again. They were done. This time for good.
And as Tooru walked away, each step taking him farther and farther away, the warmth of this encounter seeped out of his body, heart freezing into a cold and empty rock, cracked and broken.
Shouyou turned over in bed, shifting closer to the warmth of Kuroo's body, a sleepy, content smile ghosting on his lips. He was still half-asleep, consciousness swirling in the sweet embrace of dreams, but he couldn't resist a small sigh of pleasure as he stretched his sore limbs.
It was the weekend, he was in Kuroo's bed, with the man soundly asleep next to him, and so, so warm that Shouyou wanted nothing more than to curl up next to him for the rest of the day, which wasn't such an unreasonable dream since they didn't have work to rush to – everything was simply perfect. To be honest, Shouyou wouldn't have even been able to describe the bubbly emotions he'd been feeling this past week. There was just so much, a real onslaught on his senses, and his poor heart was not coping well with all the blood rushing to his cheeks and wild butterflies tickling his insides at every look or smile Kuroo sent his way.
If he had to give a word, any word, to what he was feeling... he'd say bright. He'd say magical. He'd say tender, colourful, breathtaking.
And maybe, if he was feeling daring, he'd say love.
He'd thought about it a lot, Tooru's visit and the way Kuroo had treated him afterwards made his head spin with the realization – he was in love. Really, truly, purely in love. Of course, he'd suspected it even before that, but to suspect and to know for sure were two very different things. Just as to feel and to know were, and the past week had been exactly the transition Shouyou's mind had needed to recognize the change in his heart. That he had felt love for Kuroo long before this moment. He'd even felt it that night, while he was with Bokuto, although he couldn't fathom such an unlikely idea back then. He hadn't known it then, but he could feel it. And now, after all this time, after everything they'd been through, after he'd straightened up his life – now he finally knew.
He was in love with Kuroo.
He knew... and yet, the words didn't want to go past his lips. There had been many occasions when he could have just blurted it out, left it there, hanging in the air between them, opened his mouth and said it. In the morning when they ate breakfast together, or when they brushed their teeth side to side and Kuroo leaned down for a kiss, leaving Shouyou breathless and with smeared toothpaste on his lips; in the midday when they sometimes snuck out to eat lunch together, or when they fleetingly passed each other in the empty bathroom, sharing a kiss that was a little too short, a little too heated for the cramped space of the stall; in the afternoon when they left the office and drove to Shouyou's apartment, and Kuroo couldn't stay the night so they stood in the front hall for an hour, just kissing leisurely against the frame of Shouyou's door; in the evening when he was splayed on Kuroo's bed, laid bare before him, eagerly waiting for Kuroo's touch as the man's dark eyes heated every inch of his body with the raw hunger in his gaze; in the night when they laid tangled together, skin to skin, breath to breath, heart to heart, and Shouyou's throat closed up on all the feelings bubbling inside his chest.
So many occasions and yet Shouyou couldn't find the perfect moment. Every time he opened his mouth, something made him stop, words stuck as a lump formed in his throat, like a warden meant to forever keep his confession a prisoner in his own chest. It made him run away every single time, suddenly scared of something he had no control over. He tried to find the reason, the answer to why this was happening, but as soon as he tried to chase down the queasy feeling it disappeared without a trace, leaving him stupefied and with growing frustration.
Suddenly a loud ringing cut through the peaceful morning air. Shouyou almost jumped out of his skin, forcibly pulled from his sleepy half-daze. Sitting up, he quickly reached around Kuroo to the nightstand, accepting the call as soon as he had the device in his hand. Kuroo stirred a little, but Shouyou reached out to run his fingers through his dark locks, soothing the man back to sleep.
Only then did he put the phone to his ear.
"Yes?" he asked, muffling a yawn with his shoulder. He should have turned off the blasted thing, he thought a little bitterly, glaring at the clock on the nightstand which read 8:03AM.
"Sorry to call you so early, Hinata." That voice made him blink.
"Iwaizumi-san?" To say he was surprised would be an understatement. He never expected to hear from Iwaizumi again. Not after he broke up with Tooru. "Did something happen?"
They'd never been all that close. It was true that they'd gone to the same high school, and God only knew how many times Iwaizumi saved both Shouyou's and Tooru's asses when they were being too stubborn to make up on their own, but Shouyou always knew that it was Tooru that Iwaizumi truly cared about. He didn't mind it though, not then and definitely not now. They were childhood friends, after all. They cared for each other more than they'd ever admit, which was something Shouyou has always admired about them.
And that was also the reason why he was so surprised to receive a call from Iwaizumi not so long after Tooru's last visit. Had his ex stooped so low as to send his friend after Shouyou...?
"Look, I– I didn't really want to call you, I know you must be busy with work and everything, but..."
The voice on the end of the line was hesitant, and Shouyou quickly abandoned that idea. Even if Tooru had begged Iwaizumi to harass Shouyou on the phone, Iwaizumi had too much pride to participate in something as childish as that. It left Shouyou with even more questions than before.
He frowned.
"What's going on, Iwaizumi-san?" he repeated his question from before, concerned.
"It's about Oikawa," Iwaizumi answered. Shouyou's frown deepened, but Iwaizumi couldn't see it, so he continued: "I haven't heard from him in a week, so I got worried– I mean, you know how he gets, right? He can't survive an hour without his phone or updating Facebook or just calling to annoy me, and this past week - nothing. I tried to call him a few times, but he won't pick up." Shouyou's fingers tightened on his phone. Could it be that after their talk Tooru had...? "I even went to check his place, thought maybe he shut himself in after you rejected him or something, but he wasn't there. I- I know I shouldn't bother you with this, but he said he was going to see you and I thought that maybe-"
"He was here," Shouyou interrupted Iwaizumi's hurried speech, the sting of guilt ridding him of the last remnants of sleep. "Last week." Suddenly Shouyou had a really bad feeling about this. "We talked, but I refused to go back with him and after that he left. I haven't heard anything since then either."
