Work Text:
Hajime warns him, multiple times. They can’t get away with this forever. The security guards will notice, the other team members, maybe, or even – oh God, Bokuto (they wouldn’t have another quiet second after this. Please. No.) Hajime lists all the possibilities of this going wrong, but nothing changes.
Of course not. Because Tooru is too optimistic about this, about what they are and what they’ll become and how they’ll last and stay, everything, always, together. Because Tooru calms him with a smile, kisses him on the temple with bitten lips. “Don’t fret. We’ll be okay. I don’t mind if they see us, anyway.” His arms wrap around Hajime’s neck, pouring warm shivers down his spine and silence into his mouth.
Hajime closes his eyes and exhales. Tooru waits, leaning in his hold, his breath flooding over the sensitive corner of Hajime’s mouth. God, he’s so… The thought trails off at a soft nudge of Tooru’s lips against his jaw.
“You’re terrible,” he whispers. “Sometimes I think you want them to catch us.”
Tooru laughs, his breath tickling Hajime’s skin, a feather-light touch. “I wouldn’t care if someone found out. The team probably knows. They keep asking if I have a girlfriend.”
“What do you tell them?”
Tooru smiles. “Nothing. They can keep guessing. It’s funny to see how they don’t believe me that there’s nobody in my bed at night.”
“Mhm,” Hajime mumbles. He opens his eyes, drinks in the sight of Tooru seeking for his embrace, starved and freezing. He looks good like that. He looks like he’s mine. The national team’s shirt is tight on Tooru’s chest. Hajime could pride himself on the fact that his boyfriend of three years and best friend of ever-since-they-met is one of the most brilliant setters in the under twenty-five international volleyball scene. Hajime could brag about the way Tooru directs his team like an emperor does his army, playing the other team like a cat with its prey before it devours it.
None of that matters, though, when Tooru closes his eyes and lets Hajime take his hands once again.
It’s a tradition that seems silly to others, but they have grown into it as naturally as they fell in love. Hajime sets the file against the nail of Tooru’s middle finger and buffs it down, one by one, meticulous, practiced. Tooru has rough hands, pale, longer and thinner than Hajime’s own. He loves touching them more than he’ll ever admit.
This is Tooru’s real meditation.
They are silent now. The changing room is empty, all players in preparation, but Tooru has an agreement with the coach about meditation time or something. He used to do that in high school. Now, it’s just an old lie to conceal that Tooru is curled into his arms, breathing softly, letting Hajime file down his nails for the game.
They can’t do it before every game. Sometimes, there’s just time for a phone call, when Hajime’s in class and sneaks out to type a message or press the Skype icon on his display. Sometimes, he can hear how Tooru trembles before going onto the court, and then he whispers his name and that he can do this, come on, you know you can beat them. You’ll take them all down. You’re gonna strike, and conquer.
Today, Hajime is there. They don’t have much time, but it’s enough for him to smooth Tooru’s nails into pink-white circles, just short enough to fit the rules of the court. When he’s done, Tooru opens his eyes.
Outside, a low voice yells “Oikawa!” Tooru rises from Hajime’s lap at his coach’s voice. He rolls his shoulder, cracks his neck once, twice, and steals one last kiss before storming out of the locker room.
His team wins.
Hajime screams his lungs out in the audience during the last set. His heart burns when Tooru slips during a relay and falls on his knees. The others rush to him, Hajime can’t think, can’t breathe, he’s standing and ready to –
Tooru gets back on his feet. His grin is wild, as beautiful as a hurricane.
The last point falls. Hajime turns and heads for the stairs, pushing through the crowd, his blood beating in his ears. He finds Tooru an hour later, in front of the locker room. None of his teammates says anything when Tooru whips around and pulls Hajime into a hug.
That night, Tooru sleeps ten hours. Hajime cups a hand around his neck and watches the soft rise and fall of his chest until his eyes grow heavy.
In the end, they still get caught. It’s the coach, of all people, walking in on them, the nationals semifinals and qualification for some European cup, red shirts for Tooru’s team that look so fucking gorgeous on him that Hajime wants to slide his hands underneath and make Tooru’s skin light up. He’s just kissing Tooru’s knuckles one last time, still dusty from filed nails, when the metal of the locker room’s door collides with the wall.
Fuck, Hajime thinks. There’s no time to react.
“Oikawa.”
Tooru doesn’t even jolt at the slam of the door. He just glances over his shoulder, fingers resting in Hajime’s grip, lips kissed red and lewd from stealing some confidence from Hajime’s mouth. “Coach,” he says, and fuck, he even smiles.
