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On occasion, Kei has engaged in activities (voluntarily or not) which might not be as intelligent as he tries to make the rest of his activities be. For example, there was one memorable time when he did this one thing that wasn't intelligent at all. The backstory it requires for the humour factor is this: Kei is quite fond of red fruits, particularly strawberries and raspberries, and moving right on from the memory of the raspberry muffins a certain Kuroo Tetsurou made the other day, the concept is this— almost every nature of substance he owns is flavoured with one of the red fruits. Strawberry shampoo, raspberry room freshener. That kind of thing. Outside the range of cleaning products, he also owns, of course, a great number of actual condiments that are of the flavour, aroma and colour of his beloved red fruits. Strawberry syrup, raspberry ice cream, the works.
Cutting to the chase, the gist of the thing is that on one occasion during the beginning of the semester, Kei mistook his (strawberry) dishwashing liquid for his (strawberry) syrup and partook of not one, not two, but three sips of the foamy concoction that resulted from mixing water with the liquid. Kei is not the kind of person to panic easily, but the taste of that thing sliding down his throat made him, briefly, think about life, death and the great beyond.
On that occasion, it had been Yamaguchi who had come to the rescue. Albeit laughing his ass off until tears came out of his eyes, he had taken the glass away from a stunned Kei and washed away the detrimental cocktail, gotten him a glass of milk, and then proceeded to text all their friends about it. While Kei hadn't been very happy about the texting part, or the laughing part, he had been grateful in general for Yamaguchi's existence and intervention.
That feeling of gratefulness has returned tenfold (although he admits that it is always faintly glowing in the background; childhood friends, and best friends at that, have that thing about them after all) as he stands on the platform, watching Yamaguchi's train come to a stop. Kei thinks he might actually cry when he sees Yamaguchi again. So many things have happened in the time he's been away.
'So many,' he says, the moment Yamaguchi steps off the train and grins at him. 'So many things. Tadashi.'
'So I've heard,' Yamaguchi says. 'Don't be a jerk, get my bag.'
'It's not even that heavy,' Kei says, but he takes it anyway, because Yamaguchi is here and now there can be vodka and cookies and complaining. 'How was it?'
'I just slept, as you know. My mom sent sweaters again—'
'It's barely fall—'
'—your grandma said to make sure you're eating more than just instant ramen.'
'Right.'
'Akiteru-nii's okay, by the way.' Yamaguchi's tone is light, as if it isn't seven in the morning (really, has Kei gotten to sleep in on a single day this break?) and he isn't tired.
Kei tightens his grip around the bag handle, looks around. There might be the slightest bit of fog, actually, so he supposes the sweater won't be lying folded in his wardrobe for too long. 'Think it might snow this year?'
'You should give him a call.'
'Not that I'm that fond of snow. Anyway, do you want to hear about that shitty photoshoot or not? You should be glad I'm alive after that.'
Yamaguchi laughs and leans over, bumps his shoulder with Kei's. 'I'm always glad you're alive.'
'Good.' Then Kei takes his free hand out of his pocket, takes Yamaguchi's other bag too. After all, it's seven in the morning and he's tired. 'Good.'
●●●
The walk back from the station is longer than usual since Kei is so determined on catching Yamaguchi up, however briefly, on everything so that he can expand later in peace. Recounting the trauma of the past holidays is difficult, but his stellar sarcasm and general stoicism towards existence take him through all the reports of that one disastrous party, Iwaizumi the Angry Review Guy’s dislike of McFlurries, and every single thing that Kuroo Tetsurou has brought to (and taken from) his life.
'So let me get this straight,' Yamaguchi says. 'In the month— the twenty days— that I was gone, you managed to give Bokuto three minutes and forty seven seconds of yourself on video repeating the chorus of Bubble Butt—'
'Yes—'
'—had your headphones stolen by the boy from Le Petit Yachi—'
'Yes—'
'—got blackmailed through the three minutes and forty seven seconds of yourself on video repeating the chorus of Bubble Butt to model for a photoshoot along with the boy from Le Petit Yachi who stole your headphones—'
'Yes—'
'—and then you actually did the shoot.'
