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“Pull yourself together Tadashi” he muttered.
Tsukki had freckles on his back, and Tadashi was slowly melting.
He didn’t know when he first started noticing, but every time they changed for practice, his eyes were drawn to the dusting of light freckles on his shoulder blades. He could've sworn they weren’t there at the many sleepovers of their childhood.
Every so often he had to mentally slap himself whenever he felt his gaze lingering for too long (you’re not supposed to look at your friends like that, he discovered).
He just prays that nobody finds out. What would they say? What would he say?
“Sorry that my intense gay is showing, Tsukki, I was just looking at your goddamn freckles".
How about never. He’ll just stick to glances, even when something curls in his stomach every time he sees them.
“I wonder” he thinks to himself. “If he could ever look at me the way I do him.”
Kei knew about his freckles. Akiteru had teased him about it for months when he first found the dots along his spine. He had just forgotten them, not really being the one for self-inspection.
But now he could feel Yamaguchi’s eyes boring into his back, and he knew exactly what they were looking at.
Truth is, he felt giddy when he felt the brunette’s eyes on him.
“Eventually” he thinks to himself. “Eventually I’ll tell him my feelings.”
But, in the meantime, he’ll just ignore the attention, and let the boy be curious.
Unfortunately, it’s started to affect his volleyball. With Yamaguchi’s gaze burning holes in his back, he was distracted in training.
And when Kei was out of it, he was really out of it.
He still kept his cool demeanour and snide remarks and provoked the idiots as much as he could, but every block was late and his receiving went out of the window with his sanity.
He could hear Daichi and Suga whispering about him behind his back, and noticed the blush on their faces when he made eye contact with them.
Daichi confronted him about it the next day.
“Look, Tsukishima-kun, I know you be having-“ his eyes flicked over to Yamaguchi and back to him- “problems, but could you please do something about it?”
Tsukishima sighed, making his mind up on it.
“I’ll take that as a yes?” Daichi said, smirking slightly.
After practice, he came out of the gym with Yamaguchi, determined to talk to him. They were walking along the road to their houses, the conversation stagnant but comfortable. Now was the time to strike.
"If you liked my freckles, you should have told me".
He hears a sharp intake of breath, and the sudden stop of footsteps.
He turns around to find a stuttering Yamaguchi, flush creeping up his ears. It was cute, he admitted.
"U-um sorry Tsukki I- I didn't mean to-um..." Yamaguchi stops when he sees the smirk on Kei’s face. Does he get it now?
Kei leans towards him.
Tadashi could feel his heart pounding in his ears, as well as a faint, slightly concerning, ringing noise. Is this a dream? Probably. But the bite of the winter air and Tsukki’s warm breath on his nose seemed very real.
“Pinch me” Tsukki looked surprised for a second, before smirking for a second time.
“I’ve got something better”
Tsukki closes the gap between them and Tadashi is sure his heart stops beating.
The kiss is short and sweet, but it's exactly what Tadashi wanted. (For now).
Tadashi takes the other boy’s hand in his and tells himself that he would always remember that feeling; the warmth of another hand when the air was frosty, the tingling of that first kiss.
He looks at the ground.
“How red am I? He asks Tsukki, laughing slightly.
Kei leans forward to kiss Yamaguchi on the nose, revelling in how the other boy hums in content.
“Probably about a seven”
He kisses him again.
“On a scale of one to five”
They both laugh, and grip the other’s hand tightly as they walk home.