Hajime wishes he could vanish into thin air. “I’m so sorry,” he says, “we just. I didn’t mean to.”
The coach doesn’t even look at him. “Get on the court, Oikawa. Meditation time’s over. Though I guess I finally know why you need it.”
“I am so sorry,” Hajime says.
“Nah, don’t apologize to him.” Tooru props his chin up on Hajime’s shoulder, tilting his head slightly. “Hey, coach. That’s Hajime. The guy that I told you about.”
The old man doesn’t say anything. Hajime swallows hard.
A few very awkward and extremely long seconds pass until Tooru sighs and clicks his tongue, clearly impatient. “Fine, I’m coming. Give me another minute.”
“You better hurry, or I’m putting in your replacement.”
Before Tooru can say anything else, the coach’s out of the door again. Hajime lets the breath that he’s been holding burst out of his lungs, and then he headbutts Tooru so that he falls off his lap. “Hey! Don’t injure the star setter!”
“You planned this, didn’t you! You were playing on time, and you knew he’d come looking for you.” Hajime stands, lips a thin line, but Tooru is still grinning and fuck, why can’t he even be mad? It’s – it’s always the same.
“I knew he’d be cool with it,” Tooru says. He doesn’t come in for another kiss from Hajime, but stretches instead and then moves to the door. Before he runs onto the court, he glances back once more, and winks. “And I want everyone to know whose handprints are on my hips after my free weekends.”
Sometimes, Hajime wants to strangle him. Only a bit, though. After all, he’s not any less possessive, he thinks when he’s in the audience again and is able to find the outline of dark bitemarks on Tooru’s neck just above the back of his collar.
Hajime still approaches the coach after the game is over. Tooru’s team is still shaking hands with the now former vice-champions, and the star setter of Japan wears a smile that could cut glass. Hajime wants to lift him up and kiss him, but he has something to do.
He moves towards the coach, stopping before the enclosure that separates the auditorium’s corridor from the trainer’s area. “Excuse me.”
The old man throws him a look. “You’re his boyfriend.”
It’s not a question. Hajime swallows and straightens his back. “Yes, sir. I am.”
The coach gives him a once-over. “No need to call me ‘sir’. I’m neither your trainer nor any authority to you.” He turns around to face Hajime, barely reaching his chin in height. His hands are tucked behind his back. He appears just as calm as during the game, but there’s something alert in his gaze, a sharp serenity that seems even older than all the wrinkles. So that’s why Tooru respects him. “I’ll be making this quick. I don’t care about my players’ private lives as long as they do their job.” Before Hajime can say anything else, the old man huffs a laugh. “And let’s be honest – I’ve always been wonderin’ what that meditation of his even does. ‘Cause he plays a hell of a lot better after sittin’ around in the locker room all alone before the game. Only that he wasn’t so alone most of the time.”
Hajime feels his face heat up. “I am so sorry.”
The coach tilts his head and examines him a bit more. When the players finally come running off the court, he turns to follow them. Hajime has no idea if he’s forgiven or not, until the old man looks over his shoulder and calls, “Guess we’re gonna have to get you a backstage pass. I don’t know what you were doin’ with him back there, what magic you do on his fingers. He always plays like a demon, but when he’s been doin’ that meditation with you, he’s a god on the court.”
They’re at home on a rare free weekend, and Tooru’s fingers have been dancing over Hajime’s thigh all evening while watching TV. Hajime knows the signals by know, the body language that’s senseless to anyone who hasn’t spent their childhood reading Tooru’s quirks like an open book. He’s tired, university has sucked his energy this week, and yet feels the need to ask. After all, he and Tooru don’t get free time all that often.
“Do you want to,” Hajime begins. “I mean. We haven’t done it since-”
“No.” The word is soft, dancing against Hajime’s collarbone, a pleasant shiver of Tooru’s calm breath. He’s curled against his waist, watching the movie on the TV by their bed. Now he looks up at Hajime with a rare tenderness reflecting in warm eyes. “I don’t think that I… not tonight. Is that okay?”
Hajime kisses his hair. “You don’t need to ask that. Course it is.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. I’d rather just...” Hajime presses his lips against Tooru’s neck. “This.” Tooru’s pulse jumps below his touch, that gorgeous body leaning into his embrace. Tooru lets his head fall to the side. His neck is bare, a faint mark where Hajime has kissed him a bit too hard and too much in love, and his eyes glint around a bewitching smile.
