Chapter Text
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
At the age of eight Tetsurou was shy, precocious, already well on his way to falling in love with volleyball, and convinced, as many eight-year-olds are wont to do, that moving neighborhoods was the worst thing that could ever happen to him.
He had, at the time, only three hard-won friends, who didn’t mind his overall inability to talk to other kids his age and would toss any balls they could get their hands on—basketballs, baseballs, footballs, volleyballs if they got lucky—back and forth with him in the school yard, pretending to be Jordan, Ichiro, Ronaldinho; legends whose mythoi were ingrained in their minds like scripture. He had teachers he liked and teachers he disliked, a favorite nook in the local library, neighborhood dogs that would let him scratch under the chin and between the ears. He loved the apartment they lived in: two bedrooms, one for his dad and one shared by his sister and himself, the eleventh floor of a condominium that faced East, so he could watch the sun come up over trees and roofs while he ate breakfast. He liked the things he had in that apartment, and wasn’t sure how much, if any, of that he’d have to leave behind. His father always joked that he was sentimental like an old man. Tetsurou didn’t know what that meant, exactly, but if it meant that he didn’t like to throw things away he supposed it was true.
More than anything else, he didn’t understand why things had to change.
And then he met Kenma.
At eighteen Tetsurou is a little less shy, too old to be precocious, and so in love with volleyball he’s asked his dean if he can major in it, to which Dean Yamasaki responded No, but would you be interested in sports management instead?
In a move sure to mess up his class schedule forever he’s chosen to double major in sports management and chemistry. It’s led to some curious stares when students notice him in both the business school library and chemistry lab break room, but it’s also an easy conversation starter, a foothold Tetsurou can lean on as he figures out what socializing looks like for adults. Or almost-adults, anyway.
Making friends doesn’t come as easily as it used to—Tetsurou’s spent the last three years being the big fish in a small pond, establishing the sort of person he wanted to be the first day he began high school. Someone welcoming and charming, the kind of guy you’d want on your team, the kind of guy you’d entrust to take detailed notes and host fun parties. Nothing like the kid he was before he met Kenma.
In college, where he only knows a handful of people, that shy, nervous inner child he’s never quite outgrown nips at his heels. Tetsurou’s only a few paces ahead of it at any time, scrambling to craft a persona, hearing his own younger, smaller voice call out after him: who are you? Who do you want to be?
He signs up for everything, throwing himself with reckless abandon into extracurriculars, study groups, social circles, casting a net so wide it feels like he spends half his time running from one obligation to another. If he’s busy twenty four-seven, he won’t have time to confront the loneliness that clings to him like a well-worn blanket.
Logically, it’s silly to miss home this much when he goes to university in Tokyo, only an hour and a half’s train away from Nerima. But still, Tetsurou is nothing if not hopelessly, despairingly sentimental, which is why, on his first free weekend in six weeks, he shoves the barest necessities into his backpack and catches the earliest train from Kunitachi after his last class of the day, hoping he can get to Nekoma before Friday practice ends.
He slips his head through the gym doors just in time to watch Kageyama toss a pass that moves as if in a straight line, hovering in midair for a millisecond before Tsukishima’s palm meets the ball at its peak, sending it over the net with an annoyed grimace on his face. Tetsurou’s impressed—even though he can tell Tsukishima’s not using his full strength, the contact point is higher than what he’d seen in nationals last year, which must mean—
“Have you grown even taller, glasses?”
The entire gym whips their heads around to stare at him. The volleyball rolls off the court, forgotten. A beat of silence, and then the room erupts into a cacophony of noise, the Karasuno players just as excited to see him as his own team.
“Kuroo-senpai!” Is all the warning he gets before Lev picks him up with two spindly arms, squeezing tightly, before setting him back down. Tetsurou huffs, straightening out his hoodie and backpack, and flicks Lev on the forehead.
“Is that any way to greet your senpai?”
Tsukishima snorts. “Is this any way to show up?”
“As friendly as ever,” Tetsurou retorts, sticking his tongue out, before making his rounds, gravitating towards the former second years. Third years, his brain reminds him, albeit unwelcomely.
They’re deep into prep for Interhighs, Tora explains, bumping a ball up and down, forearms reddened from practice. Tetsurou nods, although his attention is caught by Kenma, who’s using the five minute break between drills to play some gacha game on his phone, leaning half his weight on Kuroo. It’s an old habit, and not one Tetsurou is keen to see Kenma outgrow.
“Think the team’s good this year?” Tetsurou’s been made aware of exactly what Kenma thinks of the team—okay but not amazing, trying to fill in the holes left by him, Yaku, and Kai with some promising first-years—since he texts Tetsurou after every practice, but he asks anyway, because he likes listening to Kenma talk about volleyball.