'Yes,' Kei says. 'See, I told you not to go home for the break.'
'I'm very glad you're alive,' Yamaguchi says. 'I don't actually understand how you're alive, but I'm glad you are.'
'And Kenma's cat attacked me.'
Yamaguchi stops walking, and Kei walks right into him. 'Is there anything else I should know, Tsukki.'
'Well,' Kei says, adjusting the bags and clearing his throat, 'let me think.'
There is, after all, a pair of issues that might be more pressing than even the fact that he can't seem to remember where he put the notes he borrowed from Kindaichi; this pair of issues being (in order of priority) Kuroo Tetsurou's lack of motivation to return his headphones, and whatever new idea Bokuto's gotten in that ridiculous brain of his that is motivating him to show up in Kei's vicinity at the most unexpected of times and in the most unexpected of fashions with the most unexpected of expressions on his face. That second one might actually replace the first one if Bokuto keeps it up, honestly, because Kei has never been this puzzled in his life, excluding those brief three seconds of incomprehension he experienced upon swallowing the dishwashing liquid.
'So...Bokuto is stalking you,' Yamaguchi is saying slowly when Kei comes back from that memory. 'Bokuto. Stalking you.'
'Well, not exactly,' Kei replies, frowning. 'It's more like...you know how if you leave the blinds up at night you feel like every bird in the city is watching you sleep?'
'No,' Yamaguchi says.
'Well, it feels like that. Kind of.'
'Like when you leave the blinds up at night you feel like every bird in the city is watching you sleep.'
'Yes,' Kei says.
'I see,' Yamaguchi says.
'And Kuroo still hasn't returned my headphones,' Kei says.
'I know,' Yamaguchi says.
'This bothers me.'
'I can imagine. Do you want to go do groceries or something? We could make curry.'
'I don't want to eat curry, Yamaguchi, I want my headphones back.'
'We could buy some carrots and eggs and frozen peas.'
'I don't buy sad things like frozen peas.'
'We could buy ice cream.'
'...okay. Ice cream is okay.'
'Or we could just get some cakes and stuff, if you want.'
'We could.'
'No, Tsukki.' Yamaguchi's smiling, and Kei doesn't understand why until he looks up and realises exactly what door they're standing outside. 'I mean, we could just get some cakes.'
He supposes that in some parallel universe, this could be funny, the fact that he subconsciously led Yamaguchi to the very café he was complaining so heartily about. He hopes that in this parallel universe, he also owns a snazzy car in which he can drive away. Forever.
'Literally shut up.' Kei, however, has accepted this month to be one that explains a lot of life's secrets to him, and so, he takes a deep breath and waits for a smirking Yamaguchi to open the door to Le Petit Toothpick so that he can step inside.
●●●
Kei has thought many times in the past twenty days that he can hear the trumpets meant to announce the apocalypse if he listens carefully when Bokuto and Kuroo laugh together. He hadn't paused his evaluation to consider the possibility that even Yamaguchi and Kuroo laughing together could sound like that more-and-more-welcome end of the world was approaching. He regrets this now, because had he thought of it earlier, he would've taken measures to protect his ears— and then he realises, once more, that Kuroo has not returned his headphones.
He glares into his coffee (that Kuroo slid across to him even while making very gleeful introductions with Yamaguchi) and thinks that he needs more than just this one coffee that he is glaring into. No, Kei needs many, many coffees. A great many—
'So then,' Yamaguchi giggles (giggles), 'at two in the morning, we were going through the top thirty five Spanish hits of 2008 to find the song that was playing in the car that night.'