“Okay. I still want to make you feel good somehow, though.” Tooru sighs and reaches up, running his fingers through Hajime’s hair and petting him until a tiny sigh rolls out of Hajime’s chest. This is what he needs. The exam was okay, he knows he’s passed. His body is slow in realizing that it’s over, that freedom is back in his bones for a week or so.
Tooru makes it easier, with those perfect fingers of his. He keeps scratching Hajime’s scalp, circles his thumb below his ears, around the hard tension in the nape of his neck and back to where his hair begins. Tooru’s got hands that Hajime could worship day and night. One day, he’s going to do exactly that. He will kiss every single fingertip, he’s going to watch the fire flare up in Tooru’s glance, watch how he licks those soft lips and pulls them into a grin. Not tonight, though. At the moment, Tooru is massaging his head with just the right pressure and a delicious drag of blunt nails, and Hajime is in heaven-
“Aww.”
Hajime cracks open one eye. “What is it?”
Tooru smiles at him from above and curls his palm around Hajime’s neck. His skin is warm, soft, smelling like argan oil again. “You have baby hair here. It’s cute.”
Hajime frowns. Tooru keeps calling him that when he tries to bicker with him. Really, when they fight nowadays, it’s more from boredom than anything else. Their high school days are over and at least Hajime’s gotten a bit more mature.
Tooru is waiting for a reaction from him, but when Hajime doesn’t say anything, he grins. “You’re very adorable right now. Soft hair and grumpy face. Just like when we were little. You were such a cute chubby kid.”
“Yeah, no, we’re changing topics or I’m kicking your annoying ass off the bed.”
“So romantic.” Tooru gives a dramatic sigh. “You really know how to make a man feel loved.”
“Don’t you love yourself enough?” Hajime nudges his head into Tooru’s hands, and Tooru gets the hint. He starts petting Hajime again, nails tracing invisible patterns over his scalp until all tension melts away, heat spreading into the marrow of his bones. It’s quiet for a moment. Then, Tooru says: “We could watch Godzilla?”
Hajime snorts. “Wow. You’re spoiling me rotten, aren’t you.”
“Hey, put away that sarcasm. I’m very sweet to you.” Tooru grins and trails his fingers over Hajime’s neck, humming a swift melody of some pop song.
Hajime rolls his eyes and shifts to get out of bed and search for the DVD. “Yeah, of course. But thanks, I just don’t know if I can last the whole movie, this week made me so fuckin’ tired-” He freezes. Tooru’s hand is still on his neck, fingertips brushing his skin. Hajime frowns. “Hey.”
“Hm? Didn’t you wanna see the movie?”
“Yeah, but – another time, whatever. Show me that.” Hajime sits upright and takes Tooru’s hand off his neck, gently prying the fingers open. “Give me the other one, too.”
The smile on Tooru’s lips grows soft. “Okay.” He doesn’t say anything when Hajime stares at his cracked, rough hands, strained from training and red with welts. “Give me the hand cream.”
“You don’t have to.” Tooru looks at him, still curled underneath the blanket, eyes heavy with sleep. His lashes throw shadows onto his pale cheeks, the only light coming from a lamp on Hajime’s nightstand illuminating him like something unreal, something too beautiful to exist.
Hajime kisses his forehead. “But I want to. And I think you’re too tired for a movie anyways.”
“’m not.”
“Liar. Look at you.”
“Mhm… ‘s that really okay with you?”
But Hajime has already reached over Tooru to dig though the drawer of his nightstand, pulling out a tube of hand cream. “Yeah.” Tooru watches him as he lies back down, pushing one leg between Tooru’s until their bodies breathe against one another, warm and close and melting. “Let me do this for you, and then we’ll sleep. We can do other stuff tomorrow.”
“You’re the best I have,” Tooru whispers.
Hajime laughs a bit. “You say the strangest things when you’re tired.” But he still lets Tooru bury his face in Hajime’s chest. He is careful when massaging the cream into Tooru’s palms, from the fragile wrist to his fingertips that can set a ball to victory or cradle Hajime’s jaw when kissing him with breathless groans of “Haji, Haji”.
When Hajime’s done, Tooru mumbles something into his neck. It sounds like something that ends in you, but Hajime isn’t sure about it. It doesn’t matter.
“Same for me,” Hajime tells Tooru’s hair before pulling the blankets over them and sliding his hand to rest between the fragile blades of Tooru’s shoulders. Maybe it’s just his imagination, but Hajime thinks he can feel Tooru smile into his skin before sliding his hands to rest on Hajime’s chest, where his heart has been beating for Tooru for as long as he can remember.