Kenma scrunches up his nose. “Could be better,” he says, eyes never leaving the screen. “Lev doesn’t react as quickly as you do, and our new libero’s kinda shaky.” He doesn’t say it like a defeat, though; Tetsurou can almost see the gears turning in Kenma’s head as he plans around this new team’s weaknesses and strengths.
It does sting a little, to be replaced so easily. Then again, there’s nothing more ephemeral than high school sports, with rosters forced to change every semester by design, and memories forgotten as quickly as they’re made.
Coach Nekomata blows the whistle, and Tetsurou pulls away, melting to the back wall so he can observe the rest of practice. The loneliness that’s been plaguing him feels faraway here, like a suitcase he’s forgotten on campus. Here is home: rubber shoes squeaking on scuffed wooden floors, shouts of nice kill! and counter!, the people he knows and loves, familiar and warm, filling him with a simple, content joy.
But then.
Of all the ways he could have found out, Tetsurou never thought it would be this. He would’ve liked a heads up—in person, face-to-face, and if not that then a call, or even a text—but instead he has the honor of getting thrown into the deep end head first and being left to heave and choke his way to the surface.
He only catches it from the corner of his eye as he’s discussing blocking strategy with Tsukishima. Only notices because he’s trained himself to be always conscious of Kenma’s presence, like a sixth sense he’s honed without really knowing of its existence, until he realized one day that Kenma was there, a lit-up dot in the map of his mind. Even then, it’s so brief he can’t be sure he isn’t hallucinating.
There—Hinata bounds up to Kenma, who’s lying on the floor, sweaty and utterly defeated. A water bottle exchanges hands; that’s not unusual. But then Kenma leans in, bumps his head against Hinata’s shoulder in thanks, and that is strange, because despite their friendship Tetsurou’s never known Kenma to be that outwardly tactile, but that could just mean Kenma’s comfortable around him and nothing more, and there’s no reason to panic, not that he has any right to—
“Kuroo-san, you’re horrible at pretending to look interested.” Tsukishima’s voice cuts neatly through Tetsurou’s thoughts, mirroring the smug grin cutting across his face.
Tetsurou refocuses and wills the unease in his stomach to settle. “Your blocking techniques are just that boring. Ah, you can’t blame me. Where’s the creativity!”
Tsukishima doesn’t press him on his distracted state, apparently deciding he doesn’t care enough to ask. His mouth twitches once, though—he’s always known more than he lets on. “I did beat you, remember? Unless your goldfish brain has conveniently forgotten already.”
This is an easy script to follow. He lets Tsukishima goad him into a back-and-forth about the nationals game that still leaves a bittersweet taste in Tetsurou’s mouth, like unfinished business. He’s come to terms with it, as far as swan songs go, but he’ll always want a rematch.
Even so, volleyball can only prove a distraction for so long, and the next time Tsukishima breaks off to whisper a snarky aside to Yamaguchi, Tetsurou glances at Kenma. The way he and Hinata circle each other is so blatantly innocuous Tetsurou’s a little ashamed he didn’t pick up on it sooner, but now that he knows what to look for it’s obvious as headlines splashed on a newspaper. Hinata hangs onto Kenma’s every word, and Kenma regards him with an expression usually reserved for his most challenging video games. Kenma never looks at Tetsurou like that.
Hinata leaves to go bother Kageyama, but before he goes he presses the side of his hand to Kenma’s, a gesture that’s so plain it becomes achingly tender. When Kenma links their pinkies, a ringing noise starts between Tetsurou’s ears. Oh. This is what you are to each other.
He can’t look at them any longer.
Tsukishima’s squinting at him behind his thick plastic frames. “Not that I care, but are you okay?”
“It’s nothing,” Tetsurou says, looking up so Tsukishima can’t see the dampness threatening to gather at his eyes. “I’m fine.” He has a perfect view of the ceiling fans. They whir, blades spinning longer and longer shadows against the ceiling, as the sun slides sideways down the sky.
On his way out Tsukishima brushes by him as if by accident, and he speaks so quietly Tetsurou almost misses it. “Two weeks.”
Two weeks. So much can happen in the span of just two weeks. A mayfly’s entire life might be confined to two weeks, from birth to death. A rapid existence, the barest of consciousness—only the innate impulse to feed, grow, mate—before a life ends, not so much snuffed out as it is conceded. Compared to the hapless mayfly, Tetsurou’s tragedy is almost insignificant.
Or perhaps not. Perhaps it’s as simple as his world crashing down around him, his entire worldview flipped inside out. He’s known Kenma for ten years. Shouldn’t that trump two weeks?