The delight on Kuroo's face is something out of a nightmare. Kei doesn't understand why Yamaguchi has to reveal anything to this abysmal person, let alone intimate details of their shared dorky adolescence, but he supposes he might as well accept every blow the universe is dealing in one session, so that the rest of the year goes by peacefully. He still has one semester to go, so he'd better accept the swiftness with which his best friend and not-worthy-of-being-considered-enemy have gotten along. It seems, almost, as if Yamaguchi revels in the fact that Kei tries to engage as little as possible with Kuroo. This, of course, enrages Kei to no end, but he doesn't want to provoke his shitty luck anymore than it has already been provoked by God knows who, so he decides to just continue glaring into his coffee, which he has been doing alarmingly frequently in this very café in the past month. He doesn't know how and why it came to this; he mostly just wants to sleep and wake up with all his assignments done and three Tupperware boxes of Akiteru's strawberry shortcake in the refrigerator and get back to studying. Preferably with no memory of all of August.
Neither of the two males in front of him, one on either side of the counter, seem to want to let him do any of this, however. In fact, just as he (temporarily) finishes glaring at his coffee and looks up, he finds them both staring at him with twin smirks on their faces and doesn't understand what's going on until Kuroo opens his wicked mouth.
'Dinosaurs, huh,' he says.
Kei blinks at him, then turns to Yamaguchi. For the first time (at least this year), he cannot come up with any words that he might want to say.
Yamaguchi, as always, steps in where Kei falters. 'There is shortcake in my bag.'
'You're going to hell, both of you,' Kei says.
●●●
Kei supposes that worse things could have come out of this meeting as he steadfastly ignores Kuroo's cheerful wave, and leads Yamaguchi none too gently out of the cursed café. If it's only Kuroo knowing about the Spanish hits all-nighter and his fondness for dinosaurs, Kei can still live peacefully. At least Yamaguchi never went to the real facts, and Kei knows he never would. Apart from steadfastly ignoring Kuroo's cheerful wave, Kei also ignores, steadfastly, the realisation that he would not actually mind too much even if Kuroo found out that he says thank you by mistake every time the clock on his laptop announces the hour.
The air is definitely warmer than it was when they stepped in, even though the sky doesn't seem to have changed. Kei wonders what Kuroo would look like in snow or rain, then wonders what his life would look like if these kinds of unnecessary thoughts didn't plague his consciousness. Maybe then he'd remember where the hell he put the notes he borrowed from Kindaichi.
Just then, Kuroo decides (as he always seems to have done in their acquaintanceship so far) that Kei isn't miserable enough, and calls out an overly bright 'See you, Tsukki!'.
Tsukki. Kei stops with his hand on the door, staring blankly outside at this one far-off tree that he wishes to climb and live atop. See you, Tsukki.
'Did he just call me Tsukki? He just called me Tsukki,' Kei says, and now Yamaguchi looks like he might be beginning to develop a fear for his wellbeing. 'He called me Tsukki.'
'Ice cream?' Yamaguchi offers meekly. 'We can get the gourmet strawberry one.'
'What's wrong, Tsukki?' Kuroo trills. 'Not gonna say bye?'
Kei feels the corners of his mouth tugging upwards into a smile, and that is usually the sign of a level of anger that even he himself is wary of. To his horror, however, this is only half frustration. The other half is...just...just that. A smile. That terrible, no-good, very bad smile that comes when he's trying to remain angry at Hinata or Kageyama for doing something that even Hinata's little sister would disapprove of, but ends up laughing at anyway. That one.
Yamaguchi, of course, catches onto this smile right away. 'Tsukki...'
'Shut up, this is all your fault.'
It's only when they're a good five hundred metres away from Le Petit Trampoline that he realises what the universe's final blow for the day is.
'I.'
'Ah, yes,' Yamaguchi says. 'The headphones.'