"I see," Iwaizumi sighed, and even through the phone Shouyou could feel how worried the other man actually was. "Sorry to bother you then. Let me know if you hear something, okay?"
"I will," Shouyou promised.
The call ended, but Shouyou kept still, only lowering his phone to the sheets. He stared at it, hands bundled in his lap, and he couldn't gather his thoughts. Tooru was missing. He'd been there just a week ago and now even Iwaizumi didn't know where he was. He could be hurt, he could be in some hospital with amnesia and no familiar face around to cheer him up, he could have been murdered for all they knew. Shouyou shuddered at the very thought.
"Who was that?" Kuroo's sleepy voice made him turn around to find the man sitting up.
"Iwaizumi-san," he said, and seeing the other's confused gaze, explained further: "Tooru's childhood friend."
Kuroo hummed a little hoarsely, his arms coming up to embrace Shouyou from behind. He was warm, the body-freshly-out-of-sleep kind of warm, and Shouyou wanted nothing more than to fall back into that warmth. But he couldn't. The thoughts of Tooru kept him from relaxing.
"He's missing," he whispered, almost afraid of his own voice. "Tooru's missing."
"Missing?" Kuroo's arms tightened around him, and Shouyou wouldn't have been able to say how grateful he was for them, even if he'd tried.
"He hasn't been home in a week and he didn't update any of his social media, which is so unlike him." Shouyou worried his bottom lip between his teeth. "He may be just trying to cope, sleeping around again, but I don't think it's just that this time. I..." Shouyou turned his head to look into Kuroo's dark eyes, looking for some solace in the man's calm. "I'm worried."
He shouldn't be saying that, he shouldn't even concern himself with Tooru. Not now, not when he was together with Kuroo, not when he was starting his life all over again. Shouyou knew that this could ruin them, that this worry, this concern, could be the spark of something that could split them up, but... He didn't want to lie. He wanted to be open with Kuroo, to share everything with him, no matter how trivial. Was that... wrong?
Kuroo leaned his cheek against Shouyou's shoulder, as if to say it wasn't.
"It's not your fault," he said quietly, nuzzling Shouyou's chilled skin. "He's a grown man, he can take care of himself."
"I know that." Shouyou clenched his hands on the phone. "I know that, and still..."
He rejected Tooru so firmly only a few days ago, it was no wonder he felt responsible. Maybe he should have been gentler with him. They'd been together for so long, Tooru deserved more of his kindness. Shouyou released a shaky breath, guilt tightening his throat. What if Iwaizumi couldn't find him? Maybe they should call the police just in case?
And then his eyes flicked down to his phone and suddenly he remembered.
"Kuroo, can I use your laptop?" he asked, already bolting from the man's embrace and crawling across the bed to the door.
"Sure?" Kuroo's somewhat surprised reply was all the permission Shouyou needed.
He practically ran out of the bedroom and into the living room where Kuroo had left his suitcase the night before. He pulled the device out, pushed the power button and, tapping his foot impatiently on the wooden floorboards, waited for it to turn on. Once the desktop flashed the usual welcome, he quickly booted up the browser.
"What do you need it for anyway?"
Shouyou was so occupied with what he was doing, he didn't notice Kuroo coming up behind him. He jumped a little at his voice, but recovered enough to type in the address of the website.
"I'd just remembered something, you know," he said without turning to Kuroo. "Back when we were together – me and Tooru, I mean – there were times when he wouldn't come home for the night." The site opened and Shouyou quickly entered the username and password needed to log in. He turned to Kuroo with a somewhat forced smile. "He always said it was for work, or that something came up, but one time I caught him red-handed with someone else. I never told him, but after that I got this tracking app installed on his phone."
Shouyou turned back to the screen on which there was a satellite map of the town with a single red-flashing dot. A tiny smile made his way to his face.
"I guess he never deleted it," he mumbled to himself.
He stared at the dot, long and hard. Tooru was still in Tokyo. He hadn't gone back home. But what could he have been doing here all this time? Shouyou quickly zoomed in on the address. A hotel... Could Tooru be doing what Shouyou had first expected him to do? Falling into a stranger's arms to drown his pain? But even if he did, that wouldn't explain his absence from social media... or why he wasn't answering Iwaizumi's calls.
He was opening his mouth to say that he should probably go see him, knowing full well how would it sound to Kuroo's ears, when the man surprised him by asking:
"Need a ride?"
Shouyou turned to him, eyes widened in shock. "You– You'd do that?"
Kuroo's lips stretched in a smile, a smile so gentle and affectionate Shouyou felt compelled to look away. Kuroo wouldn't have it though. He stepped closer, making Shouyou look him in the eye, hand on his cheek, foreheads leaned together.
"You're worried, right?" Kuroo's thumb stroked along Shouyou's cheekbone in a mellow caress. "I couldn't care less about that guy if it was just me, but if it's important to you, it's important to me, too."
Sincerity shone in Kuroo's eyes and Shouyou could feel one of those moments – those blasted moments when he couldn't say what he so desperately wanted to – hanging in the air between them, choking his breath out of his lungs with how much he needed Kuroo to know his feelings. He swallowed harshly, once, twice, closing his eyes and lifting a hand to touch Kuroo's wrist.
"Thank you," he spoke through trembling lips.
It wasn't what he meant to say, but it was good enough for now. It would have to be.
Shouyou climbed on his toes and placed a soft kiss to the corner of Kuroo's mouth. I love you.
One day he'd manage to say it out loud. One day...