“Not hungry?” His father asks, breaking him out of his reverie. Christ, Tetsurou doesn’t usually spend this much time in his own head. He looks down at their small dinner table, filled with his favorite dishes, guilt creeping up his spine. His father isn’t the best cook, but he’s put in so much effort so Tetsurou can eat well on his first trip home. He hasn’t seen his dad since move-in day, and yet all he can do is mope.
“No no, just tired.” He laughs sheepishly. It’s not like he can explain to his dad that the best friend he may or may not harbor feelings for started dating someone else, and Tetsurou had to find out from Tsukishima, of all people. “Sorry—this is really good. You still make the best kabocha.”
His father smiles warmly at the compliment. “Has school been keeping you busy? Don’t work too hard, Tetsurou. You have to get enough food and sleep too,” he chides, picking up a piece of fish with chopsticks. “You’re skinnier than the last time I saw you.”
“Dad, just because you say it all the time doesn’t make it true.” Tetsurou puts more food on his plate anyway to assuage him, taking a bite of rice and natto. “Yeah, school’s been busy. I’ve joined a couple circles, band and yoga and stuff. I’m actually playing the drums in a show in July. It’ll be small, just a couple school bands, but uh.” He fiddles with a spoon. “It would be nice if you could make it?”
His dad draws up, eyes crinkling. Tetsurou outgrew him by the time he turned sixteen, but sitting across from his father at the table like this makes him feel no older than eight, at a different table, in a different place. The hanging lamps cast a warm glow over his face. “Tetsurou, of course. I’ll be in the front row.” He pauses, hesitating on his next words. “Did you join the volleyball club? I know you didn’t want to sign up at the beginning of the year, but have you changed your mind?”
Ah. This is the other conversation Tetsurou was hoping to avoid. “Not yet, I just…” he trails off. He doesn’t know how to explain this either, that despite his love for volleyball, he doesn’t want to play competitively for a while. “I’ve been playing some weekends with a couple guys in the gym. I might join the club next semester, though. But it’s a lot of commitment, and classes are way harder in university, so…”
“I understand,” his father says, nodding. “Remember to enjoy yourself. College is supposed to be the most fun time of your life. You have a lot of time to figure things out.”
Does he? Lately, it seems like he doesn’t have anything figured out, not even his own best friend. Still. His hands are warm, and his belly is full. “Yeah, I know. I’m really happy I got to come home this weekend,” he says, resting his chin on his palm.
His father reaches across the table to lay a hand, calloused and solid, on his shoulder. “Come back anytime.”
He’s laying in bed later that night, listening to his old CD player, when the thought filters into his head. He scrambles to catch it before it fades out, getting up to rifle through his desk drawers. Except—it’s not there. Panic, stupid and irrational, swells in his throat. He doesn’t remember bringing it to his dorm, and he wouldn’t have moved it otherwise, so where would it be?
“Hey, dad?” He calls.
“What is it?”
He gives up on the desk drawers and starts picking through his bookshelf, peering behind dusty textbooks and volleyball medals from junior high. “You know the goose keychain that I have? The one I won at an arcade with Kenma? I can’t find it.”
“Oh, one minute, Tetsurou,” his father yells, muffled through the walls. He appears in Tetsurou’s doorway soon after, holding a cardboard box. “I moved some of your things into your sister’s old room,” he explains, setting the box on the floor. “I’m thinking about consolidating, maybe turning one of your rooms into a guest room or a library. What do you think?”
Tetsurou freezes from where he’s digging through the box. “A library? Where would I sleep?”
“Well, your sister moved to Osaka in December, and she won’t be visiting home much during residency. There’s no reason for the room to stay unused,” his father muses.
Another way his life has shifted since he started university. Tetsurou doesn’t want to become a guest in his own house. “Well,” he mumbles. The keychain is at the bottom of the box. He curls his fist around it, and thinks he might attach it to his backpack. “Whatever you think is best.”
There’s roughly three people he could talk to about this. Usually Kenma would be the first person he’d call, and it throws Tetsurou off-kilter that he can’t talk to Kenma, for obvious reasons. He still doesn’t understand why Kenma wouldn’t just tell him upfront; was he worried Tetsurou wouldn’t take it well? Tetsurou would support him no matter what, no matter how much the news might squeeze his heart like a vice.
And now, going to someone else for advice splits another chasm between them. Six weeks is all it takes for Tetsurou to fear they’re drifting apart.
He can’t talk to Kai, who’s always been privately aware of Tetsurou’s feelings, even if he’s too kind to bring them up, because Kai is taking a gap year to backpack through Mongolia—brave, and somewhat terrifying. And he most certainly isn’t talking about this with Tsukishima, because there’s a limit to how much humiliation he’s willing to endure.
Which leaves him with only one option.