●●●
When he storms back into the eatery that, at this point, might as well have a neon sign above it saying at some point in the future Tsukishima Kei or Kuroo Tetsurou's body will be lain to rest here; we are not sure which one though, so please stay tuned, he is relieved to find that there are still no other customers. It's much too early in the day, and no one wants to be up at this hour on the last day of holidays before hell resumes its scheduled programming, and he's grateful for that as he walks over to the counter.
'Imagine all the people—'
Wait.
'—living life in peace.'
That traditional hoot before the chorus has probably never sounded this good coming from anyone other than Lennon himself, is what Kei finds himself thinking detachedly even as he tries to process the lilt of the voice singing one of his favourite songs. Maybe it's the fact that the place is empty, or maybe it's that his logic is a mess this month, or maybe it's the voice itself— gentle, easy; be it whatever, he finds himself crossing the gap between the counter and the wall, finds himself walking right through the open door of the kitchen— maybe it's just the voice. It's just the voice, singing you may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.
When he finds just one person in the kitchen, pushing a tray of bread rolls into the oven, he understands that it is this, and not him forgetting his headphones again, that is supposed to be the universe's final blow for the day. Or the week, maybe the month. A pre-emptive strike for the rest of autumn.
Kuroo Tetsurou, in his pink apron and white shirt with his messy dark hair and his sleeves rolled up, turns around singing imagine no and stops short at possessions.
There is something that has changed about him in the few minutes that Kei has been gone. His face, even surprised as it is right now— and Kei will have to explain himself quickly, he'll do it in just a moment— even surprised as it is right now, seems more serious (if that's the word) than he has ever seen it. Not the slightest smirk, no sharpness in Kuroo's eyes. Already Kei feels beholden, for no reason other than the streak of flour on his cheek. Just standing here in this moment, in front of Kuroo, with the fresh echoes of his voice ringing in Kei's ears still and his hands in loose fists by his sides—
Imagine no possessions...I wonder if you can.
'Of course I can't,' Kei says, and really, he should just be walking out of this kitchen and this café, and trying to see if he can fit inside one of Yamaguchi's bags.
'What?'
'My most...important possession,' he says, motions with his hands, indicates the headphones that he suddenly doesn't even really want. He can just...he could just buy new ones or something...he doesn't even want them. Really. 'I. Came back for those.'
'Ah, yes,' Kuroo says, and he's still too startled to laugh. 'I...don't have them here, I'll just—'
'No worries!' That was too quick. That was absolutely too quick, but better that than him blurting out can you sing again please, I don't think I've ever heard a voice like that before. Much better than him blurting that out. Much better than him saying I don't think I've ever heard a voice like that before.
'But,' he begins anyway, and he really wishes he could just keep quiet and leave this kitchen, 'that day. When you. Freddie Mercury.'
'Ah, yes,' Kuroo says. Then, all at once, the smile is back and he shrugs. 'I don't know, I just wanted to annoy you, I guess?'
'Just wanted to— I'll be leaving now.'
'Okay hang on, I'm just—'
'No,' Kei says. 'I mean. I. I really do have to go. Yamaguchi's waiting outside.'
'Oh. Right.'
'I'll be off then.'
'Right. See you around.'
●●●
On some days, one can be mistaken about things. On other days, one can be mistaken multiple times about things. And on very special days like this one, one can be mistaken multiple times about multiple things. For example, Kei was mistaken multiple times not only about his perception of Kuroo Tetsurou of Le Petit Breakdown, but also about which, of many, would end up being the universe's death blow of the day.
The final one, he decides, even though it is barely 8 AM, has to be this decision he made outside the door and is now executing; of striding back into the fucking café and past the counter and into the kitchen, to glare weakly at Kuroo's puzzled face and mutter in his rudest voice possible, 'That's one of my favourite songs.'
'Imagine?'
'I...don't usually like covers of it.'
'I'm sorry—'
'I said usually.'
There, he thinks, as he turns around and ignores his flaming cheeks to stumble out of the kitchen once again. Now THAT was the final blow.