Of the handful of people he knew before coming to university, Yaku’s probably the most unexpected—not because Tetsurou didn’t expect him to go to the same school, but because he didn’t expect Yaku to do university at all. A path to professional volleyball was all Yaku could talk about the first half of their third year; then he completely changed his mind, took the entrance exam, scored well, and now Tetsurou gets to call him a classmate for another four years. Unlike Tetsurou, he’s only picked one major, economics, which is located on an adjacent campus, so Tetsurou rarely sees him either way. It’s been fun making friends on his own, but sometimes all Tetsurou wants is to see a familiar face.
Yaku isn’t free until the end of the week, so Tetsurou spends the next five days alternating between wallowing in his own misery and banging on the drums in the music building’s practice room until the janitor kicks him out in the evenings. His professors don’t even have the decency to distract him with a quiz or essay, and for the first time all semester Tetsurou is faced with more free time than what he knows to do with, when the last thing he wants is to have nothing to do.
By the time he enters the cafe where he’s meeting Yaku—near campus, better known for being open late than for its coffee—he feels like a limp, wrung-out rag, murderously bored and despicably hollow. He orders a latte for himself and then, upon reflection, a croissant for Yaku’s sweet tooth, claims a table in the back corner, and waits.
His phone buzzes. He fumbles with the lock screen in his haste to check the notification, even though he’s not sure what he’s hoping for—an apology from Kenma? An explanation? Hey, it’s not what you think it is. We’re just friends.
Of course, the message isn’t from Kenma. Tetsurou hasn’t told him anything.
Yaku barrels through the door not three minutes later, already holding, bizarrely enough, a paper cup in hand.
“Sorry,” he huffs, sliding into his seat across the rickety linoleum table. “I got roped into volunteering for a department event. Good news, free tea. Bad news, I think one of my TAs thought I was flirting with her?”
“All good,” Tetsurou says, amused, shrugging off his jacket. The day is on the chillier side for mid-May, and he doesn’t want to add an actual cold to his list of ailments at the moment. Yaku’s in a t-shirt and shorts.
“A croissant! Excellent,” Yaku exclaims, and starts digging in before Tetsurou can say you’re welcome. “So. What did you want to talk about? Your text was so cryptic.” There’s croissant flakes stuck to the corner of his mouth.
Tetsurou slides him a napkin and sighs. Now that he’s here, he suddenly doesn’t know how to put the jumble of his mind into words, isn’t sure he’s strong enough to admit any of it out loud. “I went back to Nekoma last weekend,” he begins.
“Oh? How’s the team? Suffering without us, I’m sure.”
“Ha. You think so highly of yourself, Yakkun. Only a little. They’ve got some interesting first years, though.”
Yaku hums, polishing off the last of the croissant, which is Yaku for keep going.
“The thing is, when I was there, I saw Kenma and Hinata, like, acting weird.” Tetsurou stares down at his mug. The barista left a little foam heart at the top, but it’s all muddled now, more closely resembling one of the deformed pancakes Tetsurou would make for Kenma and himself the morning after sleepovers.
“They’re both weird, so you’re going to have to specify.”
“No, like—being closer. Leaning on each other, holding hands. Stuff you’d do if you were—you know.”
Yaku’s eyes widen. “Dating?”
That’s the first time anyone’s said that word out loud. Tetsurou doesn’t like the way his voice comes out thinner, reedier on his next sentence. “Right. Yeah. Um, and then Tsukishima told me they’d been doing whatever it is they’re doing—“
“Dating.”
“—for two weeks.” He takes a deep breath. “Why wouldn’t Kenma just tell me? I’m his best friend. He’s my best friend. And I keep going over and over this, because it’s the part that doesn’t make sense, and I just feel like. What if it’s not what I think it is at all? Maybe I’m overreacting.”
“Kuroo, wait.” Yaku sets his cup down and looks Tetsurou in the eyes. “You saw them. So it must be true.”
And that’s the crux of it, isn’t it? All Tetsurou’s doing now is lying to himself, denying his own sight and memory, because—because admitting what he saw is conceding. Conceding that Kenma’s infatuated with someone that isn’t him.
“Yeah,” he agrees, finally, averting his gaze. There’s only so long he can live in denial. “It must be.”
“Anyway,” Yaku continues. “What’s important is how you feel about it. So how do you feel? Seeing Kenma with Hinata?”
Like Kai, Yaku knows only as much as he’s gleaned from the sidelines, which is plenty enough to paint a picture of pale gray misery. This is all they know, because Tetsurou’s never spoken his feelings aloud. He doesn’t think the back of a student cafe playing BoA over the speakers on a random Saturday morning is the right place to confess. Everything’s changed now, though, and there’s no such thing as a right place or a right time anymore.
“Jealous. Like—like it should’ve been me instead.” There. His worst secret, bared open. A punch to the solar plexus. He doesn’t feel any better for it—if anything, he thinks he might never walk this off.
His hands are trembling. Yaku reaches across the table and covers one of Tetsurou’s hands with his own, his steady libero’s hands, until Tetsurou’s still again.
“I’m sorry,” Yaku says, soft and quiet. “It’s not easy to be where you are.” His eyebrows are drawn tight in sympathy. Tetsurou’s glad, suddenly, that Yaku’s the first person he told. “I’ll buy you a curry bun, and then we can talk about something else.”
When Tetsurou leaves the cafe an hour later, having swindled not one, but two curry buns, Yaku’s words echo in his head as he walks back to campus. You saw, so it must be true.
It’s like a car crash in slow motion. Everything he is witnessing has already happened. There is nothing he can do about it.
2:04 PM From: Kenma
> sakurai-sensei is soooooo tough :(
> how did u survive english class
2:05 PM From: Kuroo
> hahahah
> i barely survived!
> pretty sure she hated me
Tetsurou pockets his phone and finishes stuffing notebooks and printouts into his backpack. He and Kenma still talk—Tetsurou isn't so jealous that he’s willing to put their friendship in jeopardy, but lately, their conversations have felt…off. And he’s certain, for once, that he isn’t imagining the rift between them, like they’re both aware the other person isn’t telling them something. He wasn’t lying when he told Yaku they were best friends; Tetsurou can’t remember the last time Kenma kept a secret from him for a whole month. But maybe it’s different, because it’s about romance, because these are uncharted waters for Tetsurou and Kenma both. Maybe this is what their friendship will become, when they’re both grown up, with real adult jobs and real adult families, separated by both distance and the uncompromising, intangible thing people call time: stilted half-truths, ships passing just by each other in the ocean, never enough to touch.
Crumpled at the bottom of his backpack is his latest assignment, decorated with red ink. For a while it seemed like his grades were his only lifeline, the one thing he could depend on to get right, but ever since he’s visited Nekoma his—distress, anxiety, whatever—has begun to bleed into his studying abilities as well.
To his left, Ryosuke stretches back as far as the lecture hall seat will allow, lacing his hands behind his head. “Jeez, this professor sure is brutal. I thought I did better this time, but nope! At least I passed,” he gripes, announcing it to the classroom at large, but mostly Tetsurou, probably.
“Tell me about it,” Tetsurou commiserates. “If I got this score in high school I’d start crying.”
Ryosuke snorts, tumbling sideways off the chair and clumsily righting himself. “You busy tonight?”
If sitting in his dorm bed alone with YouTube essays and melonas counts as being busy, then sure, he’s busy. “Nah,” Tetsurou replies. “Why, what’s up?”
“One of the guys in the tennis club is throwing a party. You’re cool, you should come.” Ryosuke pulls his own phone out and starts scrolling. “Here, put your number in. I’ll send you the details.”
“Oh,” Tetsurou says, stricken. Socializing requires a modicum of energy he’s not sure he can muster up at the present. Though—he wants to be the fun guy, doesn’t he? The person who can walk into any party and know at least one person there, and if not, then leave with a new friend by the end of the night? And while Tetsurou’s a terrible lightweight and rarely drinks much, there’s a chance alcohol can make him forget about Kenma, even if for a little while. “Sure, sounds like a good time.”
Ryosuke hands him the phone. “Hey, that’s pretty cute,” he remarks.
Tetsurou stops typing and follows the line of his finger to the goose keychain swinging from a zipper. The sight of it makes his heart clench. “This old thing? Thanks,” he laughs tepidly, thoughts spiraling. “Here, you have my number now.”
“Great!” Ryosuke swings his backpack over one shoulder and starts walking out of the classroom backwards, nearly bumping into a girl who ducks out of the way just in time. “See you tonight!”
“Okay! I’ve got, uh, half a bottle left. Anyone?” Two mugs shoot into the air. Drinking liquor out of mugs, jesus—being a college student is just as unchic and trashy as Tetsurou has always hoped it would be. His own mug is lying somewhere in this apartment, forgotten while he sways on his feet and tries to coerce Moriko into dancing with him.
“No way,” she hiccups, covering her mouth with both hands. “I’m a terrible dancer. Why don’t you just come here and hug me instead?”
Unfortunately, there’s no good way to let someone down easy when you’re still recovering from a rejection. Or in Tetsurou’s case, even less than that. “Uh—”
“Alright, there’s like, maybe two shots in here? I’ll give you um—Kazuki, do you have any bills—no—that’s cool—I’ll give you a kiss on the cheek if you finish the handle!”
“I’ll do it,” Tetsurou says before he’s even registered he’s moving, arm reaching for the bottle.
The senior whose name he’s forgotten already plants a big, sticky kiss to his cheek and shoves the bottle into Tetsurou’s waiting hands. Tetsurou’s so drunk he doesn’t even think to grimace at the feeling, just tips the bottle back and starts chugging. Two shots is barely any liquid; he’s done within a minute, flipping the bottle upside down as everyone around him cheers, proving there’s nothing left.
Either the floor’s spinning, or he’s spinning, or they both are. He sways, again, and stumbles this time, catching the outside edge of his shoe on the floor.
“Woah big guy, careful,” someone says. Tetsurou nods, and starts listing the other way instead.
“Wait, no—catch him!”
He lands on someone else’s chest, head knocking into their shoulder. “Shit, sorry,” he mumbles. “Definitely cut me off.”
Ryosuke swims blurrily into his vision. “You’re kinda tall for such a lightweight,” he says. Tetsurou can only nod. “He’s pretty out of it, is his phone on him?”
A pair of hands pat him down and extricate his phone. “Yeah, but it’s locked.”
“Just—call the last text notification or something, let’s get him out of here.”
“Yeah, okay, gimme a second—Kuroo, please don’t throw up in my living room—”
Elephants are stomping in his skull. Four, five, possibly? His head hurts too much to count. Actually, the rest of his body hurts too, and especially his right hip, for some reason.
Tetsurou groans, lethargically rolling onto his side. It almost feels like too much effort to open his eyes, but he rubs at the crust around them and does it anyway. It’s dark, thank god—with the way Tetsurou’s head is pounding, any sort of light would turn into hellfire. He scans the room, wondering why he’s face to face with a chair leg, before realizing: he’s on the floor. Also, the desk is in the wrong spot. Also, the volleyball posters taped to the wall aren’t his.
He’s not in his dorm. And judging by the stack of microeconomics textbooks he can see over the edge of the desk, as well as the various posters of famous, now-retired liberos, he’s in Yaku’s.
How drunk was he last night?
The door opens, and he hears someone step into the room. “Wha’,” he mumbles, throat like sandpaper and tongue like a rock.
“Finally awake, princess?” Yaku comes closer and crouches down so Tetsurou can see all of him, clad in exercise gear, slightly sweaty. He must’ve just come in from a jog. “You know, it’s pretty nice getting to look down at you for once.”
“Loud,” Tetsurou groans, shoving his face into the futon.
“Weak,” Yaku snorts. A second later, a cup of water and two painkillers appear. “Here, take these.”
Tetsurou has to struggle into a somewhat sitting position to drink, body protesting every step of the way, but his brain stops hurting soon after. “Thanks,” he says, still too tired for more than a single syllable.
“No, don’t do that,” Yaku recoils, nose wrinkling. “It’s bad enough seeing you this pathetic, don’t make it worse.”
“Fine. ‘m not thankful.” He sits up more fully, noticing that he’s still in last night’s disgusting, crinkled clothes, although his shoes are nowhere to be seen. “What happened? I didn’t throw up, did I?”
Yaku looks like he might be sick. “No,” he says, suspicious. “You’re not going to puke now, are you?”
Tetsurou shakes his head, which—big mistake, his head now feels like a bruised, overripe watermelon. “Nah. Feel better. Don’t think I drank that much.”
“I don’t know, you were really out of it last night. I’ve never seen you that drunk before.” Yaku stands to kick off his own shoes, drinking out of a water bottle as he goes.
“I’ve never been this hungover before, so.”
“Hah. Suffer, dumbass.” Shoes gone, Yaku returns, pulling out the chair and sitting so they’re almost face-to-face, although Yaku still has a couple inches on him, and judging by the smug tilt of his head he’s enjoying it.
“Here’s what happened,” Yaku continues. “I get a call at fucking one-thirteen in the morning—you’re lucky I happened to be up watching Olympics qualifiers, by the way—from you, except a person that is not you starts yelling at me over the phone that you’re blacked out. I meet them at a halfway point, you get exchanged like you’re a drug deal going down, I drag you all the way back here because you’re so drunk you can’t tell me where your room is. Uh, if your hip hurts, it’s because you banged it into every hard surface in my room. Also I took your shoes off. You’re welcome.”
So that’s definitely the worst state he’s ever been in, no contest. It trumps even the first time he got drunk, a result of cousin-supplied liquor, training camp, and one Bokuto Kotarou, when they’d both been so sure their coaches would find the bottles of sake stashed at the bottom of Bokuto’s gym bag, and there goes their volleyball careers—even that. Tetsurou drops his face to his hands, shame burning a path from his neck up to his ears. “Yaku, I am so, so sorry. I owe you for like, seventy lifetimes. I will buy you infinite croissants.”
Croissant bribery does seem to soften Yaku somewhat. “I want the pistachio ones,” he says, but it’s more of a tease than anything else. “That’s not the worst part. You spent the whole walk back panicking that Kenma and Hinata would elope and move to Brazil, for some reason, and Kenma would never speak to you again and you’d have to get updates about him by sending Hinata mail by pigeon, and that Hinata would try to extort blocking lessons out of you. And then—and then, when we got here, you cried into my jacket, because you’ll never get to have the agedashi tofu that Kenma’s mom makes ever again. Actually. You owe me a new jacket and pistachio croissants.”
“Jesus Christ,” Tetsurou curses, horrified at himself, at last night, at the smoldering wreckage his life has become in the last few weeks. “I—shit. Wow.”
“Wow is right. You should really talk to him, because I am leaving you in a ditch the next time you try calling me wasted in the middle of the night.”
“I know.” Run, deny, close his eyes. There are some conversations he can’t avoid forever. There are things he must concede. “I’ll ask if he wants to visit. This is something we should talk about in person.”
Appeased, Yaku starts kicking at his legs. “Great talk, Kuroo. Now get out, I have to shower, and you’ve taken up more than enough of my time today.”
Tetsurou’s body is hungover and sluggish and doesn’t move fast enough to avoid the kicks, so he just lets Yaku work off steam as he stands. “Alright, alright, I’m going. Wait—where are my shoes?”
Like the most beautiful of mockeries, the day Kenma visits is a comfortable twenty-three degrees, the sky a sometsuke plate, flat and azure, wisteria drooping and otherworldly. Spring at its pinnacle—soon, the campus grounds will be swarmed with tourists and students alike, sipping from paper cups on sidewalk benches, posing by the statues, snapping photos of the last blooming sakura trees, bundles of pink clinging on into the end of May.
He picks Kenma up at Kunitachi station. They do the walk to campus side by side, and don’t talk about it. Tetsurou points out buildings he’s been in instead. This is the library with the best study rooms. This is where I have lecture twice a week.
Kenma is genuinely interested in what Tetsurou’s doing in university, and asks about what he’s studying, what he does for fun, even agrees to make it to Tetsurou’s band’s show. Any awkwardness fomented over text dissipates in person. They chatter back and forth easily, as if no time’s passed at all, as if their friendship is simply a river picked up and set back down, stream unbroken. Tetsurou thinks: maybe he can do this. Maybe this won’t be so bad.
For lunch, Tetsurou lets Kenma pick. They end up splitting a pizza, side by side at a metal table in an open courtyard, warmed by the midday sun, fingers sticky with grease. Kenma recounts stories from interhigh prep—they played Shinzen in a practice match last weekend and crushed them two-nil. Lev’s got a mean cross-shot now. According to Kenma, their chances of qualifying are high, but not concrete. They don’t talk about it.
In the afternoon, they still don’t talk about it, but Tetsurou brings Kenma inside the student center, where one of the rooms has been converted into a so-called game room, stuffed to the brim with beanbag chairs and televisions rescued from old classrooms, and watches Kenma grind a few cocky upperclassmen into a pulp in Smash. He grew up like this, more or less: watching Kenma play video games, peeking over his shoulder while Kenma’s fingers flew over the newest, coolest console. Later on, sitting in Kenma’s bed working on assignments while Kenma tapped away at his computer.
They grew up watching each other play volleyball. Now it’s only Kenma doing the playing, and Tetsurou doing the watching.
In the evening, after a quick dinner picked up from the combini, before Kenma’s parents are expecting him home, Kenma stops Tetsurou in the middle of the sidewalk, turns to him, and says— “Can we talk?”
What was Tetsurou thinking, he definitely can’t do this. His feet are rooted to the concrete. “Okay,” he says, and despite the warmth of late spring, his fingertips are ice-cold. “Here, why don’t we sit.”
They move to a bench nearby, just off the sidewalk, shielded by two trees that haven’t quite picked up the seasonal memo, branches still half-bare. Kenma lifts his feet onto the bench and tucks his chin over his knees, habitual. An unbearable wave of nostalgia washes through Tetsurou; it’s another thing he once counted as part of his day to day, as common as putting his uniform on in the mornings, that he’s gone too long without.
The sun is beginning to set when Kenma tilts his face to Tetsurou, about a centimeter of space left above the horizon line if he were to measure between thumb and index finger. Nearer and nearer the year gets to the summer solstice, days stretching longer, just so Tetsurou can have his heart broken in what would otherwise be the most romantic setting imaginable.
“I—I have to tell you something,” Kenma admits, quiet. Illuminated like this the tips of Kenma’s hair flare gold, nearly as lustrous as his eyes. “Actually, I’ve wanted to tell you for a while. But you know I’m terrible at talking about my feelings.” He pulls a face at that word.
Tetsurou nods, wordless, useless, helpless.
“It’s about Hinata, isn’t that funny?” Kenma exhales, visibly shaky. He looks down at his feet. “We started talking more this year, like way more, and I started, well, liking him. And I guess he liked me too, because he—”
“I know.” Kenma’s eyes snap to his. Tetsurou’s heart is beating right out of his skin, but he continues. “I saw you. At the practice game, when I visited, remember?”
Kenma frowns. “But that was at school, in front of Nekomata-sensei. We wouldn’t have been doing anything.”
Tetsurou shakes his head. “No,” he says, “but you did enough. Come on, Kenma, I know you too well. Of course I could tell.”
“Oh.” Kenma’s frown smooths out, even if his mouth is still twisted. Tetsurou doesn’t know how to feel about any of it, that Kenma wanted to tell him but couldn’t, that Kenma’s surprised Tetsurou worked it out himself. He doesn’t know how to tell Kenma, really, that this—this fact, this change—is simultaneously so tiny and so large that it’s upended him entirely, sent him tumbling down slopes too steep to ever climb up again. That for Tetsurou, everything is different, and the past isn’t something you can ever reach back and yank into the present. “I’m sorry. I know I should’ve told you right away, I just—I wasn’t ready to talk about my own feelings yet.”
Two students walk by, pressed shoulder to shoulder, heads knocking as they lean in to speak to each other, caught in their own bubble. Tetsurou wonders if he’ll ever know what that feels like. “Can I tell you something?” He asks.
Kenma nods.
Sometimes the hard things are easy, when the time comes. “I was upset that you didn’t tell me—I mean we’re best friends, I wouldn’t judge—but I was also jealous.”
“Jealous?” Kenma asks, shock written plainly on his face. So cruelly ironic, that everyone around Tetsurou had an inkling except the person whose opinion actually mattered.
“I guess some small part of me always thought that would be us.” Tetsurou laughs, watery. “I don’t know. Sometimes I think I wanted our friendship to last so much that I turned it into something more in my head. Like, if we’re married, Kenma can’t ever find a new best friend. Stupid, right?”
The sun meets the very edge of the earth, and for the space of one heartbeat they’re two tangential shapes, circle and line. By the time Tetsurou speaks, the circle has begun to deform. “Fuck, I’m so stupid. This whole thing is so stupid. I’m sorry, Kenma. I shouldn’t have assumed we’d ever be more.” His voice breaks on the last word. Tetsurou thinks something in him might be broken too, shattered and fragile.
“Hey,” Kenma says. Tetsurou’s crying, all of a sudden, tear tracks running down his cheeks, eyes red. “You’re not stupid. What Hinata and I have—it’s not more than our friendship. It’s just different.” He pulls his sleeve cuff down and uses it to wipe at Tetsurou’s face, getting it all wet and gross, like they’d done for each other as kids. “Different isn’t bad.”
It’s not. But right now, it’s also not what Tetsurou wants, and doesn’t that make all the difference?
He bats Kenma’s hand away, grabbing a napkin he’d stashed in his pocket from the pizza takeout and using it to dry his eyes instead. At Kenma’s disgusted stare at his own sleeve, Tetsurou passes a napkin to him too, and Kenma pats at the damp spot furiously. “Man, this is the second jacket I’ve ruined. I don’t usually cry this much.”
Kenma laughs, shoulders twitching with it. “Yes you do. Sentimental.”
Well, Tetsurou can’t argue with that. “So, Hinata, huh?” He says, switching topics—if they keep talking about him and his feelings Tetsurou’s afraid he’ll start bawling. “He’s not too energetic for you?”
Kenma groans, cheeks pinking. “Shut up. Shut up shut up. It’s literally whatever.” And then, after a beat: “he gets me, I think. I’ve always found him interesting. Mostly as an opponent. But also in…other ways.”
“Ah. You guys match. Height wise, that is,” Tetsurou snipes, and cackles when Kenma tries to hit him.
The sidewalk lamps snap on with a low buzz, sun now fully gone, the twilight sky sweeping in like a drawn curtain. The lamp’s glow forms a circle around the bench, cocoons them in a little yellow cone. Like this, they’re kids again, catching fireflies in the backyard long past their bedtimes, dreaming big and bigger.
But Tetsurou is eighteen, and it’s the end of the day, the end of spring, the end of the world. Kenma has to go home, and Tetsurou has to go—somewhere.
“Come on,” he says, standing. “I’ll walk you back to the station.”